Here’s a cool animation of the progress of the Civil War — it’s like the Confederacy is a giant gelatinous red blob spread over the South, punctuated with explosions as it occasionally makes amoeboid protrusions into the North, only to eventually succumb as it is driven back and chopped into bits.
Sorry, Southerners who read this blog, you may not want to watch. The Yankees will enjoy it, though. Except for the little meter with the casualty counts, which is spinning at a horrendous rate for both sides.
I too will apologize to readers from the south, but sometimes I can’t help but wish we’d let the south secede. I’m sick and tired of southern politics…
We won, but we lost.
No need to apologize, PZ. I’m a Southerner who reads this blog, and trust me that we (Southerners) are acutely aware of which side won the US Civil War. The War(tm) is rather an obsession down here, which I understand is not the case in the rest of the US. For the record, I’m not a Confederate sympathizer.
Sherman’s March to the Sea really spelled the end of the Confederacy, didn’t it? You can see that once the beast was split in half like that, it quickly collapsed. Amazing to watch.
Couple of observations from across the Pond
1) The animation really does make The War of Northern Aggression seem like a suitable name for the conflict.
2) I had no idea it took place over such a small part of the now USA.
Shouldn’t the South be grey, not red? Red seems anachronistic, and colours the South with the brush of current politics, especially once you consider Lincoln was Republican (a red North?!!).
But when they do show up, a jaw-dropping and hilarious type will be had by all.
“The animation really does make The War of Northern Aggression seem like a suitable name for the conflict.”
How do you figure? I’m not sure how you could get anything about cause from the, admittedly interesting, movie.
The short movie was enhanced by a really good choice of music to go with it.
[#4 and #7]
I think what Donalbain is referring to is that, once the wave of secessions was passed, the animation doesn’t show the Confederacy really making any significant incursions into the Union. For pretty much the whole thing, they were either just holding the line or being forced back.
1) The animation really does make The War of Northern Aggression seem like a suitable name for the conflict.
Yes. The CSA’s only military goals were to protect its own borders and sovereignity. The USA’s military goal was to conquer the seceded territory, and restore the Union.
2) I had no idea it took place over such a small part of the now USA.
See #1. The CSA were pretty much always on the defensive except for the breakout campaign at Gettysburg, where they hoped to inflict enough casualties to stun the USA into ending the war.
I too will apologize to readers from the south, but sometimes I can’t help but wish we’d let the south secede. I’m sick and tired of southern politics…
Then again, if the Union army (and politicians during the Reconstruction) hadn’t come through and behaved like, well, like Americans invading and occupying a country, we might never have had Southern politics as we know it.
But holding the line was all they needed to do; victory for the South would have been diplomatic (recognition by the major European powers), not military. Even major incursions into Northern territory like the one that ended at Gettysburg were essentially defensive in their strategic purpose.
Given that all the Confederacy had to do was not lose, and given the length and the incredible, sickening bloodiness of the war (much harder on Northern public opinion since survival was not at stake), the outcome is actually pretty amazing.
I’m not sure cause has anything to do with it. The plain fact is, and it is illustrated well by this animation, that the south, with a few notable exceptions, fought a defensive war. It wasn’t like the Confederacy was planning on invading and taking over the Union. The only reason they did mount any invasions of the north was to relieve pressure on other fronts (well, except in Kansas… but that was almost a whole different war).
OTOH, implying that the north had no reason for their aggression as the common usage of “War of Northern Aggression” does is most certainly fallacious.
Bureaucratus Minimis got there before me. Just like Lee usually got places before the Union generals did, until Grant came along…
Some Southerners will undoubtedly be offended and charge me with bigotry (it happens here every time somebody disparages the culture of the South). But It’s impossible to know anything about the Civil War and not be convinced that the Union were the good guys and the Confederacy the bad guys. Yes, it sounds simplistic, and many Northerners were as racist as most Southerners; and, yes, the causes were varied and it was not simply a war to end slavery; and, yes, the Union armies committed atrocities. But as far as wars go, this one and WWII were really straightforward good guys vs. bad guys affairs.
___________________________
Well, this kind of animation doesn’t reveal that much about the action — only territory shifts. Those little flutterings of the border back and forth on the eastern side were incredibly intense and bloody, and that they didn’t lead to major gains hides the magnitude of the battles that were going on.
The map also doesn’t adequately show the differences in leadership. Lee was an immense advantage to the South, and McClellan…well, tidy uniforms and pretty parade ground marches don’t show up on the map, either.
Has anyone blamed Darwin, materialists, or atheists for this little conflict yet?
I thought the title referred to the recent secession of the Lakota. That ought to take around four minutes to settle with a few bombers.
Darn, Bureaucratus beat me to the punch.
Well, as a liberal southerner with ancestors who fought on both sides I have to say that for the good of the country and for my own existence that the North won. But the feeling to add the caveat, “If it weren’t for y’all’s superior numbers. . . and industry, and etc ” is a great temptation even with me. ;)
I recall talking to a historical re-enactor. He had “fought” battle on both sides but preferred to fight for the South because he liked to win.
This film seems to be no longer available. All the links to it that I can find are not wroking. Has it been “PZed”? (As in slash dotted).
It worked for me from PZ’s link just now. Try again.
I think the only mistake made during the Civil War was the lack of real foresight into what was to happen afterwards with the enslaved. If anything, the North should have invaded the South and put in new management and possibly created a new government for each of the Confederate States to prevent the idea of ‘States Rights’ from turning into code for ‘bigotry.’ While war is nasty, we should have placed more care into changing it into what the North saw as right and not simply letting the South free to its devices to keep on this pathetic ‘heritage’ of institutionalized bigotry.
