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General Order No. 11 was the title of an order issued by Major-General Ulysses S. Grant on December 17, 1862, during the American Civil War. It became notorious for its instruction for the expulsion of all Jews in his military district comprising areas of Tennessee, Mississippi, and Kentucky. The order was issued as part of a campaign against a black market in Southern cotton, which Grant was convinced was being run "mostly by Jews and other unprincipled traders".

Following protests from Jewish community leaders and an outcry by members of Congress and the press, it was revoked a few weeks later by order of President Abraham Lincoln. Grant later claimed it had been drafted by a subordinate and that he had signed it without reading.

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Text of Grant's Order

General Order No. 11 decreed as follows:

1. The Jews, as a class violating every regulation of trade established by the Treasury Department and also department orders, are hereby expelled from the Department [of the Tennessee] within twenty-four hours from the receipt of this order.
2. Post commanders will see to it that all of this class of people be furnished passes and required to leave, and any one returning after such notification will be arrested and held in confinement until an opportunity occurs of sending them out as prisoners, unless furnished with permit from headquarters.
3. No passes will be given these people to visit headquarters for the purpose of making personal application of trade permits.[4]

In a letter of the same date sent to Christopher Parsons Wolcott, the assistant United States Secretary of War, Grant explained his reasoning:

Sir,

I have long since believed that in spite of all the vigilance that can be infused into Post Commanders, that the Specie regulations of the Treasury Dept. have been violated, and that mostly by Jews and other unprincipled traders. So well satisfied of this have I been at this that I instructed the Commdg Officer at Columbus [Kentucky] to refuse all permits to Jews to come south, and frequently have had them expelled from the Dept. [of the Tennessee]. But they come in with their Carpet sacks in spite of all that can be done to prevent it. The Jews seem to be a privileged class that can travel any where. They will land at any wood yard or landing on the river and make their way through the country. If not permitted to buy Cotton themselves they will act as agents for someone else who will be at a Military post, with a Treasury permit to receive Cotton and pay for it in Treasury notes which the Jew will buy up at an agreed rate, paying gold.

There is but one way that I know of to reach this case. That is for Government to buy all the Cotton at a fixed rate and send it to Cairo, St Louis, or some other point to be sold. Then all traders, they are a curse to the Army, might be expelled.[5]

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The order went into immediate effect, with Jewish traders and families in Holly Springs, Mississippi, Oxford, Mississippi, and Paducah, Kentucky being forced to leave the territory. Such a sweeping interpretation may not have been intended by Grant; his headquarters expressed no objection to the continued presence of Jewish sutlers, as opposed to cotton traders. However, the wording of the order singled out all Jews, irrespective of their occupation, and it was implemented accordingly.

A group of Jewish merchants from Paducah, led by Cesar J. Kaskel, dispatched a telegram to President Abraham Lincoln in which they condemned the order as "the grossest violation of the Constitution and our rights as good citizens under it". The telegram noted it would "place us . . . as outlaws before the world. We respectfully ask your immediate attention to this enormous outrage on all law and humanity ...." [5] Throughout the Union, Jewish groups protested and sent telegrams to Washington, D.C.

The issue attracted significant attention in Congress and from the press. The Democrats condemned the order as part of what they saw as the US Government's systematic violation of civil liberties and tabled a motion of censure against Grant in the Senate, attracting thirty votes in favour against seven opposed. Some newspapers supported Grant's action; the Washington Chronicle criticised Jews as "scavengers ... of commerce". Most, however, were strongly opposed, with the New York Times denouncing the order as "humiliating" and a "revival of the spirit of the medieval ages." Its editorial column called for the "utter reprobation" of Grant's order.[6]

Kaskel led a delegation to Washington, D.C., arriving there on January 3, 1863. In Washington, he conferred with Jewish Republican Adolphus Solomons and a Cincinnati congressman, John A. Gurley. After meeting with Gurley, he went directly to the White House. Lincoln received the delegation and studied Kaskel's copies of General Order No. 11 and the specific order expelling Kaskel from Paducah. The President told General-in-Chief Henry Wager Halleck to have Grant revoke General Order No. 11, which Halleck did in the following message:

