“Why are you standing with confederates who betrayed this country?” Those words from New York Times editorial board member Mara Gay on MSNBC captured the unhinged coverage of the Colorado Supreme Court’s disqualification of Donald Trump from the 2024 election. While the underlying theory under the 14th Amendment had been previously rejected by jurists in various states (including many Democrats), Gay had a simple take for viewers: anyone raising democratic or constitutional objections are modern day confederates.
Gay was asked on MSNBC’s Morning Joe how she would respond to many of us who have questioned the constitutional basis for using the 14th Amendment to bar Trump from ballots.
Gay responded:
“Why are you standing with confederates who betrayed this country? This is what they’re standing with. It’s the spirit of those confederates rather than the Americans who came together after a long and brutal Civil War that was fought to keep the Union together and clearly saw a threat in ex-confederates running for office. So much so they amended the Constitution to prevent those traitors from running for office.”
It is that simple for the editors of the New York Times: either you support this previously rejected theory to prevent voters from casting their ballots for a candidate or you are a confederate. So those three Democratic appointees on the Colorado Supreme Court were just more confederate fellow travelers.
Gay knows that other states and courts have rejected this theory. She knows that even the majority said that the precedent for the decision was “sparce” and that this was “uncharted territory.” Yet, if you reach the opposing view of most judges who have looked at this question, you are standing not with the Constitution but the confederacy.
The obvious attempt is to intimidate and ostracize those who may have qualms over barring citizens from voting for candidates. It is akin to being called a racist on campus if you oppose diversity policies or standards on academic grounds.
It is only the latest example of how the left is engaging in McCarthy-like tactics to portray advocates for free speech or other constitutional protections as enemies of the state. Back in the day, it was the Democrats who were denounced for raising such legal objections. Now, Democratic members and pundits attack witnesses as “Putin lovers” or supporters of “insurrectionists” in opposing censorship. Or confederates for objecting to ballot cleansing.
Indeed the rhetoric used by Gay is strikingly familiar to the defense for censorship on the left. She added on MSNBC that the Colorado decision “should send a message that our electoral system can be used for nefarious purposes against democracy itself. It’s clear. It’s clear as day.”
Thus, it is up to society to protect citizens from the “nefarious” uses of free speech or free elections by cleansing ballots and social media.
Of course, others simply used the opinion to vent on an almost schoolyard level. Rick Wilson of The Lincoln Project, taunted the former president and said that the court “called you out for what you are. You’re a filthy insurrectionist. You’re a losing loser who loses.” That is still weirdly preferable to labeling anyone raising constitutional concerns as standing with “confederate traitors.” Yet, it is remarkable how these critics who have long objected to Trump rhetoric have adopted the same personal and reckless rhetoric.
Gay’s interview should be chilling for anyone who cares about both law and journalism. It shows the righteous rage that fuels the intolerance in our country. It also shows the potential for this insidious theory as more Democratic politicians, like those in California, who are calling for their own officials to find ways to block Trump from ballots.
It was not the South that betrayed this Country but the North. They HATED the Constitution. Here’s the opinion of the Radical Republicans of the 1850s and 1860s:
“Freedom of speech and freedom of the press, precious relics of former history, must not be construed too largely.” General William T. Sherman
“We are Disunionists, we want to get rid of the Union.” Wendell Phillips, Radical Republican, 1859
“We confess that we intend to trample underfoot the Constitution of this country.” Wendell Phillips, Radical Republican
As Radical Republican WENDELL PHILLIPS said in 1860:
“The Republican party is in no sense a National party; it is a party pledged to work for the downfall of Democracy, the downfall of the Union, and the destruction of the United States Constitution. The religious creed of the party was hate of Democracy, hate of the Union, hate of the Constitution, and hate of the Southern people.”
Radical Republican WENDELL PHILLIPS:
“The Republican party is the first sectional party ever organized in this country. It does not know its own face and calls itself National, but it is not National, it is sectional. It is the party of the North pledged against the South. It was organized with hatred of the Constitution.”
“The Republican party that elected Abraham Lincoln is pledged to the downfall of the Union and the destruction of the United States Constitution.-Wendell Phillips
The North “HATED the Constitution.”
They hated it so much that they fought a war to apply to to blacks enslaved by the South.
You want to rationalize slavery, that’s on you. But you don’t get to rewrite history. The historical fact is that many of the Abolitionist arguments were based on the Constitution.
For more on this, see: _The Crooked Path to Abolition_, by James Oakes
Democrats do not won’t the unwashed masses to be able to vote unless they perceive they are winning or they can cheat their way into a victory for their progressive masters, the elites of the northeast corridor.
we are getting closer to a real insurrection as these unconstitutional attempts to prevent democracy and to make being a conservative illegal gain traction with the main stream media influencing those with silly putty for their convictions.
Mara Gay, a fascist.