Hey, the Panda’s Thumb is based in the South. Surely we can’t all be bad.
Don’t you think the film would be useful in American history classes? I haven’t succeeded in getting the producers to release the thing. Want to agitate for action?
Might does not make right.
“What the North saw as right” was, in fact, institutionalized bigotry. The same Congress that passed the 14th Amendment passed a law segregating the D.C. public schools.
Lincoln was a liberal. At the time the Republican party was a brand new liberal party set up to compete with the then conservative Democratic party. The switch in orientation did not take place until the early 1900’s around the time of the first Roosevelt, if I recall correctly. The south has always been more conservative and the north has always been more liberal, since before the U.S. even existed. So painting it in terms of current colors is not at all inappropriate, the names may have been different but the politics were the same.
Even though one consequence (not originally intended) was the abolition of slavery (soon enough replaced by Jim Crow quasi-slavery, though), I have trouble seeing the mind-boggling slaughter as being justified. Sorry, Abe.
But It’s impossible to know anything about the Civil War and not be convinced that the Union were the good guys and the Confederacy the bad guys. Yes, it sounds simplistic,
You’re right: that’s quite a simplistic view. Ending slavery was unquestionably good. Saving the union? Eh, who knows? A divided US might have been less of a threat to world peace. On the other hand, a victorious CSA might have decided to go conquesting south, leading to something even worse than the Monroe Doctrine in Central and South America. Abandoning the former slaves to poverty and oppression? Clearly bad. Raping and pillaging as part of the war? Bad. And bad tactics–why make a population you intend to rule hate you? The plan (fortunately abandoned) to deport all the former slaves to Africa, a place they’d never lived? Bad. One good outcome does not justify all bad behavior on the part of the north. Sorry.
“I too will apologize to readers from the south, but sometimes I can’t help but wish we’d let the south secede. I’m sick and tired of southern politics…”
Hey now…Jimmy Carter (GA), Al Gore (TN), Bill Clinton (AK) are from Dixie. Y’all have blessed us with the Bushes (CT), Guiliani (NY), Romney (though born Michigan), Liebermann (CT)….I’ll take Carter, Clinton and Gore over the New-England liberals anyday…
Oddly, Illinois has always been a hard state to figure out….birthplace of Eugene Debs, Ronald Regan, Hillary Clinton…
Like the Kennedys? Barney Frank? Tip O’Neill? FDR? Senator Pell?
Interesting except for that silly casualty counter. Must have based it on McPherson’s(sp?) History of the Civil War which did things like have the Army of Northern Virginia (pretty well documented during the winter of 1864-and reinforcements during the campaign known) suffer more casualties in the campaign of 1864 than it had infantry. Which makes you wonder how the ANV showed up in the trenches at Petersburg with roughly 40,000 combat ready. Best estimates for actual deaths (not casualties) run roughly 200,000 for the South (100,000 in battle and 100,000 from disease- out of a total of ~ 750,000 mustered in) and around 350,000+ for the North (~150,000+ in combat-lose more when you’re generally on offence- and 200,000 from disease-more than twice as many troops mustered in meant twice as many deaths from disease)from a total of 2,000,000+.
Lincoln’s plans for reconstruction were generally friendly and generous and might have succeeded at reuniting the nation without the travesty of reconstruction that we got. He was thinking marshall plan, not oppressive occupation.
Congress had other ideas, and the complexities of national politics saw Congress winning. If Lincoln had lived, well…
Let JWBooth’s ghost choke on that.
Also, the south’s plan was very definitely to invade and conquer to the south. Whether the populace would have been behind the leadership is hard to say, but americans in general were aggressive in the 19th century and that manifest destiny stuff was stronger in the south.
And we, the South (and especially blacks), are still paying the price for a war led by a republican with no clear, comprehensive exit strategy.
Steve, I once made the mistake of saying we should have let them secede to an African-American friend of mine. The look he gave me could have burned through steel.
I’m personally quite glad we (the South) lost. We were all in favor of keeping our fellow man enslaved, and to what end?
As far as letting the South win — as someone who is in the midst of the “bible belt” (I’m on the GA/SC border), I understand that the South can sometimes be a source of outstanding ignorance, but to pretend the South is the problem with the United States — that’s just wrong. Hmm… is Dover in the South? How about New York state, where a man can put a child’s penis in his mouth as long as its part of a religious tradition. The problem ain’t the place, it’s the mindset. Also, to say you wish the South would’ve won (if only to keep the South separate) is also to say that you’d prefer that blacks in the South would’ve remained enslaved.
I don’t blame him- it’s a very difficult case to make. I’m really not sure which side I come down on myself. But it’s hard to just ignore 1) the unfortunate fact that improvement in the status of African-Americans was for the most part illusory and temporary, and 2) the enormous heaps of dead and maimed people.
Probably though, contemplating the likely territorial expansionism- and consequent new life given to slavery- of a victorious South would still tip me to the pro-war side in the end.
Slavery was the proximate cause of the “irrepressible conflict” but someone here recommended I read “Albion’s Seed” and I learned lots about the cultural roots of the North, South and parts between and it’s obvious that just as most Union soldiers did not fight to free slaves, most rebel soldiers did not fight to secure rights to slaves.
It is important to remember that the South had power in the nation disproportionate to it’s population. A good book about this is Gary Wills’ “The Negro President”. It’s rather dense despite the fact that it is short and heavily footnoted.
tritonesub is correct, slavery is not the only issue that the civil war concerned; the cotton industry was a major factor. In fact, Lincoln only finally signed the Emancipation Proclamation in an attempt to make the war about slavery, thus preventing England from entering the war to assist the South (the Brits were loving the cheap cotton).
