(June 26, 2016 at 6:31 am)abaris Wrote:(June 26, 2016 at 6:19 am)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: Knowing your historical bent, I know there's no ugliness behind your question.
No, I just always wondered why the secession was considered treason in 1861. That, of course, doesn't mean I feel sympathy for the ones wanting to keep their slaves, among other things that led up to it. It always seemed odd to me, given how many individual rights the states actually have, that there was no provision for leaving, after a colony joined.
That was a big argument in the years leading up to the Civil War, whether a state had that right under the Tenth Amendment. Of course, the players on either side had their own justifications for their own views.
It wasn't considered treason by many folks, who held their local way of life -- e.g., a slave economy -- to be more meaningful than being part of the Union. It's my understanding, and I may well be wrong, that the Framers of the Constitution put off the question of binding membership in the Union vs secession in order to seal a speedier compact in the wake of the failure of the Articles of Confederation.
