Outliving this Day and Coming Safe Home

Britain’s royal baby has a name: Prince George Alexander Louis of Cambridge. Some news media sources have opined that it is fraught with politics and tradition. That is true. There will be numerous comments made over the next week or so before everything settles down. We can, and many will, read all about it.

What is the fascination, if that’s what you can call it, with the British Royal family? Especially in this country? After all, the United States won its independence from Great Britain, denouncing King George III and his transgressions in the Declaration of Independence, and expressly prohibited nearly all the trappings of royalty in our Constitution. Thomas Paine in his eponymous pamphlet expressly stated that it defied common sense for an island to rule a continent, and his characterization of a king was the chief ruffian of a restless gang. Besides that, my political philosophy or ideology, as it were, is expressly libertarian. I take seriously Thomas Jefferson’s observation that the government that governs best is one that governs least.

In reality, the monarchy, though at times feckless, and at its worst brutal, has for nearly 1000 years worked pretty well for England/Great Britain. That is not to say that it would work well for these United States, or anywhere else for that matter. Nevertheless, it is a focal point of the British culture, language, and legal system, all of which are dominant in the United States and for a significant part of the rest of the world’s land and people. English will ultimately become the world’s language. Studying the many generations of reigning monarchs, and their collaterals, goes a long way to helping us understand the historical process that brought our country, and the present world, into being.

The British Monarchy has been somewhat of a misnomer. Even before Magna Carta, the English kings were not absolute. The main reason for the 18 year Anarchy in the 12^th Century was the barons’ refusal to accept Matilda as a queen regnant, despite the wishes of her father, Henry I. Those who flouted the wishes of the people who mattered, refused to accommodate the various factions, or were not adept at playing power politics faired ill. The titled aristocracy held the monarch in check through the Seventeenth Century. Since George I, whose inability to speak English hampered his ability to govern, executive power has been shared with ministers responsible to the Parliament. This has evolved to the point where the monarch has very little constitutional power. Interestingly, though rocky at times, the monarchy’s prestige has increased as its political power faded. But it is not irrelevant.

There is something about the trappings of royalty that fascinates people. I would say the past 200 or so years, Britain has had the best of both worlds. They’ve had a representative democracy within the framework of a limited monarchy. The spectacles of pomp and circumstance, and, yes, even a fairytale-like world can be enjoyed above the messiness of politics necessary for a government responsive to the people to work. Good grief, Britain even had an unhappy experiment with socialism, but seem to be recovering – all under the same monarch.

So let us celebrate with the Royals. Their nation will remain a royal throne of kings and a sceptered isle. The monarchy might not be a precious jewel set in a silver sea, but rather a brightly polished facet of a rather rough diamond, in what might otherwise be merely a dirty coaster butting through the mad march days. (That pretentious enough for you? Sorry, had Guinness at lunch – Cheers!)

One of my readers took me to task for not including the two other lines between Edwards IV and III, and referring to them as “distaff” as if that were a politically incorrect insult. Since it is my policy to never apologize, I only explain that it was because of lack of space and the desire not to appear too pedantic that I omitted those lines. Because of immensely popular demand, here they are.

York/Mortimer Line

King Edward IV – Great x18 Grandfather

Richard, Duke of York – Great x19 Grandfather

Anne Mortimer

Roger Mortimer, Earl of March

Phillipa of Hanault

Lionel of Antwerp

King Edward III

In this line, there are 2 additional generations. Richard, Earl of Cambridge married Anne Mortimer (2^nd cousin, twice removed) and became parents of Richard, Duke of York.

York/Beaufort/Neville Line

King Edward IV – Great x18 Grandfather

Cecily Neville – Great x19 Grandmother

Joan Beaufort

John of Gaunt

King Edward III

Cecily Neville married Richard, Duke of York and they were the parents of Edward IV and Richard III.

Henry VII Tudor, who defeated Richard III in the Battle of Bosworth Field, resulting in his son and grandchildren ruling England for the following century, had a much weaker claim to the throne than Richard, at least insofar as kinship goes. He did, as it turned out, have the Mao-esque kind of political power. Not from the barrel of a gun in this case, but the point of a sword. Makes us grateful for our messy, contentious, but peaceful means of choosing our Chief Executive.

One word about Henry Tudor’s great-granddaughter Queen Jane, who reigned for nine days in 1553 – this very month of July 460 years ago. Henry’s son, the VIII of the same name, created havoc with the English government, church, and society so as to have a legitimate son to avoid the possibility of succession wars like those of the past century. He married six times, and succeeded with his third wife. That son, Edward VI, a sickly teenager, died before reaching majority. On his deathbed, he named Jane, descended from Henry Tudor through her mother Frances and grandmother Mary, to succeed him. The Privy Council accepted his wish and proclaimed Jane Queen. Mary, daughter of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon, had her own Mao-esque power, as well as a legal right though Henry’s will, and deposed Jane after nine days. Though Mary initially regarded Jane as a mere pawn and was inclined to show clemency, politics intervened. Jane lost her head the next year. She was seventeen.