“If anything, the North should have invaded the South and put in new management and possibly created a new government for each of the Confederate States to prevent the idea of ‘States Rights’ from turning into code for ‘bigotry.'”
I don’t believe that you have a complete grasp on how Reconstruction actually occurred, Zbu. Andrew Johnson did in fact pursue an agressive policy towards Reconstruction in the South. Admittedly he didn’t go as far as the more radical Republicans wanted but it was enough to instill a deep-seated resentment towards carpetbagging and federal interference. I am not clear on how meddling more would have made a shameful history turn out better.
“In fact, Lincoln only finally signed the Emancipation Proclamation in an attempt to make the war about slavery,”
I’ve never heard that before, do you have a citation for it?
Wait… The war’s over?
Being a Civil War buff,I found that fascinating history
condensed to four minutes exceptionally well done.
And to think that both sides implored the same god to
vanquish the other. Has anything changed?
There was an organized attempt by the Seccesshers to open up another war theater in California and the western territories.
Fortunately, Clint Eastwood was there to ruin their fiendish plans. Him, plus the Mojave.
Interesting how contentious this issue is, even 150+ years later. Isn’t this the US, land of no-history and why are they still whining about a massacre that happened last year? The country that looks down on Kosovo because it is fighting a war with roots that go back more than a decade? (And if you’re going to argue that this is only a contentious issue on a blog with people who like to argue then you’re going to have to explain why presidential tickets have to have “regional balance”.)
But the feeling to add the caveat, “If it weren’t for y’all’s superior numbers. . . and industry, and etc ” is a great temptation even with me. ;)
Actually a number of analysis of the war have shown that the North’s numerical superiority was effectively eliminated by the requirement that they station garrison troops wherever they went. It has been greatly exaggerated the “advantage” the north had until the last year or so of the war.
“What the North saw as right” was, in fact, institutionalized bigotry. The same Congress that passed the 14th Amendment passed a law segregating the D.C. public schools.
Of course to put it in context, this was at the same time that virtually every community in the south denied any schools for blacks. In fact the only schools operating in the south to educate the freed slaves were those established by northern abolitionist organizations.
So, to put it in context, the fact that this Congress passed a law calling for the education of blacks in Washington at all was fairly enlightened. You can’t measure historical actions by today’s measuring stick.
Harry Turtledove writes novels of alternate history, including a long series on the consequences of a Civil War victory by the South. (For some reason — probably Turtledove’s other novels — the Southern Victory series is shelved in bookstores in the science fiction section.) It’s interesting (and often chilling) to read Turtledove’s speculation on life in a North America divided by the bitter rivalry of the USA and the CSA (in his scenario the US occupies Canada and the CSA takes over a big chunk of Mexico). Turtledove also imagines that the CSA would eventually think of a “final solution” for its “Negro problem.”
My own preferred alternate history involves swearing in as president the man who actually won the 2000 election, thus sparing our nation and the world the benighted presidency of George Worst-President-Ever Bush.
Dianne, Steve L, and tritonesub make some good points. Is Aris going to explain “But It’s impossible to know anything about the Civil War and not be convinced that the Union were the good guys and the Confederacy the bad guys”? Or is this statement imagined to be so obvious as to not need explanation?
I’m from the south and I thought it was fascinating. There is no question that the good guys won and the bad guys lost. If there were a hell, the politicians responsible for the secession would currently be roasting there. Unfortunately, they are not so different from politicians from all over the country today.
I think it is far more productive to refer to the northern forces as the US forces. They were, after all, soldiers in the US Army.
And let’s not start that stupid argument again about whether the southern US is worse than the rest of the country.
gex, are Southern politic really that different from elsewhere? What do you think of the election of Rutherford B Hayes in 1876? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1876
Southern states such as Louisiana and others had more than one set of delegates and presumably made a deal (with whom?), trading his election for the end of Reconstruction (New Orleans was occupied for about 15 years – how long will we be in Iraq?)
How would you compare the Southern politics of New Orleans with the Northern politics of Chicago?
jba, the claim you are questioning may or may not be true (I doubt it)- I never studied the history of that time, but note that there is nothing about slavery carved on the base of this statue: http://picasaweb.google.com/kwbaker/NewOrleans/photo#5066679813524366466
While you will be hard pressed to find people supporting slavery today, another issue is what right the Union had to use force to prevent secession. There are few other wars we (the US) have fought over human rights.
Wow, that was great. I was surprised at how many of the battles I recognized from my high school history class (nearly all of them in fact). They make a whole lot more sense now, strung together like that. Very interesting. And I agree with #24 – it should be in classes.
Does anyone know the name of the melody that serves as background for the video? It sounds familiar, but I don’t know the name of the tune. Thanks.
I can’t believe I’m about to defend this, but… why should a mohel placing his mouth on the baby’s penis be illegal, apart from health reasons? I can see it being considered bad from a health standpoint… an open wound being infected, etc. So if the health department sees reason to ban it, OK. Hell, ban the circumcision in the first place, it’s stupid and barbaric and the kid gets no say in it.
But for what other reason? The mohel is not getting off on it, the parents aren’t either and are OK with it, the kid is not going to care about the mouth as much as he is about the freaking horrible pain that’s just been inflicted on him. The kid is not being exploited, not being coerced, nobody is buying the photos to whack off to.
So what, other than the health issue and the stupidity of circumcision itself, would be a reason to make it illegal?
Because penises in mouths are bad? Because anything involving the penis is inherently sexual or something?
