> There would have been no United States left to retain citizenship to. The US > was made up of the North AND the South. Once the "United States" were no > longer united, it would have been the Confederate States of America, and the > Federal States of America. Sorry, but your are wrong here. Even if the southern states seceded peacefully, what was left of the old United States would still be the "United States". The remaining States would have been the United States. The Confederacy never intended to overthrow the U.S. government, only separating itself from it. ( Confederate History 101 ) > The Federal > Government had overstepped their bounds, passing laws to punish the Southern > States, ignoring the fact that these States had rights as sovereign and > independent States. Clearly you have no intention of seeing both sides of the story. Was Maj. Anderson overstepping his bounds by keeping his forces at Ft. Sumter ? I think firing on Ft. Sumter before making an opportunity for peaceful separation was overstepping the process. Most Confederates themselves recognized this as the one mistake that lost them their cause. Rash behavior alienated the sympathetic majority in the northern States and left Lincoln no alternative but military action. > How can you say that they were "Federal" owned property? They belonged > equally and jointly to the United States, the Southern States being PART OF the > United States. Just goes to show you how we, even now, see the government as being > an entity unto itself, and not belonging to us, the people of these United > States. Yes, they were the joint property of the United States. One State or a group of States can not legally confiscate joint property. Like you said it belongs to the people of the United States, not simply the people of the deep South. There has got to be a legal process here. --Scott Williams