For those interested and upon the birth of the newest British Royal:

The newborn son of Prince William and Catherine is the 33^rd generation from King William the Conqueror who assumed the English throne on December 25, 1066. Here is the unbroken line:

Newborn son (not yet named)

William – father

Charles – Grandfather

Queen Elizabeth II – Great Grandmother

King George VI – Great x2 Grandfather

King George V – Great x3 Grandfather

King Edward VII – Great x4 Grandfather

Queen Victoria – Great x5 Grandmother

Prince Edward – Great x6 Grandfather (George II’s 3^rd son)

King George III – Great x7 Grandfather

Prince Frederick – Great x8 Grandfather (pre-deceased George II)

King George II – Great x9 Grandfather

King George I – Great x10 Grandfather

Sophia of Hannover – Great x11 Grandmother

Elizabeth Stuart – Great x12 Grandmother (James I’s daughter)

King James I – Great x13 Grandfather

Mary Queen of Scots – Great x14 Grandmother

James V of Scotland – Great x15 Grandfather

Margaret Tudor – Great x16 Grandmother (Henry VII’s daughter)

King Henry VII Tudor – Great x17 Grandfather

Margaret Beaufort – Great x18 Grandmother

John, Duke of Somerset – Great x19 Grandfather

John, Earl of Somerset – Great x20 Grandfather

John of Gaunt – Great x21 Grandfather (Edward III’s 4^th son)

Elizabeth of York – Great x17 Grandmother

King Edward VI – Great x18 Grandfather

Richard, Duke of York Great x19 Grandfather

Richard, Earl of Cambridge – Great x20 Grandfather

Edmund, Duke of York – Great x21 Grandfather (Edward III’s 5^th son)

King Edward III – Great x22 Grandfather

King Edward II – Great x23 Grandfather

King Edward I – Great x24 Grandfather

King Henry III – Great x25 Grandfather

King John – Great x26 Grandfather

King Henry II – Great x27 Grandfather

Queen Matilda – Great x28 Grandmother

King Henry I – Great x29 Grandfather

King William I the Conqueror Great x30 Grandfather

Note the omission of Edward VIII; William IV; George IV; William III; the Stuarts, except for James I; the Tudors, except for Henry VII; Richard III; the Lancasters; Richard II, Richard I Lionheart; Stephen; and William II; as they are all collateral, not direct ancestors. There are also two other lines on the distaff side between Edward III and Edward IV (cousins marrying cousins). This was the time of the so-called War of the Roses, more accurately named the Cousins’ Wars. The Tudor line died with Queen Elizabeth I. The Stuart line ended with Queen Anne’s death, because the closest Protestant descendant of James I was George, Elector of Hannover (the Act of Settlement of 1701 barred Catholics from the throne).

Matilda was named by Henry II to succeed him as Queen, but the barons would not accept her because she was a woman, and they crowned Stephen of Blois. That caused a 18 year civil war known as the Anarchy, that ended when the barons accepted her son Henry as king upon Stephen’s death. He conveniently died a year later.

Media researcher and thinker Marshall McLuhan published influential books during the 1960s including Understanding Media, The Extensions of Man and The Medium is the Message that introduced or at least popularized the concept of the Global Village and predicted the establishment of our current World Wide Web.

The practically instantaneous communications we have today allow anyone with access to a television or a smart phone, which includes nearly everyone, even those who are abjectly poor, to learn details of events while they are occurring halfway around the globe, or even down the street. Marshall McLuhan’s Global Village has become a reality.

Our Global Village is a busybody’s delight. Purely personal or local matters become everyone’s business. An unfortunate homicide resulting from an encounter that, in a still not completely explained manner, became a struggle perceived by at least one participant as a deadly threat, turned into a universal cause célèbre.

Every village has its idiot; some have more than one. A Global Village is bound to have millions. They have come out in force to exhibit themselves on the village green, aka the Internet and cable news, in the wake of Florida’s trial of George Zimmerman.

George Zimmerman is not guilty of murder or manslaughter. That does not mean that he is innocent in a moral sense. He may be even found legally liable for damages in a future wrongful death civil suit, as O. J. Simpson was after his acquittal in 1995. The moral issue will be decided in another forum, perhaps another world. Civil liability is doubtful.

Except for comments about the role of a neighborhood crime watch participant, I have expressed no prior opinions concerning the Zimmerman case. It had to play out in the Florida legal system. Now that the jury and court have spoken, I offer my observations.

The Prosecution

The prosecution was politically, not legally, motivated. It was a shameless exercise of pandering politicians. Don West was right about that.