I mean, yeah, its a weird and stupid ritual that comes after an even stupider ritual… but it should be illegal just because it squicks you out?
Fascinating. Watching that unfold gives a bit of a feel what the war must of felt like for an American alive at the time.
Dainne divided US might have been less of a threat to world peace.
Really, and do you really think the United States and the Confederacy would have kissed and made up with all that blood on the ground? More like we would reading about death squads and ethnic cleansing in Missouri or some boarder state right now.
The music was the opening theme for Ken Burns documentary miniseries on the civil war which was first shown on public TV around 15 or 20 years ago. I don’t remember the name of the tune, but, unlike the other music in the miniseries which mainly actual civil war era songs, the opening theme was written around the time of the miniseries. I don’t recall if it was written expressly for the series.
TheBlackCat #27:
The switch didn’t happen until much later, when the Democratic party became the party of ending segregation and when the Southern Strategy (based on civil rights being decided by the states, which seems to have nowadays substituted gay people for African Americans) became the preferred way of winning presidential elections for the Goopers.
Craig #55:
Wrong board? Wrong thread?
Mena: See comment #36.
If it sounds familiar, it’s probably because it’s the same tune Ken Burns used for much of the background music in his Civil War PBS series. It’s “Ashokan Farewell,” written by Jay Unger. I think that’s him playing lead fiddle in the recording here.
In the Burns series, many people thought it was period 19th century music, but Jay wrote it sometime in the 1990’s (I think), and Ken Burns liked it enough to use it heavily in that series. It’s now a staple piece for old-time music groups, despite being “modern.”
Correction: that’s Jay Ungar with an “a”.
Thanks Rey!
That really got me wanting to play Risk; guess I’m going to have to call up my nerd friends for some Thursday night drinking and world-conquering.
Thanks, foldedpath!
Just a quick note: This continuously loops on a wall-screen at the Lincoln Presidential Library museum here in Springfield.
Apologies if this has been mentioned earlier in the thread…I didn’t see it scanning through the comments.
Ashokan Farewell was written in 1982. It’s named for the Ashokan Reservoir in New York, where there was an annual folk festival Jay Ungar went to. It is, however, played and written in traditional style — the sort of thing that COULD have been done at the time — which is why it was chosen. (I’m a folkie.)
As for the map, I do wish they’d included the rest of the country. They skipped the Trans-Mississippi (Missouri, Texas, and New Mexico) where there were some important, if small, battles. I was hoping to see the Confederates claim NM and Arizona, then get driven out of it… :) (I’m also a history major and ACW buff.)
Science-wise (since this IS a sci-blog), the Civil War produced a lot of technical innovations — not just ironclad warships but also machine guns, observation balloons, mines, submarines and a lot more.
Anyone remember the scene from “Gettysburg” where the Confederate generals debate Darwin? Armistead, who is depicted as a highly religious man, is very pro-Darwin; doesn’t seem to have a problem between his faith and his science, which was refreshing. Great movie.
Awesome video!
I’m going to preface this by saying I’m a Southerner and had ancestors on both sides of this conflict, and I’m whole-heartedly happy that the Union won.
Aris,
Your simplistic good guys vs. bad guys dichotomy is funny. Don’t you think that most victors in war think they’re the good guys and the losers are the bad guys? For example, I’m sure Marc Antony and Caesar Octavius thought they were the good guys at the Battle of Philippi, but you can make a case that Brutus and Cassius were good guys too.
There are several reasons why I don’t think you can say the Union was necessarily “the good guys.” First, Lincoln started a war against Southern states that had legally seceded from the Union. Therefore the war was an unprovoked attack on a now independent country. Contrast this to WWII, your other example. Japan attacked the US first. See, the USA did not simply go to war cause they didn’t agree with the Japanese about a legal issue.
Secondly, the Emancipation Proclamation only freed the slaves in the CSA. Sorry, if you’re not willing to free all the slaves, you’re not the unequivocal “good guys.” Again, lets make a WWII analogy. If Hitler had made a proclamation that all Jews in Russia were no longer to be targeted by progroms, it wouldn’t have been useful nor would it have assuaged his guilt for continuing to imprison
the Jews in German occupied Europe. If on the other hand he freed the Jews in his own concentration camps, then that would have been great.
Finally, Sherman’s March to the Sea was an unprecedented level of violence aimed at civilians. It was a horrendous atrocity and every Yankee who calls themselves the good guys needs to admit that.
All that being said, I’m still happy the Union won. I believe the South would have become an increasingly isolated backwater in the eyes of the rest of the world if the CSA had been successful in secession.
Oh, and I think slavery and bigotry are really, really bad. Just wanted to make sure that was plain.
#66 (Jennifer A. Burdoo) – I’m a folkie and a history buff as well (American history major with an emphasis on black history in college). Jay Ungar is one of my favorite fiddle players. His tune, Home Grown Tomatos with Molly Mason (?) is one of my favorites as well.
As for Civil War inovations, don’t forget long distance communications using a type of flag based code.
I love the movie Gettysburg (my twin sister moved to just outside of there with her hubby who is from Gettysburg) but I don’t remember that scene – thanks for giving me a reason to go back and watch it again! Cheers!
Re 38, 39 etc. no careful reading of U.S. domestic politics from 1820 on (if not earlier) can fail to spot slavery as the core of the tension between N and S and the issue that provoked secession — key Southern politicians were quite explicit on that point. This does not mean that there were no other issues, or that a lot of people did not see the union as a good thing in itself. (And as a legal matter, of course, the N was fighting to preserve the union which the S had broken.)
