None Dare Call It Treason

Posted by Chad Orzel on December 14, 2010
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As usual, the most sensible commentary on the Southern organizations celebrating the 150th anniversary of secession comes from the Daily Show. Specifically, Larry Wilmore:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c
The South’s Secession Commemoration
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog</a> The Daily Show on Facebook

This whole business makes me think the British have the right idea regarding the commemoration of treason. We should have an annual Jefferson Davis day, but along the lines of Guy Fawkes day, not a fancy-dress ball for neo-confederates. If we’d spent the last century and a half burning them in effigy, maybe we wouldn’t have to suffer people with confederate flag decals on their trucks questioning the patriotism of New Yorkers.

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Comments

  1. #1 vagueofgodalming
    December 14, 2010

    Yeah but we celebrate Guy Fawkes Day, as 1066 And All That put it, to remind Parliament that it would have been a Good Thing.

  2. #2 DRK
    December 14, 2010

    It would be fun, though, to have a holiday where we could burn something in effigy, like maybe Jefferson Davis.

    Remember remember twenty-fourth of December
    Secessionist slaveholder plot
    I see no reason why calling it treason
    Ever should be forgot

  3. #3 marciepooh
    December 14, 2010

    As long as I still get the day off from work (AL state employee here) I’d be happy to burn Jeff Davis in effigy on his birthday.

  4. #4 Mark P
    December 14, 2010

    The most unfortunate thing about the whole idea is that the whole idea is not dead. There are lots of people, including quite a few politicians, who think the South had the right idea. They cloak it in “states’ rights” but of course it all boils down to the white power structure (rich, old, white men) controlling everything. I live down here, and my opinion now is that maybe it would be pretty good for the rest of the country if everyone who believes that stuff moved down South and the sane among of us down here could move some other place where you don’t drown in your own sweat if you take a walk in July. Then we could let them secede and the rest of us would be the better for it.

  5. #5 Brian
    December 14, 2010

    Marcie: Wait, you get a day off from work for Jefferson Davis’ birthday????

  6. #6 katydid13
    December 14, 2010

    My 11th grad American History teacher sometimes called it “the War of Northern Aggression.” I’d like to think he was joking, but now I’m not so sure.

  7. #7 marciepooh
    December 14, 2010

    Yep. We state workers get Confederate Memorial Day (last Monday in April) and Jefferson Davis’ Birthday (first Monday in June) off. (As I understand it’s because years ago the employees took the extra holidays instead of a raise.) And I’d be glad to do some effigy burning on those days in celebration. It’d be a lot more fun than scouring Wikipedia for alternate things to say the day is.

  8. #8 Paul
    December 14, 2010

    American revolution was also a treason. The two didn’t differ all that much as far as I can tell, apart from the fact that the second one failed.

    History is written by the victors.

  9. #9 Chad Orzel
    December 15, 2010

    American revolution was also a treason. The two didn’t differ all that much as far as I can tell, apart from the fact that the second one failed.

    Other than, you know, that one was fought over the right to own other human beings as property and the other wasn’t. A minor difference, but there you go.

  10. #10 mad_prophet
    December 16, 2010

    Secession in and of itself isn’t evil. While many of the the Confederate States seceded because of slavery (especially South Carolina), some northern abolitionists (e.g. Lysander Spooner) were calling for northern states to secede prior to the war.

  11. #11 Kaleberg
    December 16, 2010

    Secession might not be evil, but the Confederacy was. It was all about slavery, and each state’s statement of secession cited slavery as its primary cause. The mere fact that so many apologists try to argue that the Confederate cause was other than slavery shows that even they recognize the evil of their cause, but what does one expect from apologists trying to justify that which cannot be justified.

    The Confederacy still is evil, with the murder, divorce and poverty belts running through its heart to this day.

  12. #12 mad_prophet
    December 17, 2010

    I’m not here to argue the merits of the position of “northern saints, southern sinners,” as it has little to do with topic of secession.