Recall that 2012 was an election year. There were a number of important races in Florida, and the state itself was a “battleground” state in the Presidential race. The case came to national attention because the alleged victim was useful as a symbol of the left’s narrative of ongoing racism and oppression in the nation. Playing on that paranoia could solidify and motivate voters to vote for Democratic Party candidate. It also would be dangerous for Republicans, or so they perceived. I can just imagine special prosecutor Angela Corey being summoned into the corridors of power and told “put a lid on this for us, and you will have a great future career” or words to that effect. In many states, she would have had to present the case to a grand jury for an indictment to allow the case to go forward. In Florida, that is optional, but is often used to keep the political heat off of prosecutors. That wasn’t good enough for the Florida politicos. Corey knew she could not get an indictment – the previous police and state’s attorney investigation found no evidence that negated self defense, and indeed, her subsequent investigation revealed none – so she chose to proceed by a charging document called an information, or complaint. It took on a life of its own from there.

The Trial

The case should never have come to trial, and it should have been a directed verdict. Of course, there was no way the judge was going to do anything but let the jury decide. She did not want to fade that kind of heat.

The smartest part of the defense argument was Mark O’Mara’s use of the hunk of concrete to show a deadly weapon. How much brain damage should one have to risk? Some idiot commentator on a television news program likened this altercation as a “fistfight” to which the use of a firearm was a “disproportionate” response. A young adult woman was killed in my neighborhood by being struck and hitting her head on a concrete walkway not too long ago. A juror post trial said that demonstration, coupled with Zimmerman’s bloodied head made an impression on the jury.

The prosecutors did not have much to work with. Nevertheless, their histrionic closing and attempted heartstrings-pulling rebuttal was pathetic and counterproductive. That kind of drama can work only if you have matching underlying facts. Those facts were not there. Furthermore, when the prosecution’s rebuttal belabored the “common sense” theme, it was obvious he was playing to the respect for that concept that most ordinary people have. For it to be effective, however, it has to apply; it must be commonsensical. Anything other than a finding of self-defense in this case would have defied common sense.

Referring to a seventeen year old athletic male as a “child” in this context was ridiculous. Adulthood used to be acknowledged much earlier. A 13 year-old used to be an adult among many groups. True, in our soft culture, childhood sometimes extends into one’s mid twenties or later – witness the absurdity of requiring insurance companies to keep the children of policyholders on medical policies to age 26. The reality is that many 17 year-olds are a match for adult men of all ages.

The prosecution put on most of the defense’s case. The defense turned nearly every state’s witness around. The forensic science experts, especially Vincent DiMaio, at one time an assistant medical examiner here in Dallas County, were some of the most effective defense witnesses. DiMaio demonstrated almost to a certainty, that Zimmerman’s version of the confrontation was the right one.

As Thomas Sowell stated in his column “The only real heroes in this trial were the jurors. They showed that this is still America — at least for now — despite politicians who try to cheapen or corrupt the law, as if this were some banana republic.”

The Aftermath

Profiling of individuals, even when considering their race, is not illegal and often is truly common sense. In Zimmerman’s neighborhood, there had been multiple burglaries and thefts; nearly all perpetrated by young black men. Commentator Shelby Steele, who happens to be black, described a hoodie as “a costume of menace.” A common figure of speech, a synecdoche for a brigand, ruffian, or other kind of criminal is “hood.” That has been around for a long time, and it refers to person of any complexion who wears a garment that covers his head and most of his face making him harder to identify. Looking into houses in the neighborhood while walking in the darkness would arouse suspicion, or at least prompt inquiry. Put these together, and you have a profile – a profile that bears pursuing further inquiry. Recall Jesse Jackson’s comment that he was distressed by hearing footsteps behind him at night and being relieved when he discovered that the person they belonged to was white. I don’t believe Jackson is a racist, but in that respect he is not a lunatic either. Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen, who leans left most of the time opined “If the police are abusing their authority and using race as the only reason, that has got to stop. But if they ignore race, then they are fools and ought to go into another line of work.” There are many complex reasons why such a disproportionate number of young black men become mired in our criminal justice system. But it is a fact; a fact that someone walking on the street ignores at their peril.

Neighborhood crime watch organizations are effective, but those who participate must know their limitations. See something suspicious? Call the professionals. Now a big problem, particularly where I live, is the police are stretched pretty thin. Even if timely called, they might not get there soon enough to prevent a crime. They usually do not. It is easy to understand frustration. The punks get away most of the time.

