Was Jefferson Davis Right?

Rating:
Summary: A Message for Kevin Connelly
Review: "Some of the statements seem particularly misguided, for example, the assertion the the Bill or Rights applies only to Federal actions, not state actions!" (I know what you are thinking, this is not my typo, it belongs to Mr. Connelly.) Mr. Connelly, I am writing to inform you "the the Bill or Rights" did originally apply to Federal actions only. It was not until the previous century and the latter part of the one before it did this change. The blame for this can be placed on an activist U.S. Supreme Court of the time.

Now that this is out of the way, I can say that this is an excellent book for anyone who is Pro-South. I myself found it very pleasing to read and I feel that others will to. It is full of interesting facts that you just can not find in other books. The Kennedy brothers have, as they have done before, written a great book.

Rating:
Summary: Selective quotation instead of facts again
Review: Anyone who's bothered to read the Federalist Papers or other documentation on early US constitutional history will notice that the Kennedys have presented a very odd view on the entire process. Any notion that states had more power than the federal government is mistaken. The central problem with the Articles of Confederation was an overly weak central government.

I could go on for paragraphs but why bother? The Kennedys write books that have no relation to anything remotely resembling historical reality.

Ignore the Kennedys, read the original documents and judge for yourself.

Rating:
Summary: Justice for Jefferson Davis
Review: History has not been kind to Jefferson Davis. This is especially true now with the current wave of politically correct motivated attacks on him. The Kennedy brothers seek to rectify this by placing him under a mock trial charged with treason against the United States government. Incidentally, Davis repeatly asked for this trial which the U.S. government refused based on recommendation of their legal counsel.
Most Davis critics know very little about him. An excellent biography introduces him to the reader. The Kennedy's present the questioning and motives of his federal accusers and offer a stalwart defense in his behalf. Decide for yourself if he was guilty or innocent of treason.
Also, included in addendum are informative documents relative to the period and subject.
When Jefferson Davis died in 1889 the South mourned. Thousands upon thousands of people of all races and walks of life attended his funeral and processions. The South still loved and respected their president.

Rating:
Summary: Justice for Jefferson Davis
Review: History has not been kind to Jefferson Davis. This is especially true now with the current wave of politically correct motivated attacks on him. The Kennedy brothers seek to rectify this by placing him under a mock trial charged with treason against the United States government. Incidentally, Davis repeatly asked for this trial which the U.S. government refused based on recommendation of their legal counsel.
Most Davis critics know very little about him. An excellent biography introduces him to the reader. The Kennedy's present the questioning and motives of his federal accusers and offer a stalwart defense in his behalf. Decide for yourself if he was guilty or innocent of treason.
Also, included in addendum are informative documents relative to the period and subject.
When Jefferson Davis died in 1889 the South mourned. Thousands upon thousands of people of all races and walks of life attended his funeral and processions. The South still loved and respected their president.

Rating:
Summary: Political Statement
Review: I found this book interesting. I'm an amateur historian with great interest on the Civil War and the leaders from both sides. I originally bought this book looking for more information on the Biographay and beliefs of Jefferson Davis. It does provide some insight into who he was but REMEMBER WHEN READING the authors' state that it is a defense of Jefferson Davis and what he stood for. Therefore this book definately has a slant toward defending and sugar coating who Jefferson Davis was.

The book is a defense of State Rights (and decentralized government) as opposed to a strong centralized government. Wether you support one idea or the other this book is definately worth reading to get a different point of view.

For historical reading on Jefferson Davis read his own writings and speeches from his life and service to the United States and then the Confederate States.