People who question the legal basis for the war should reflect on the differences between the Articles of Confederation and the U.S. Constitution. Not only did Southern assemblies lack sovereignty, it’s hard to argue that they represented their populations.
None of this diminishes the horror of the hundreds of thousands killed and wounded.
“unprovoked attack on a now independent country”
bullshit. See Fort Sumter, bombing of.
re that ancient canard about the Emancipation Proclamation, the copperhead Democrats certainly understood its implications for the whole country. One of Lincoln’s difficulties was that the Constitution did not give him authority to abolish slavery — he was only able to do it in 1863 on the basis of legally-dubious war powers.
Why assume that Southerners would be offended by the video? I’m from Mississippi, for crissakes, and I thought it was very interesting. I’m so tired of this kind of thinking.
On the other hand, once Texas, Florida, and Missouri finally de-science themselves back to the Stone Age, my home state will look like America’s golden child. I will laugh heartily.
Blacks in D.C. had education access before that, by local ordinance. The schools were segregated, also by local ordinance. After the 14th amendment passed in Congress, those who were opposed to its ratification advanced the argument that it should be voted down because it would require the integration of schools. In response, the Republican Congress (there was a 4:1 GOP majority at the time, and no Southern states had yet been readmitted), using its plenary powers over D.C., superseded the local ordinance with a federal law segregating the schools in the hope of assuaging fears about the amendment’s scope.
More generally, though, the commenter I originally replied to was suggesting that the North exercised restraint during Reconstruction, and that, had the North done more to “impose its will,” things would somehow have been better. The Congress of 1865-1870 or so was, by any objective standard, the single most radical Congress in American history. It was dominated by the radical reform wing of the GOP, a group with enough political power to completely impose its legislative will (they had a veto-proof majority). And they acted accordingly: parts of Reconstruction were unquestionably unconstitutional, morally right and probably necessary though they were. And that Congress was perfectly fine with institutionalized bigotry. Certainly, compared to the antebellum (and 1890s) South, it was “institutionalized much-less-bigoted-by-comparison bigotry.” But it was institutionalized bigotry nonetheless.
An excellent background on these issues can be found in Michael Klarman’s From Jim Crow to Civil Rights, which is a book I highly recommend to anyone interested in the legal history of race relations in America.
c wrote:”People who question the legal basis for the war should reflect on the differences between the Articles of Confederation and the U.S. Constitution.”
What are the differences? Why is there no mention of whether secession was possible or prohibited? Believe it or not, those are serious questions that I haven’t seen any obvious answers to.
“Not only did Southern assemblies lack sovereignty, it’s hard to argue that they represented their populations.”
OK, for Louisiana (strong trade ties to north, perhaps persuaded to secede by a sermon of Presbyterian minister Dr Benjamin Morgan Palmer), but do you seriously think that secession was not supported by most Southerners? Is that why no one in the South cares about the war anymore?
allium, how can you mention the West and the Mojave without referring to camels (not in first link either)?
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/CC/quc1.html
(a) the Constitution established a unified nation not a voluntary agglomeration of sovereign units (hence of course no provision for secession) (b) unlike you I’m counting black people as part of the populations of the Southern states.
I grew up in the South and am well aware that lots of folks care about the Civil War. I care about it.
but do you seriously think that secession was not supported by most Southerners? Is that why no one in the South cares about the war anymore?
I’ll give you one huge reason people still “care” about it: race. Note, the uptick in neo-confederate organization and sympathies didn’t really come about until the civil rights movement and the imposition of integration on the South by the federal government. That’s when you saw the battle flag re-placed in all of the southern state flags, that’s when White Citizens Councils started popping up (many of which have morphed into the neo-confed movement). The uptick happened because the southern institutionalization of white supremacy was overturned by those damned northerners yet again.
Good points MAJeff. There is a no doubt a strong correlation as you mention. But if as c argues, secessionists didn’t represent the majority of southern people, is he saying that white southerners care more about slavery and civil rights now than they did then?
PS (side issue) Is it possible for someone to fly a Confederate flag at home and not be a racist?
“But It’s impossible to know anything about the Civil War and not be convinced that the Union were the good guys and the Confederacy the bad guys. ”
Well, that *would* be the case if the Union had been fighting to end slavery, but that’s just not so. The north was fighting to establish federal supremacy over the states. They were land-grabbing, and the elimination of slavery was just a side-effect of Lincoln’s desire to keep the UK from intervening for the south.
There were two slave states in the union, and during the war, slaves escaping from the south across union lines were captured, and held in prison as captured enemy property.
-jcr
BTW, a very interesting read here:
http://sunsite.utk.edu/civil-war/davisexit.html
In Jefferson Davis’ farewell address to the US senate, he lays out in some detail the difference between secession and nullification.
“I hope none who hear me will confound this expression of mine with the advocacy of the right of a State to remain in the Union, and to disregard its constitutional obligation by the nullification of the law. Such is not my theory. Nullification and secession, so often confounded, are, indeed, antagonistic principles.”
-jcr
” Is it possible for someone to fly a Confederate flag at home and not be a racist?”
Of course it is.
-jcr
Is Aris going to explain “But It’s impossible to know anything about the Civil War and not be convinced that the Union were the good guys and the Confederacy the bad guys”?
Sure.
If we are to understand the Civil War as a struggle between one nation that supported slavery and one that didn’t, it should be obvious who the good guys are and who the bad guys are. I don’t think the North attacked the South just to end slavery, but at least the North was against slavery and the Civil War eventually did become the catalyst that brought about the official end of slavery. Now, there’s a good case to be made that we’d all be better off if the South was allowed to go its own way. I made that exact point in another thread. Indeed, it’s very probable that without the southern states (and I include Texas) the culture of an abbreviated US would be much closer to that of Western Europe, i.e., liberal, secular and less jingoistic. I’d like that America much, much better. But that doesn’t change the fact that the South decided to go its own way in order to maintain something evil, the institution of slavery.