I have come to believe that President Obama has unnecessarily set back race relations in this country. His 2008 campaign was by no means a sure thing, and he believed that part of his baggage was being at least half-black (which as an unfortunate legacy of our past, means all black to a good many, if not most people). He took an analogous page out of John F. Kennedy’s 1960 campaign play book. Many perceived Kennedy’s Catholicism to be a liability. Kennedy believed that stirring up a certain amount of bigotry might actually help him because Americans by and large feared religious bigotry more than they feared that he would be consulting the Pope at every turn. He was right, and that ploy probably worked. After his election, however, Kennedy did not wear his religion on his sleeve, and determined to be President of all the people. Obama, on the other hand, not six months into his term of office, injected himself in the Henry Louis Gates affair in Cambridge when he should have kept his mouth shut. After Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin, the President did likewise with his notorious bon mot that if he had a son he would look like Martin. In both instances the President, enabled the transformation of purely local matters into national media circuses. One wonders what he was thinking. He reminded me of President Richard Nixon opining about Charles Manson’s guilt right in the middle of the trial.

Whatever it was, it had some predictable effects. The more virulent race baiters are calling for a federal civil rights prosecution and a wrongful death civil suit against Zimmerman, and threatening social unrest if those do not occur. There is no legal basis for a civil rights prosecution, though one commentator who worked there opined that left wing zealots in the civil rights division of the Justice Department doubtless would try to manufacture one. The response of “we’re looking into it” so far has the quality of putting it off hoping it will go away. As for a wrongful death suit like the one against O. J. Simpson? No lawyer in his right mind would take this on a contingency. There is a mountain of exculpatory evidence already marshaled and an insolvent defendant, not to mention immunity from civil liability for the use of deadly force in self defense under Florida law (the law is similar, and perhaps even stronger in that regard here in Texas). It’s a summary judgment case, or in lay terms, one that would be thrown out of court because it has no basis. If there are zealots who would pursue it on principle now, when the costs begin to mount up with no real prospect for remuneration or even symbolic vindication, their ardor will fade rapidly.

One exceptionally disturbing – and offensive – piece of rhetoric is some, supposedly responsible, leaders and spokespersons equating Trayvon Martin with Emmitt Till and Medgar Evers. That is preposterous on its face; not even remotely comparable. These absurd attempts at invidious comparison can only serve to inflame the uninformed. When emotions override reason, nothing but bad can come.

Finally, what about justice. Was it served here? I have given that some thought and will spend some more time, bits, and bytes later.

I hope our economic well being and standard of living, as well as individual freedom, is not going to be compromised by the global warming doomsayers.

For the record, I believe that the earth’s climate has changed; some of the change may have been caused by human activity; it might, though there is nothing outside of pure speculation that says it will, continue to get hotter.

As for human activity, most of the present activity that contributes to the alleged greenhouse gases occurs outside the United States – read China and India. Are those nations going to curtail their industrial activity? Not a chance.

I have heard of some efforts to develop processes to extract CO² from the atmosphere on a massive scale. Assuming that the science is correct that gas stays in the atmosphere for decades, such a solution might be the only way to reduce CO² if that is found to be necessary. For more, see this feature from NPR

We are not, in any event, going to move back into caves and adopt a pre-industrial standard of living. Not going to happen.

As for the alleged consensus of climate scientists, Matt Ridley has some interesting observations.

See Matt Ridley’s column

This is an essay I posted last year. I think it is deserving of repetition.

Permit me to say a few words about our national birthday and the document it celebrates.

But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government and to provide new Guards for their future Security.

But one that also demonstrates triumph.

As this year is an anniversary of a Presidential Assassination that many of us personally remember, let us everyone not forget that three other of our Chief Magistrates (as the Founders termed the office) were slain by assassins while in office. There were attempts on the lives of at least four other Presidents and candidates – Gerald Ford was targeted twice.

Today is the anniversary of the shooting and mortal wounding of one President. I wrote about him on Presidents’ Day over a year ago, and thought it appropriate to republish it here, with some appropriate modifications and updates.

James Abram Garfield was the 20^th man to hold the Presidential office. He was born on a farm — the last of our Presidents who was born in a log cabin — in Cuyahoga County, Ohio in 1831. His father died before his first birthday leaving his mother to raise the family alone. At sixteen, he had a brief stint as a laborer on the Erie & Ohio Canal, where he nearly drowned in an accident. Afterward, with the encouragement and support of this mother and older brother, Garfield sought an education. He enrolled in the Western Reserve Eclectic Institute (now Hiram College, in Portage County, Ohio), where he defrayed his tuition by serving a school janitor, giving validity to Newt Gingrich’s recent much maligned (by the present American left, that is) suggestion that it might be useful for high school students to do the same in our day. Garfield soon left to attend Williams College in Massachusetts. After graduating with honors, he returned to teach at Western Reserve and became president of the school at age 26. A mostly self-taught mathematician, Garfield published his own proof of the Pythagorean Theorem. In perhaps his spare time, he read law and passed the Ohio bar examination. When the Civil War broke out, Garfield obtained a commission as lieutenant colonel of volunteers in the Union army, and was soon promoted to colonel to command a regiment. His success in securing part of the border state of Kentucky for the Union led to his promotion to general. In 1862, Garfield was elected to his first of nine terms in the House of Representatives, although he did not leave the army to take his seat immediately. After the war, he sought a writ of habeas corpus for five Indiana men who had been tried and sentenced to death by a military tribunal for freeing Confederate prisoners. In this noteworthy case titled Ex parte Milligan, the Supreme Court decided that military tribunals did not apply to citizens in states that had upheld the authority of the Constitution and where civilian courts were still operating, a legal principle that still holds today, as we have recently observed.