A paper purporting to be General Orders, No. 11, issued by you December 17, has been presented here. By its terms, it expells [sic] all Jews from your department. If such an order has been issued, it will be immediately revoked.[5]

One of Halleck's staff officers privately explained to Grant that the problem lay with the excessive scope of the order: "Had the word 'pedlar' been inserted after Jew I do not suppose any exception would have been taken to the order." According to Halleck, Lincoln had "no objection to [his] expelling traitors and Jew peddlers, which I suppose, was the object of your order; but as in terms proscribing an entire religious class, some of whom are fighting in our ranks, the President deemed it necessary to revoke it." The Republican politician Elihu B. Washburne defended Grant in similar terms. However, Grant's subordinates expressed concern at the order. One Jewish officer resigned in protest and Captain John C. Kelton, the assistant Adjutant-General of the Department of Missouri, wrote to Grant to note his order included all Jews, rather than focusing on "certain obnoxious individuals," and pointed out the Jews serving in the Union Army.[7] [6] The order was politically unsustainable and Grant formally revoked it on January 17, 1863.

On January 6, a delegation led by Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise of Cincinnati, called on Lincoln to express its gratitude for Lincoln's support. Lincoln expressed surprise Grant issued such a command and said, "to condemn a class is, to say the least, to wrong the good with the bad." He stated he drew no distinction between Jew and Gentile and would allow no American to be wronged because of his religious affiliation.

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Supporters of Lakotah argue that their assertion of sovereignty is entirely legal under "Natural, International and United States law"[27]. The group emphasizes that the Republic's establishment comes from a "withdrawal" from the United States, not a secession.[7][16]

They argue that as an Indian tribe in the United States, the Lakota were already and always have been a sovereign nation as guaranteed under Article Six of the United States Constitution, bound to the United States Federal Government by treaty. As such, the legal basis of such a state's independence is argued to be the Lakota nation's withdrawal from the Treaty of Fort Laramie (1851) and the Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868) and the rejection of all United States federal laws, executive orders, and other government acts since then, in particular rejecting the Major Crimes Act, the General Allotment Act, the Citizenship Act of 1924, the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934, the Indian Claims Commission Act, Public Law 280 and the Termination Act.[28][18]

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US Government response

The United States Department of State is referring queries on the subject of Lakotah to the United States Department of the Interior, which oversees the Bureau of Indian Affairs.[46]

Gary Garrison of the BIA said that the group's withdrawal "doesn't mean anything". "These are not legitimate tribal governments elected by the people ... when they begin the process of violating other people's rights, breaking the law, they're going to end up like all the other groups that have declared themselves independent - usually getting arrested and being put in jail".[9]

Russell Means, on the subject of what the Republic of Lakotah expects the Federal Government response to be, has stated that "I don't expect the federal government to do anything. I don't believe they even know what to do."[7]

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1903 - The Wright Brothers make their first powered and heavier-than-air flight in the Wright Flyer at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.

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1925 - Benito Mussolini announces he is taking dictatorial powers over Italy.

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1496 - Leonardo da Vinci unsuccessfully tests a flying machine.

James

Jan 3 2009, 11:00 PM

On this day in history, I made this post. Lets not forget that.

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In the strange connection to January when some of the most notorious earthquakes in the world happened, the worst in recorded history happened on January 23, 1556 in Shaanxi, China. After the recent quake at the time of this writing in Sichuan, China having an unimaginable death toll for the modern populace, we tend to forget that earthquakes from prior centuries were even deadlier. But considering that Shaanxi quake in 1556 killed approximately 830,000 (even though there was no reliable method of count then), the souls of those lost there teach us a lot about earthquakes back then and how those in China today are actually surviving them much better thanks to knowing what to do when they strike and modern technology creating more stabilization in the structure of buildings.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/769133/chinas_worst_earthquake_in_history.html

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In 1790, the South Carolina legislative body granted special legal status to a community of Moroccans, twelve years after the Sultan of Morocco became the first foreign head of state to formally recognize the United States.[12] In 1796, then president John Adams signed a treaty declaring the United States had no "character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen".[13]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_the_United_States