___________________________
[c](a) the Constitution established a unified nation not a voluntary agglomeration of sovereign units (hence of course no provision for secession)
That is something I have a problem with. How can one group of people constrain their descendants to be in a group that the descendants don’t want to be members of? What in the Constitution suggests that war is the appropriate response to a seccessionist movement? [And I always thought that it was the aftermath of the Civil War which made the US a nation and not a group of aligned states.] Should we go back to having children inherit their parents’ financial debts too?
[c](b) unlike you I’m counting black people as part of the populations of the Southern states.
———–
Very cute. I fell for that one.
Actually there were four slave states that remained in the Union. Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri all remained in the Union. Also note that no free states joined the Confederacy.
While you can argue that there were many causes of the Civil War, to say that slavery was not the main cause is just wrong. Slavery was the dominating political issue for the early 19th century.
Someone asked for a citation of the comment about Lincoln signing the Emancipation Proclamation. I can’t cite a particular source because it was just a tidbit I was surprised to learn during an American History class. However, if you plug E.P. into Google, you’ll find lots of info on the background of the document, including the many reasons it was signed, including the one I mentioned, which was a big deciding factor according to most sources. If you’re interested, Harry Turtledove’s timeline-191 series has a really interesting alternate history where the declaration isn’t issued, thereby allowing England and France to both formally recognize and support the Confederacy. It’s fiction, but interesting and educational none-the-less. It’s not like Turtledove is pulling facts out of his ass (i.e. ID)
If we are to understand the [war in question] as a struggle between one nation that supported slavery and one that didn’t, it should be obvious who the good guys are and who the bad guys are.
So you also believe, I presume, that the Texas revolution (bid for independence from Mexico) was wrong, that the anglo Texans were the bad guys, the Mexicans the good guys, and the Alamo a symbol of oppression. Right? Because the anglos only decided to revolt when Mexico banned slavery and slavery. The Texas Revolution was another war over slavery, yet if you go to the Alamo you’ll find all sorts of verbiage about the “heros” who died there for “freedom”. Sort of gives you an idea of how the CSA would have spun the Civil War if they’d won. Ending slavery was a good thing, no one is questioning that. But that doesn’t mean that every last act of Lincoln or the Union army were good things or even that the war was the best vehicle for ending slavery. Almost all central and South American countries had ended slavey by 1861 (I think Brazil was the only exception) by peaceful means. Why couldn’t the US do the same?
“If we are to understand the Civil War as a struggle between one nation that supported slavery and one that didn’t, it should be obvious who the good guys are and who the bad guys are. ”
Sure, and if that were the case, then it would be as cut-and-dried as you want to imply, but it’s not. There were northern absentee owners of southern plantations, for example. It was Bostonians and New Yorkers, for the most part, who owned the slave ships. There were also Quakers in the south who nominally owned slaves, but it was quite an open secret that the people they “owned” were living their lives free of interference from their “masters”.
When I was in school, the civil war story that was sold to me was that the war was a holy crusade by the north to stamp out slavery, which was exclusively a sin of the south. What was left out was any mention of the *other* side effects of the war, such as the fact that my state today is powerless to oppose federal agents harassing medical marijuana users, and even requiring the state of california to provide the foot soldiers in the war on drugs.
-jcr
jah I made no assertion about majorities then or now. I’m interested in the legal and moral status of assemblies that claim to be entitled to detach bits of territory to make new countries, since this is the basis for the bullshit claim of CSA status as a sovereign nation.
But I see from your “side issue” that you’re just another troll. Somebody else can educate you on the concepts of nation and state and what constitutions are for.
JCR, Lincoln had limited powers. Southern secession was patently, openly motivated by a desire to defend the legal status of slavery. The Northern response was initially mainly (and perforce legally) a matter of defending the union. I’m not terribly interested in defending statements about “good guys,” but I’ll take simplistic moralizing over neoconfederate talking points any day.
And the Federal government already *had* supremacy over the states. It’s called the Constitution. Certain powers were left to the states, and in some ways that wasn’t a bad idea. Sovereignty wasn’t.
That’s enough for tonight. Anyone interested in larger perspective might check out Robin Blackburn’s _The Overthrow of Colonial Slavery 1776-1848_.
PS (side issue) Is it possible for someone to fly a Confederate flag at home and not be a racist?
Possibly, but that someone is almost certainly treasonous.
I live in Virginia. The folks around here seem to believe that a southern victory would have resulted in some sort of paradise. After shrub got the supreme court to award him the presidency, any complaining about the travesty was met with “it’s history, get over it”. This from the same people who can’t get over a war they lost over 150 years ago! Very amusing dichotomy, I think.
Cheers,
Ray
Kind of like a Thurmond victory in ’48 would have helped “avoid all these problems all these years?” (Ah, Senator Lott, we’re going to miss your neo-Confederate sympathies)
True, Lincoln wasn’t goodness personified.
Because the South fought a fucking war to keep it.
Very entertaining video, to bad about the ending however, as it seems as though the Union hasn’t quite finished the job of war..err sorry, of freeing the people yet,yeah thats right, especially those lucky nbieggars who aren’t even American, but would surely love to be?. Wink wink.