By 1880, the Republican party had split into two factions, primarily over the issue of federal patronage. The Stalwarts, led by New Yorker Roscoe Conkling, wished to preserve the “spoils system” where the prevailing party and candidate appointed their supporters to federal government jobs. The “Half-Breeds” so called because of their perceived moderate politics and desire for reform, wished to end that system and install a merit-based civil service. These included James G. Blaine of Maine, and ultimately, Garfield.

When fellow Ohioan Rutherford B. Hayes declined to run for re-election, the GOP nominated Garfield as a compromise candidate. Elected in 1880, Garfield served but 199 days. Like William Henry Harrison, who had been elected 40 years earlier and died after scarcely a month in office, he is generally excluded from lists rating Presidents. Even so, like most of the so-called Gilded Age Presidents, Garfield gets little respect from academic historians. Part of this is probably political bias – longtime Yale history professor C. Vann Woodward once observed that his colleagues are usually liberal Democrats – but the reality is that between Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt, American Presidents were generally passive, quietly presiding over the government while Congress took the lead in formulating national policy.

On July 2, 1881, one Charles Guiteau, ostensibly because of his disappointment over Garfield not appointing him as ambassador to France, shot Garfield in the back at a railway station in Washington. The wound was not fatal and was probably survivable even if left untreated – as were many similar wounds suffered by soldiers during the Civil War which had only ended sixteen years previously. Nevertheless, treating physicians who should have known better by this time, probed the wound over and over in septic conditions in a vain attempt to locate the bullet and caused a massive infection to set in that ultimately killed the President. This malpractice was even more egregious because Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone, had also invented a magnetic induction device that probably would have located the bullet, had the physician in charge permitted its use on the side of Garfield’s body where the bullet was discovered after the President’s death. After more than two months of suffering, James A. Garfield died on September 19, 1881.

Bell’s device, like his telephone, made use of the little world we cannot see – the flow of electrons along conductors and electromagnetic waves inducing such currents across space that carry information well beyond the range of our unaided senses. By 1880, the telephone had been acknowledged as a success, and President Hayes, Garfield’s immediate predecessor, had already installed one in the Executive Mansion (it was not formally called the “White House” until 1901). Of course, the telephone worked in a manner that anyone could perceive, even if the means by which it worked were invisible.

That was not the case with antisepsis, the other significant contemporary advance. The little microbes we now know are responsible for disease processes not only are invisible, but they take longer to do their damage and become symptomatic. A cause and effect between germs and disease was not so clear. But Joseph Lister, a British surgeon, had by the 1870s pretty well proven the germ theory of disease, and even presented it to the American medical community in an exhibition at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition in 1876 (along with many other inventions, including Bell’s telephone). Nevertheless, Lister’s theory had not been widely accepted among American physicians by 1881, and was even disdained by one in particular, Garfield’s treating physician.

This physician was Dr. Doctor Willard Bliss (yes, ironically enough, his given name was “Doctor”). Bliss and those who assisted him administered alcohol and various heavy metals, such as mercury, which did little but induce vomiting. They probed the wound with dirty fingers, causing infections throughout the President’s body. Defending himself at trial, Charles Guiteau insisted that “General Garfield died from malpractice.” That was certainly true, but on June 30, 1882, just two days shy of the anniversary of his crime, Guiteau was hanged. Justice, or retribution if you wish, was swifter in those days.

Garfield principal legacy as President is, unfortunately, his dubious distinction of being the second of four Presidents felled by assassins. He is also remembered, by historians mostly, for the Pendleton Civil Service Act, later passed and signed by successor Chester A. Arthur in 1883, that ended the spoils system. Garfield had supported that reform, and thus became a martyr to that cause, as Guiteau’s crime was touted as an inevitable consequence of the spoils system.

But James Garfield’s greater legacy as an American is not his final office, but his life before and how he got there. He was a teacher, lawyer, general, and conscientious Congressman. He was as much a martyr to the cause of advancing science and technology as he was to government reform. President Garfield had not been born to any advantage, quite the contrary. He grew up in less than comfortable circumstances, and overcame what obstacles placed before him, save the last. He embodied the American theme of the triumphant individual, and that is how he should be honored on this 132^nd anniversary of his shooting.