Question. Why is it treason for conservatives to protest inside the Capitol building, but freedom fighting when Hamas supporters, people dressed as the Handmaid’s Tale, or other left wing activists do it? Or when BLM burned cities, threw bombs at federal buildings, and destroyed an entire police precinct. THAT wasn’t insurrection?
Why the double standard?
Also, Jan 6 was not only a riot. It was also a peaceful rally blocks away that cleaned up after itself, and a peaceful demonstration let in by Capitol police in which most people took selfies. It was a subgroup of a subgroup that broke off and became unruly.
Kind of disturbing the lack of real historical knowledge. The Confederates were Democrats who would rather leave the union than give up keeping slaves. A Confederate cowardly murdered the founder of the GOP to prevent Reconstruction from helping blacks bc Lincoln foolishly picked a Dem VP to try and reconcile the country. For any Democrat to accuse the GOP of being Confederates when any knowledgeable person knows from the early 1800s to today the racists have ALWAYS been Democrats is straight up ignorance.
So you have never heard of the “Southern Solution”? That’s more up to date than you using pre-civil war political party designation.
Another mindless incoherent steaming turd from fishy smell
The Democrat Party believed race determined value then, and it does now.
Democrats used to harass blacks for not voting Democrat then, and they do now.
Democrats believed that blacks were incapable then, and they do now. They demand the bar be lowered, and to abolish meritocracy, to benefit blacks, while they tacitly admit that other minority like Asians and Polynesians do quite well. Japanese were put in internment camps and lost everything in the 1940s. Today, they are on average more successful than Americans of European ancestry. Strangely, the long history of discrimination towards Asians has not been grounds for Reparations. Republicans believed in meritocracy then, and that blacks can be successful, and they do now.
Objectively, it must be very difficult to refer to a soldier as a coward who acts directly against the leader of the opposing military force in that leader’s own capitol, proclaims his position publicly on stage in front of the opposition leader’s audience, and exits with a broken leg.
I wonder if you would accept that impossible mission on orders from your nation.
Objectively a Steaming TURD^^^^
Booth wasn’t a soldier. And he was not acting under orders to kill Lincoln.
The entire calculus changes when you pay attention and assimilate the irrefutable fact that secession was and is fully constitutional, not to mention historically and globally ubiquitous.
Did you know the Confederate flag is Biblical, it was based on a cross an ACTUAL Christian saint (Saint Andrew) was executed upon?
Did you know that the first slave owner in America was a black man that went to court to make slavery FOR LIFE:?
Did you know the North was the one that introduced slavery to the South?
Guess who captured slaves and sold them to Americans in the first place?
Did you know the Civil war was started because the North wanted to tax the South 50% of its’ income?
Did you know in the South, less than 5% of white people had slaves?
Lastly are you aware African American slaves had a better quality of life than the working poor in the USA today? Workers need 30$ an hour to equal the standard of living of a 19th century slave. “Minimum-Wage Workers and 19th-Century Slaves: An Economic Comparison” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiS-cSUKsh8
There is even more hidden history if anyone would care to learn, and I am a yankee from NYC. I just discovered all this the past couple years.
https://confederateshop.com/archives/2976
More about the confederate flag: “…the blue x in the confederate flag refers to Saint Andrews’ cross “he St. Andrew’s Cross (‘X-shaped cross’ or ‘Cross in the shape of a Roman ten’) is a cross with two diagonal intersecting bars. It cross consists of slanting beams (also of different lengths), the term sloping cross is also used. There is this cross often at a level crossing. The name refers to the apostle Andrew, who is said to have died as a martyr on such a cross, reports from the 4th century suggest. The diagonal cross has therefore become an attribute of this apostle and found expression in religion and especially in late medieval Christian iconography. Originally a symbol of the crossed sticks of the fire sacrificial altar, it can also be found in depictions of the sacrifice of Isaac. It also contains the Greek letter Chi (Χ) as a symbol for Christ, as in the Christ monogram. Especially in early Christian times, the St. Andrew’s cross was often used for the name of Christ, e.g. B. was used as an identifier.”
George has officially gone off the deep end^^^^^
I believe it’s a little more involved than slavery. Taxation, the bankers don’t like it when they don’t control who has the cash. Cotton was King.
Lincoln didn’t “found” the Republican Party. And he was a dictator who had newspapers shuttered, editors arrested, stripped away and ignored Constitutional protections, who unlawfully seized firearms, who imposed puppet governments on a state that had not withdrawn from the “Union”, and unlawfully initiated hostilities to provoke an attack by the withdrawing states. Lincoln’s unconstitutional acts against South Carolina provoked Virginia & North Carolina, which had previously rejected secession, to reconsider and vote to secede BECAUSE OF LINCOLN’s tyranny.
Ergo “death to tyrants”
Lincoln paid dearly for his sins.
Your logic would imply that the Detroit Lions won the Super Bowl because Matthew Statford won it when he played for the Rams.
RE: Times Editorial Board Member Paints Opponents to Trump’s Disqualification as Modern Day Confederates
…although certainly not intended as such, I deserve no such commendation to be compared with my illustrious forebears (God bless ’em), who fought against yankee tyranny – apparently, they were right, after all.