Yup. Europe officially pooh-poohed slavery, but the UK for one really liked that cheap slave-produced cotton; that’s why the British government of the time, as well as most of the rest of the British establishment (as exemplified by the editorial staff of the Times), were rooting for the South. The main thing that kept the British government from officially recognizing the Confederacy was that the majority of the British people opposed such a move.
Actually, if Lincoln had listened to Winfield Scott early on, the war would have been over inside of eighteen months, and the North would have won at far less cost to either side.
Scott was the first to advocate what Grant and Sherman eventually did, which was to make the stab that bisected the South. The main reason that nobody listened to Scott was that a) everybody thought the war would last maybe six months anyway, so there was no need for doing anything so extreme that would make the North look like a bully, and b) he was a fat old man (like John Wayne’s Rooster Cogburn).
By the way, lots of historians (many with a pro-Confederate bent) have over the decades bad-mouthed Grant both as a general and a president, but he did more for civil rights or the civil service than any president from Lincoln to FDR. And as Gore Vidal said, no one can read the slightest bit of Grant’s memoirs — which he wrote while dying of cancer — without realizing that they were the product of a first-rate mind.
“Actually, if Lincoln had listened to Winfield Scott early on, the war would have been over inside of eighteen months, and the North would have won at far less cost to either side.”
He also failed to fire McClelland as soon as he deserved it. If the Union army had been competently led, it could have all been over in a couple of months. If only Robert E. Lee had taken the command of the US Army, about a million lives could have been saved.
-jcr
“Southern secession was patently, openly motivated by a desire to defend the legal status of slavery.”
That was *one* of the issues. See the Confederate constitution if you want to understand the others. Near the top of the list were the trade restrictions and tariffs that constrained the south to buy goods from the north instead of from europe, and you might also note that the confederate government was explicitly forbidden from using tax revenues gathered in one state to build infrastructure improvements in another.
-jcr
“the UK for one really liked that cheap slave-produced cotton; that’s why the British government of the time, as well as most of the rest of the British establishment (as exemplified by the editorial staff of the Times), were rooting for the South.”
Well, let’s give credit where credit is due. England was the first world power to not only abolish slavery, but fight it all over the world, and they did this at considerable expense, not to mention that they did it all alone for several decades before the rest of Europe decided to help.
As for British sympathy towards the South, I think that had more to do with lingering resentment of the United States for overthrowing the rule of King George III.
-jcr
Randolph, any chance of citations for any of your claims here?
Wrong.
The constitution defines treason as follows:
As the explanatory note clarifies, the constitutional definition of treason was incorporated expressly to prevent the government from considering the expression of opinions favorable to a perceived enemy as “treason” and punishing it as such. This is as it should be.
“any chance of citations for any of your claims here?”
Can you be more specific?
If you want a good overview on the history of slavery, both in the USA and around the world, try books by Thomas Sowell.
-jcr
“, the constitutional definition of treason was incorporated expressly to prevent the government from considering the expression of opinions favorable to a perceived enemy as “treason” and punishing it as such. ”
Unfortunately, they have played fast and loose with the first amendment on many occasions, by using different terminology. Debs wasn’t imprisoned for “treason”, but he was put away for criticizing WW I on a trumped-up charge of espionage.
My grandfather did time in Atlanta with him, for showing up at a US Army induction station and handing out leaflets that denounced the war as having nothing to do with the working man (Grandad was an IWW member.)
-jcr
Yeah, right. Remember that the “good guys” in WWII included Stalin.
Okay, I’ll be quick, and possibly innacurate (correct me as needed).
The anger felt by the south had many legitimate economic bases.
The Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States gives the states all powers which are not granted by the Constitution to the federal government or specifically denied to the individual states. Therefore, the secession of the southern states was perfectly legal.
What finally drove the north to action was the insistance of the now non-union states that they were free from all federal debt obligations, and that they had no intentions of compensating the US for federal property (roads, post offices, military bases) that they now claimed as their own.
In pub parlance, they wrote a check that their asses couldn’t cover.
Section 10 of Article I of the constitution would also seem to preclude legal secession.
Azkyroth, I fail to see the relevance. The territories in question were no loner under the aegis of the Constitution when they entered into confederacy. They had introduced legislation in their congresses which were enacted and upheld.
As an interesting aside, I was told in my American History class, and it was a long time ago, that the tenth amendment was insisted upon by states in New England, because they wanted an out if this new program didn’t work.
There is, as far as I understand, nothing in the Constitution of the United States which prohibits secession.
Hi autumn,
thanks for providing a specific reference to the constitution.
I agree that the noncompensation for Federal property led to Fort Sumter and the spark that set everything off. However, I doubt that even if cash were available, the outcome would have been any different. “The union must and shall be preserved”
http://loc.harpweek.com/LCPoliticalCartoons/DisplayCartoonLarge.asp?MaxID=&UniqueID=41&Year=1860&YearMark=
Azkyroth, It seems to me your link can seem like a reference. But why wasn’t specific wording put in if Section 10 was intended to address the question? I can’t imagine that people at the time weren’t thinking that some states might bail at some time.
Hi j a h.,
I tend to think that, had the economics worked out, the north would have abandoned cotton and pumped money into the new frontiers of the west, which would have allieviated tensions there (amazing how cash does that), giving birth to a strong north dependant upon its industry to support its western farmers, and a south that held a strong agricultural dominance that Europe would be willing to exploit to mutual advantage.
But I also think that unicorns would be kick-ass non-polluting transportation.
People fight, they always fight, they will never not find something to fight about.
In the case of the American Civil War, the concensus is that the less assholey of the two sides happens to have won.
Much assholeyness ensued.
[c]Not only did Southern assemblies lack sovereignty, it’s hard to argue that they represented their populations.