For those who wish more detail, I suggest the very readable account by Candice Millard, Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine, and the Murder of a President, published last year, upon which I relied for many of the facts related here.

While rooting through my archives I found this from Sunday, Arpil 15, 2001 (Easter Sunday).

Apropos to some current events, don’t you think?

Death and taxes might come in the same package.

This coming week, which includes the Fourth of July, I would normally be inclined to write something about the Declaration of Independence or some other topic related to that momentous event of 237 years ago. I, indeed, have done so in this space. This year, however, that anniversary is in close proximity to the sesquicentennial of the Battle of Gettysburg in the American Civil War (or, if you please, the War Between the States, War for Southern Independence, etc.). So I will write about Gettysburg.

Anniversaries, particularly those divided by 50, bring forth a lot of writing, dramatization, and speaking about the commemorated event. Apart from the American Revolution and World War II, there is no other contender for the most significant event in our history, thus, the current avalanche of expression.

Books I previously mentioned in this space (or elsewhere) concerned the causes of the War, both remote, proximate, and immediate. York (Ontario) University professor Mark Egnal’s Clash of Extremes performs a detailed and painstaking analysis of the events leading up to the conflict to support his thesis for why we had a Civil War. It was all about money, or, more accurately, wealth, and how it is produced. The War was an epic struggle between the ancient feudal agrarian economic system, and the burgeoning free market capitalism made possible by the scientific-technological-industrial revolution. I would add that revolution flowed from the ideas of the 17^th and 18^th Century Enlightenment. The South was dependent on slavery as a labor source, and also, as many thought at the time, as a means for social control of a Toynbean proletariat (a group that is in a society but not of it).

A recent book by Thomas Fleming about the causes, A Disease of the Public Mind: Why We Fought the Civil War, propounds the thesis that the cultural differences between the Northern and Southern colonies, and later states, caused suspicion, distrust, and dislike from the very beginning of the colonial period. (I have yet to read Fleming’s book, but listened to an interview of the author on the KERA 90.1 radio program Think. See KERA.) The inevitable consequence was separation, or an attempt at it. Perhaps Fleming regards the Constitution a Procrustean instrument to forge a tenuous union. I may report on his work in the future.

Nelson Lankford’s Cry Havoc: The Crooked Road to Civil War tracks the events that led to the actual outbreak of war. Like World War I, which was to occur a half-century later, hostilities commenced because the politicians on both sides, blind, willfully or not, to the likely consequences and therefore recalcitrant, lost control of the situation.

A third book is more for the buff. Russell S. Bonds’ Stealing the General: The Great Locomotive Chase and the Medal of Honor, recounted the April 1862 Andrews Raid in Georgia. That attempt to disrupt the railroad supply lines to enable an early thrust into the heart of the South failed, but the failure was accompanied by heroism on both sides.

This weekend, in an essay in the Dallas Morning News op-ed section (see DMN Horowitz), Tony Horowitz asks whether the War was necessary or inevitable and presents a number of views by historians.

Historians have “decided the Civil War is a ‘good war’ because it destroyed slavery . . . it’s an indictment of 19th-century Americans that they had to slaughter each other to do that,” Horowitz quotes University of North Carolina professor Fitzhugh Brundage.

But David Goldfield believes that the War was America’s greatest failure. War could never have truly delivered the slaves from bondage or re-unite the nation. The subsequent 100 years bear him out. According to Horowitz, Goldfield’s conclusion is that given the equivocal gains – forcible and uncompensated emancipation and forcible political re-union – the War was not worth the immense toll in blood and treasure.

The blood was, by revised estimates, that of 750,000 dead Americans; as of this writing more than all of the other wars the United States has engaged in put together. (Earlier estimates were around 618,000, which would have been exceeded during the Vietnam War.) The treasure was over $10 billion in 1860 dollars, enough to buy the freedom of every slave and purchase land for them (probably more than the storied 40 acres of abandoned marsh land General Sherman’s Field Order No. 15 provided for, given the vast public lands in the west). The British Empire had accomplished compensated emancipation in the 1830s, and Brazil was to later in the 1880s. Why could not the United States have opted for the same solution? I suspect that Fleming may have his opinion about that.

Gary Gallagher of the University of Virginia opines that there is an Appomattox Syndrome that causes us to look at the Union victory and emancipation and read the historical evidence backward. Very few Northerners went to war seeking the destruction of slavery, Gallegher says; very few Southerners went to war to defend it.

Does that mean that slavery was not a cause, or even the main cause of the War? Of course not. The economics of slavery was the sine qua non for secession and war. But there had to be a rallying cry. At first, for the North, it was “save the union.” For the South, it was “repel the invader.” When preservation of the Union became too abstract for a man who had a wife and children at home, freeing the slaves took its place. For the South, Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, which was a strategic military ploy, which only had effect in places held by the Confederacy, raised the specter of millions of freed slaves that would be a danger to the fighting man’s home and hearth. That Proclamation, probably not by design, resurrected John Brown’s spirit, if not his body.

