Secession

Calhoun emphasized the principle that the states were sovereign and independent and not merely the creation of the federal government.

One type of secession active in 2025 is when one or more rural counties seek to secede from the current state to join a neighboring state.

Most modern Americans cannot conceive of states seceding from the US, but in 1860, the majority of the people believed secession was both legal and moral and saw the Constitution as permitting it. 

When one thinks of Jeffersonian Democrats, the founding of the US comes to mind. However, the Jeffersonian ideals were held well into the 1860s by people who believed that the states created the union, not the other way around.

The Southern secession from 1861-65 is portrayed as a “lost cause” by supporters and an act of evil by its detractors. Murray Rothbard argued that the Confederates were seeking freedom from political oppressors, just as their ancestors had done in the American Revolution.

California secession would not change the US into a laissez-faire paradise, but the positive change would be immense.

Alexander Stephens's infamous “Cornerstone” speech remains controversial even today. The simple revisionist narrative is that the northern states opposed slavery while only the South supported it. Like all narratives, it leaves out important information.

William Rawle was a well-respected lawyer, legal scholar, an abolitionist, and a believer in the right of states to secede. He described this in A View of the Constitution of the United States of America, which many claimed to have read while at West Point prior to the Civil War.

William Rawle was a well-respected lawyer, legal scholar, an abolitionist, and a believer in the right of states to secede. He described this in A View of the Constitution of the United States of America, which many claimed to have read while at West Point prior to the Civil War.

Historical revisionism is nothing new, and recent attempts to label an “antiracist” approach to history have wrongly been called “revisionist.” To better understand revisionism, one must first be grounded in reality, then apply reality-based thought to studying the past.