Rating:
Summary: An extraordinarily cogent and revealing discourse
Review: In a day in which the Federal government of the United States is virtually all-powerful, nothing is needed so much as a diligent study of the United States constitution, its limitations, and the original intentions and perspectives of America's founders. "Was Jefferson Davis Right?" serves this capacity not only by employing a rigorous examination of the US constitution and early American politics and perspectives, but by challenging the modern politically-correct dogma concerning Jefferson Davis, the Southern Confederacy and the War of 1861-1865. The Kennedy brothers demonstrate key principles that impacted the events of the conflict between North and South and created the America that we live in today. Among those are: 1) The historically provable fact that the Founding Fathers did not intend that Washington's government be all-powerful but rather limited to a small range of specifically delegated powers: a conditional, not supreme union. 2) That prior to 1865, the states of the union did not hesitate to defend their reserved rights and that such actions were in fact mainstream practices. 3) That the consolidated view of the United States government was a view that evolved after the formation of the Republic. 4) That the usurpation of power by the Federal govt. began very shortly after the formation of the union and was reasonably contained until 1861. 5) That Jefferson Davis and those who advocated southern independence were in fact following the pattern originated by our Founding Fathers in their separation from England. 6) That the issue of slavery (although a heinous practice) was beyond the power of the Federal govt. and was instead a matter for the states to decide for themselves just as the Northern states (and European nations) had done during the time in which they embraced the practice. In summary, "Was Jefferson Davis Right?" is an excellent book in terms of providing evidence for its assertions and eliciting thoughtful response. I would highly recommend it to anyone interested in the great issues that so consumed our nation in the mid-19th century, and (in many ways) have dictated the society in which we live today. On the nitpick scale, I'd have to say that I had only two problems with this book. To start with, it was a bit too redundant in some places. I know that repitition is the key to learning and such but I think that this statement applies more to facts and less to logical thoughtlines. I have more trouble with remembering dates and names than I do with following ideas though, and your mileage may vary of course. The only other detractor is a Kennedy brothers predilection that is actually much reduced from "The South Was Right," and that is the use of rather harsh language directed at certain historical figures and regions. I can understand very well the frustration that these issues raise (particuarly when considering your stolen heritage...I am a Virginian, after all....), but I think that your case is weakened and sometimes lost on those who might be persuaded (or at least become sympathetic) to your point of view, if your word usage is designed to be offensive to the "facts" and perspectives with which some individuals are familiar. They take it personally. For that reason, I believe that some things could have been phrased more effectively for the undecided or skeptical reader. Overall...an excellent work. Powerfully persuasive. Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Good book, bad manners
Review: The Kennedy's should follow Churchill's dictum: in victory, magnaminity. The stridency serves no persuasive purpose, and to many it is off-putting. That said, they're right.

The reviews tell the story, people either accept the thesis whole-hog or reject it. I don't know how any literate person could think that the original Bill of Rights applied to any other than Federal action, but I suppose I run the risk of offending a government school graduate's self-esteem. That is what the Kennedy books struggle with; the mind-numbed masses that the government schools turn out.

Nobody much will read this book, and certainly few who aren't already predisposed to it will. That is a shame, for America does have a history, and the government school myth does not reflect it. Deo Vindice

Rating:
Summary: A short summation
Review: This book clearly establishes the passioante belief and in-depth understanding Davis had about God and the Constitution. It more than establishes that it was the South and Davis that were fighting for the Constitution, freedom, states' rights, and self-determination, not the north. Also helps to bring in to perspective better history and politics today. An outstanding eclectic piece of research that belongs in every house and classroom.

Rating:
Summary: A Splendid Defense of Constitutionalism
Review: This book is a much-needed historical correction. That being said, and the state of modern politics and education being what they are, I have little hope that this book will have much of an impact beyond readers who are predisposed, either by conviction or a genuine search for the truth, to give it a fair hearing.

That's a real pity, because an accurate understanding of the war for Southern independence -- the last really just and necessary war that Americans engaged in -- is sorely needed if the present trend towards globalization and corporate tyranny is to be thwarted. And in this book, the Kennedys provide some necessary material towards understanding that conflict. (Other writers worth reading are Eugene Genovese, Marshall DeRosa, Clyde Wilson, and the late, great M.E. Bradford.)

Modern day so-called conservatives, who enjoy talking about "original intent" and "constitutionalism," are in truth discussing these terms within the parameters established by Abraham Lincoln when he made a travesty of the original Republic. Contrary to the assertions of some, the process by which the Constiution was ratified was a process of acceding to the Union by the States, in which the self-understanding of at least some of the ratifying conventions was that the States retained what they did not expressly convey to the national government. This included their sovereignty.