Probably the historian who lives geographically closest to the Battle is Allen Guelzo, professor and director of Civil War studies at the eponymous Gettysburg College. In his most recent book, Gettysburg: The Last Invasion, as well as others, Guelzo indulges in the “what ifs” the battle had turned out differently. He believes that if Lee’s army could have broken the Union line on July 3^rd, it would have been all over. Perhaps, but who really knows.

What I believe the salient lesson of the Battle of Gettysburg, was not that Robert E. Lee, normally the most brilliant of tacticians, and one of the most honorable figures to come out of that profoundly saddest of American episodes, had a bad day at the wrong time, but that he never should have been there in the first place. For the seven years prior to the fourscore Lincoln alluded to, Lee’s kinsman by marriage, George Washington, realized that he did not need to win the war; he just needed to not lose it. The South’s war-making capacity in materiel and infrastructure was vastly inferior to the North. An invasion, if successful, might have broken the Union army’s morale, but it is nearly impossible to see how it could have. Lee simply asked too much of his men. Washington simply outlasted the British. Arguably, lee lost his War at Gettysburg, not by a tactical defeat, but by a strategic one.

Part of this might have been a manifestation of the adage that generals always tend to fight the last war. Lee was a veteran of the Mexican-American War, where the U.S. Army’s artillery blasted the Mexicans to bits at Monterrey, Buena Vista, and Chapultepec. He appears to have felt he could do the same to the Union army with his prolonged cannonade prior to Pickett’s charge. It was not enough.

Nevertheless, after his great successes at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville. Lee should have hunkered down in Virginia and let the Union forces come to him. Whether they would have is more speculation, but Lee would have been on his own ground and could have defended the way he did a year later, but with an intact army. Furthermore, later in 1863, General Longstreet’s corps, though weakened at Gettysburg, was sent to Georgia to assist in the Battle of Chickamauga. The Confederates won that battle but failed to relieve Chattanooga. If Longstreet’s force had been up to strength, they might have completed the victory.

Lost in the drama of Gettysburg was an equally significant event on July 4, 1863. While Lee began the withdrawal of his seriously weakened army from Pennsylvania, General Ulysses S. Grant was accepting the surrender of the Confederate redoubt at Vicksburg. This victory gave the Union forces control of the Mississippi River. While a serious blow to the South, it did not, as some historians put it, cut the Confederacy in two. The river did not become the Great Wall of China. If, however, Mark Egnal is right about the Great Lakes economy and its impact on sectional relations, control of the river in itself would have accomplished a major goal of the War from the perspective of Midwesterners. If Gettysburg had not happened, it’s possible that a negotiated peace would have been attractive to both Lincoln and Jefferson Davis.

But the Dogs of War still slipped.

It was quite a week at the Supreme Court and elsewhere.

Supreme Court

One of the first concepts one learns in law school about the way cases are decided in our courts is contained the word “narrowly.” Thus, the Supreme Court’s decisions this week were not much of a surprise to lawyers or laypersons familiar with the judicial process. The Court made a number of narrow decisions. That does not mean they cannot be far-reaching and game-changing. They can be, and when they get as far as the court of last resort, they usually are, at least for those in the areas that are affected. The cases full of great pith and moment, which are usually reserved for the last week of the Court’s term (some cynics might say that’s for the justices to be able to get the hell out of Dodge) are usually those that affect all of us.

Fisher vs. Perry — This lawsuit is what is common termed a “reverse discrimination” case. The plaintiff asked the court to denounce and forbid any race-based preferences in the admissions policy at the University of Texas. The Court declined to go that far, but opined that the strict scrutiny standard required when federal or state governments consider race for any state action was not applied strictly enough here. It sent the case back to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals for reconsideration. Perhaps as many as 20 years ago, retired Justice Sandra Day O’Connor opined that such scrutiny may be strict in theory, but fatal in application. That has been generally true. In Fisher, we’ll see.

Shelby County vs. Holder — Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (“VRA”) requires pre-approval by the U.S. Justice Department of even the slightest change in voting procedures in certain covered jurisdictions. Those jurisdictions include some entire states and well as certain counties and smaller one in other states defined by Section 4 of the VRA. The determination of covered jurisdictions was made by their historical use of racially discriminatory laws and procedures. Although voting qualifications and procedures are Constitutionally the purview of each state, the VRA was originally upheld as the “appropriate legislation” power Congress was given by and to enforce the Fifteenth Amendment. A good argument can be made that the VRA came 100 years too late, but sections 4 and 5, which were designed to be temporary, lasted at least 25 years too long. One flaw in the process was that inordinate power was given to career DOJ staffers, quite often ideologues who saw racial discrimination where there was none.