I disagree. 600K dead to preserve slavery was not brave nor honorable. Lee, Davis etc were traitors and should have been hanged as such
The Southern States peacefully, patriotically, legally, and constitutionally seceded.
Period. Full stop.
That is all.
In a society of laws, the laws must be adhered to, or the society is doomed.
Secession is not prohibited by the U.S. Constitution, and many State constitutions provide for secession.
“Crazy Abe” Lincoln nullified fundamental law, denied fully constitutional secession, commenced an unconstitutional war, and killed a million Americans.
The Supreme Court held in Texas v White in 1869 that States do not have a constitutional right to secede. The South lost the Civil War. The 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments are part of the Constitution. This history and reality cannot be changed by endless daily comments — end of story!
To the contrary, any person who is willing to stand in the line of fire and shed their own blood to defend their deepest-held beliefs, however reprehensible you and I may view those beliefs, is both brave and honorable.
To the contrary, any person who is willing to stand in the line of fire and shed their own blood in defense of their deepest-held beliefs is both brave and honorable, no matter how reprehensible you and I may find their beliefs.
The fight then was the fight now. Align the Southern agricultural industry to today’s carbon emissions standards. A federal bureaucracy that has no viable solutions to alternatives while demanding immediate elimination of the industries main means of production.
The civil war was fought over States rights, abolition was the anchor for the Federal to justify their actions. Now we are all slaves through taxation.
The men you refer to were honorable patriots, more than a few were from founding families of this Nation.
I was born a Confederate and am proud to still be one.
This NY Times op-ed from JAN 8,2021 summarizes how Breckinridge and another Scott collaborated to make sure the electoral votes electing Lincoln got counted.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/08/opinion/capitol-protest-1861-lincoln.html
Real Confederates did their duty, back in the day. Republicans feared that Lincoln’s presidential electors would not be certified in FEB 1861. But the Vice President at that time, John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky, did his duty and oversaw the certification, despite a walkout from one senator and protests from others. Even more striking is the fact that Breckinridge, a Southern Democrat, had finished second to Abraham Lincoln in a field of four candidates.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/08/opinion/capitol-protest-1861-lincoln.html
Section 3—–>Section 5—–>18 USC 2383
End of story.
“Why are you standing with confederates who betrayed this country?”
– Mara Gay
_____________
The only person who betrayed this country egregiously is Abraham Lincoln.
Lincoln illicitly and unconstitutionally denied the fully constitutional right and freedom of secession to sovereign United States.
Secession was and is not prohibited by the Constitution, and it is fully constitutional.
Secession, “not delegated to the U.S. nor prohibited to the States, is reserved to the States.”
Secession is historically and globally ubiquitous.
A criminal act shall not beget a furtherance of crime.
Every effect and consequence of Lincoln, subsequent to his unconstitutional denial of secession, was and remains invalid, illegitimate, illicit, and unconstitutional, demanding comprehensive and full correction.
Barring that, the name of this once-great and now defunct nation must be replaced and a new manifesto imposed by the communists (liberals, progressives, socialists, democrats, RINOs, AINOs).
The Union of Obama Socialist Republics (UOSR), under the Communist Manifesto of Karl Marx, would do nicely.
Real Confederates knew how to do their duty. Witness Vice President John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky. In FEB 1861, he certified Lincoln’s electors while presiding over the Senate. This despite a walkout by one senator and calls to invalidate the vote. More remarkable, Breckinridge had finished second to Lincoln in the 1860 race, running as a Southern Democrat. This NY Times op-ed from JAN 8,2021 summarizes.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/08/opinion/capitol-protest-1861-lincoln.html
Your reading of the Constitution was challenged and lost. Defending slavery is not defensible
Reprehensible slavery was made legal by constitutional legislation.
Reprehensible slavery must have been made illegal and legally abrogated by constitutional legislation.
Secession was and is not prohibited and fully constitutional.
In a society of law, the laws must be adhered to or the society is doomed.
The U.S. Constitution and American freedom persisted for a mere 71 years.
Lincoln could not abide the Constitution and constitutional legislation, being the high criminal that he was.
Long-suffering abductees must have been compassionately repatriated as is the natural desire and demand of all abductees.
Taking over the government and imposing martial law as a dictator as Lincoln did is typically illegal and unconstitutional.
The African tribal leaders who abducted and sold their own citizens for profit might disagree with you.
I haven’t heard of African tribal leaders paying “REPARATIONS” for their deeds.
It was not the confederates that betrayed the country; it was the power hungry yankees that refused to honor the US constitution, as it was written. The South refused to be part of a lawless nation that ran roughshod over the South.
Silly the southern sates all knew the end of slavery would come as the British and French had already done so. Would you really argue that we are worse off today as a country because slavery was outlawed?
Spoken like someone who doesnt care about the 1000s of lives lost every year in chicago alone.