Southerners who followed Thomas Jefferson believed that the virtues of self-government, to be nourished and preserved, were best fostered by an agrarian social order. As the nineteenth century progressed, this order was perceived as being threatened by industrialism. The very best of the pro-slavery writers, George Fitzhugh, would level the charge of "wage slavery" against the North; and who can say he was wrong about that? And how much of the current debate about "welfare reform" is but a continuance (whether its protagonists realize it or not) of that old argument? Is a person flipping hamburgers in the local fast food joint truly free? Not in the Southern understanding of liberty; and, truth be told, you and I are probably not, either.

The tragedy of the South, and of the order fostered by agrarianism, is that industry and its benefits are a necessity for any nation wishing to preserve its independence. The tragedy of modern conservatism lies in its efforts to defend a noble and historically conditioned cause of liberty in a land where the preconditions for that liberty have been slowly vanishing.

Southerners defined freedom as necessarily including economic liberty, so that no man could threaten another man's livelihood for speaking his mind, or worhipping where he pleased. That agarian definition of freedom applies to very few today, and for that state of affairs, we have Lincoln, more than any other individual, to thank or blame. (For the best book on the creator of our American empire, see Gore Vidal's masterful "Lincoln.")

The cause that Jefferson Davis led was the last serious attempt to stem the tide of events. Maybe a romantic attempt, maybe -- given a determined adversary -- a doomed one, but certainly not a wrong or immoral attempt. History records that Davis failed,and it is perhaps inevitable that, given the swirl of issues that attended the conflict, the reasons for which the losing side waged it would be in time distorted beyond recognition.

The victor and his twisted history are not alone in responsibility for this. Every person wielding the Confederate battle flag in opposition to the legitimate struggles of blacks in the South (and in the North), as they sought a decent education and the chance to live lives without fear, bears the burden of using that symbol in a way that has rendered recovery of the cause of the South almost impossible. I sometimes wonder, for example, what Robert E. Lee or Jefferson Davis would have thought of the use of their flag as a backdrop to the racial epithets that were hurled at black children seeking to enter a public high school. To even ask the question is to answer it.

It is perhaps inevitable that, in the post-agrarian world, the power of the state should be harnassed to help alleviate the dislocations of industy and then technology. For if citizens cannot hope to have the necessary preconditions that an agarian would say are essential for a life lived in liberty, then these conditions must be secured against the power of corporations and then -- the most difficult point -- the elites who run the state themselves. That this is almost an impossible task goes without saying. That those who continue to warn of the effects of state power look to such models as Jefferson Davis, a man who in his arrest and torture at the hands of the Federal government is our highest-ranking victim of state power, is to their credit.

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating!
Review: This book is worth the purchase price simply for the fascinating biography of Jefferson Davis. This gentleman stood head and shoulders above the sectionalist, despotic, backwoods bozo who won the election of 1860 and forced the Southern states to secede in order to preserve the Constitutional ideals handed on to them by the Founding Fathers. If Jefferson Davis, a man who proved time and again during his national career that he was concerned with the general welfare and interests of *all* the states, had run in the election of 1860 and won I believe he would have been hailed as the greatest American president since George Washington.

He was a hero of the Mexican-American War; he treated captured American Indians with honor and dignity; he was a Congressman and Senator of note who was scrupulously honest in the performance of his duties -- even to the point of not availing himself of the perks of his office; and he was probably the best Secretary of War our nation had (which to its eternal shame did not officially acknowledge his death in 1889 as all other Secretaries were acknowledged and officially mourned).

And that's only the first half of the book!

The second half is an impassioned defense of Jefferson Davis' honor and proof that he was not a traitor based on the writings of the Founding Fathers (including such centralists -- even monarchists -- as Alexander Hamilton). Based on the ideals of the Founding Fathers, as the Kennedys prove beyond doubt, Jefferson Davis was not a traitor. Abraham Lincoln and his Yankee cohorts who raped and ravaged the South in the name of "preserving the Union!" were the true traitors, indeed war criminals.

This juror's verdict? Jefferson Davis was right!