The evil that underscores both of those cases is the persistence of official classification of individuals by race or ethnicity, in the U.S. Census and otherwise. In the wake of the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s, the remedial measures of the VRA and affirmative action were necessary where there had been pervasive government–sponsored or supported — racial segregation and discrimination. Keeping such measures in place for so long had become counter-productive. Sections 4 & 5 of the VRA came to treat race, and later “ethnicity” as determinative of community of interest. The effect was to herd minority groups into electoral districts to obtain sufficient numbers to ensure election of an official “who looked like” them. Whether he/she also thought like many I suppose was irrelevant. Affirmative action programs, particularly in higher education and industry, tended to make the abilities and qualifications of black persons, at least, suspect. Whether justified or not, people tend to rely on stereotypes to make everyday decisions. Because of this, affirmative action, except where it specifically and in a narrowly tailored manner was applied a remedy to individuals who had been unfairly treated because of their race or color, has been counterproductive, and tending to perpetuate racial stereotypes.

The Gay Marriage Cases — The result in both cases, like the Shelby County case, showed a certain respect for federalism. One might disagree with many of the federal laws that discriminate against single persons and provide certain benefits to married persons. If Congress bestows that largesse on person on the basis of the marriage relationship, and some states provide for same sex marriages, then federal law should respect a state’s definition of marriage. If one changes their domicile that really doesn’t matter so long as the state of celebration recognizes same sex marriage. The state of domicile, however, would not have to. Different treatment? Yes, but that is what federalism means. Different strokes for different folks in different states, so long a fundamental rights recognized by the Constitution are protected. There may be a fundamental right to privacy and freedom of association, but there is no fundamental right that a state must recognize marriage, at least under current Constitutional jurisprudence.

As far as the California Proposition 8 is concerned, the Court dismissed on the basis of standing, and the merits were not reached. Given that at least three of the left-leaning justices, who typically are not concerned with standing as an issue, were on board, one can speculate justifiably that they would not have liked the result of a merits decision.

My solution is to get the government out of the marriage business. Enact civil union statutes for any couple who wants to commit to each other that define the rights and responsibilities in the absence of an agreement, including those of children born or adopted to that union. Religious or social organizations can sanction those unions if desired and call them marriages. In the eyes of the law, all would be civil unions. The extremes of both sides of this issue might not like this compromise, but of us would.

Adoptive Couple vs. Baby Girl — Not nearly as celebrated as the other cases, but nonetheless significant was the case where the state courts in South Carolina, applying what they believed were the requirements of the federal Indian Child Welfare Act (“ICWA”), allowed a biological father to wrest away a child from adoptive parents. The unmarried mother of the child, with the consent of the aforesaid sperm donor, placed the child for adoption. The child was adopted by a married couple who resided in South Carolina. That family lived together for over a year. The sperm donor, for some reason, had a change of heart and, upon discovering that he had a Cherokee Amerindian ancestor, which under the twisted concept ensconced in that law, made the child 3/256th Cherokee, sued for custody. Applying the ICWA, the South Carolina court awarded it to him, and was affirmed by the South Carolina Supreme Court. The adoptive parents sought review.

The U. S. Supreme Court reversed. In its ruling the Court stated “under the [South Carolina] Supreme Court’s reading, the Act would put certain vulnerable children at a great disadvantage solely because an ancestor—even a remote one—was an Indian. As the State Supreme Court read §§1912(d) and (f ), a biological Indian father could abandon his child in utero and refuse any support for the birth mother—perhaps contributing to the mother’s decision to put the child up for adoption—and then could play his ICWA trump card at the eleventh hour to override the mother’s decision and the child’s best interests. If this were possible, many prospective adoptive parents would surely pause before adopting any child who might possibly qualify as an Indian under the ICWA.”

The Court was surely correct, but it did not reach what many consider the ultimate question. How on earth can a 3/256th (3 great great great great great grandparents) qualify someone to be a Cherokee Amerindian? This carries the concept of hypodescent (or the “one-drop” rule) to absurd lengths. Our obsession with biological heritage as being determinative of “who one is” is nothing new. It is, of course, racism at the most basic level. In this case, it is a good bet the child has been traumatized by being used as an emotional football for the sperm donor’s self-aggrandizement, aided and abetted by an ill-considered law or the application thereof. The South Carolina courts should be relieved, as this was yet another of the Supreme Court opinions that have show at least a modicum of respect for state sovereignty.

Out of Court
Leaker Edward Snowden remains on the lam; perhaps in Russia. President Obama says he will not indulge in international negotiations to secure the extradition of a “29 year old hacker.” Good for the Pres. If Snowden comes back to the U.S., the government should arrest and try him for espionage. Otherwise, let him go to Ecuador, Cuba, or some other socialist cesspool and find out for himself what paradise really is not. Ignore him and his celebrity will soon wane and few will care.\