No carving here. You say they are all wrong?
Yes, they are all wrong. The thing is, most dealers and auction houses are generalist, that is, they know a little about a lot of objects as opposed to knowing a lot about very little. They are not specialist in a single type object (like furniture for instance). Add in that period American Empire is all hand made, each piece is unique and the fact that it tends to be expensive and BAM! it's easy to see how people market a related but clearly different object as the same.
The bottom line? Your friends piece is a late classical stand, about 1850 or later and the value as stated before is not a lot, about $100-$200 in todays auction market. Perhaps the most critical factor here is this, people who collect period american Empire will know the difference, of that you can be sure so right away, that segment of the market is off limits for this stand.