[c]I made no assertion about majorities then or now.
Then what does “represented their populations” refer to if not a majority of the population? (in/excluding as you wish, all humans, the voting population, women, children etc)?
[c]I’m interested in the legal and moral status of assemblies that claim to be entitled to detach bits of territory to make new countries, since this is the basis for the bullshit claim of CSA status as a sovereign nation.
So am I. Where in the Constitution is force authorized to preserve the union?
Since I can’t even understand what you mean by “represented their populations”, I was trying to get some idea of what and how people think. If you are a person who sees everything in black or white, then it is a waste of my time since I think most things are shades of grey.
[c] I’ll take simplistic moralizing over neoconfederate talking points any day.
So would I. But I prefer rational discourse over either.
You can call me a troll and denounce my claims as “bullshit” (you won’t hurt my feelings), but you don’t appear capable of answering a simple question about the interpretation of the Constitution.
PS (anyone)Sorry, my curiosity is piqued. What was the legal justification for splitting Virginia into Virginia and West Virginia? You can secede from a state but not the Union? Or can Congress somehow authorize this? Some legalese (I do not speak) is at http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=case&court=us&vol=78&page=39
autumn: “But I also think that unicorns would be kick-ass non-polluting transportation.”
No, no, no.
1) http://www.all-creatures.org/nyca/ch-hist-19711000.html
2) think “road rage”
:-)
” sometimes I can’t help but wish we’d let the south secede.”
Well, that would have spared us Johnson, Carter, and Clinton, to name three…
-jcr
“What was the legal justification for splitting Virginia into Virginia and West Virginia? ”
it was done by force of arms, and I’ve never heard of anyone bothering to legislate or litigate the matter.
-jcr
West Virginian was occupied by the Union from early in the war – incidentally, Lee was the Confederate commander on teh spot but made a hash of it. There were virtually no slaves in the mountainous region, where the inhabitants had generally been politically opposed to the rich planters of the lowlands.
When the occupied counties petitioned to join the Union, the Republican-dominated Congress accepted them as a non-slave state. Lincoln wrestled with his conscience over the matter, but his conscience lost.
The contiguous area of East Tennnessee was similar in many ways to West Virginia. Lincoln pushed from early in the war for the occupation of East Tennessee, whose inhabitants were sympathetic to the Union. But the generals did not act until late 1863.
It is interesting to reflect that if they had acted two years earlier, there might be another Southern state today.
Also, that it is wrong to conflate “the Confederacy” with “the South”. Southern states like Kentucky and Maryland never seceded. Non-slave areas like West Virginia, East Tenessee, the mountainous parts of North Carolina and the Ozark area of Arkansas were broadly Unionist in sympathy. Not to mention the sympathies of the the four million slaves – about 40% of the Southern population.
#4, #10 …
“The War of Northern Aggression”.
No way!
Lincoln was VERY careful to makes sure that not only had the “South” seceded, but that they STARTED THE FIGHTING.
Fort Sumter WAS fired on, by the South, first, with no provocation.
They did not have to do it, and deliberately chose to do so.
I understand that W. Virinia didn’t want anything to do with the South, and once you have started secession, … well, it goes right down the line, after all.
Yes the Confederates did fire first. [Who Fort Sumter legally belonged to I suppose depends on whether the US was a community property country.]
Nonetheless, as explained by many others above, the South wanted to leave the union (that is what secession means) whereas the North wanted to preserve the union. Would the South have invaded the North if the South was given independence?
Sure, Stalin was as bad as Hitler, and he was our ally; sure, our other allies were hardly paragons of democracy (Britain still had colonies); sure, the US then (unfortunately even now) is hardly a perfect democracy. All of these things are true, and more besides. But in a world of almost endless grays a fight between one group that’s composed mainly of flawed democracies and another that’s gassing millions of people because of their ethnic and religious heritage, is a black-and-white affair. And so I have no problem using the simple (and, yes, simplistic too) language of “good guys vs. bad guys” to describe it.
P.S. That doesn’t mean war a glorious thing to be celebrated or anything like that.
___________________________
“Secondly, the Emancipation Proclamation only freed the slaves in the CSA. ”
Not only that, it only applied to those parts of the southern states which were not in Union hands.
-jcr
“Southern states like Kentucky and Maryland never seceded”
Maryland probably would have, but the bulk of the Union army was already there.
-jcr
As a general rule, it is theoretically possible to have >100% casualty rates. For example, a unit has 100 men and suffers 75% caualties (75 men). The unit is reconstituted with replacements, maybe FNG’s (Vietnam slang for F’ing New Guys), and the unit suffers a further 50% causalty rate. That’s 125 men, or a casualty rate of 125% for a 100 man unit.
Close. It didn’t actually ‘free’ very many slaves at all. First, those states still in rebellion had to be defeated before the proclamation could actually be implimented. It also only freed the slaves in those areas of the CSA still in active rebellion. In those areas of the CSA already pacified by that time (like Tennessee), the EP did not apply. Of course it also did not apply to the border states that remained loyal to the Union.
If you doubt that slavery is the cause of the war, read “Apostles of Disunion” which is a collection of the writings of the secessionist delegates sent from the deep south to convince border states to secede. There you will find the rationale for the separation explicitly given. Or read the text of Stephens’ (the CSA vice pres) “Cornerstone” speech where he states that the new nation is founded on the inequality of the races. Just because the rank and file didn’t fight for rights to slaves doesn’t mean that the men wielding the weapon of southern armies didn’t, ’cause, you know, they did.
The emancipation proclamation (later the 13th amendment) and the 14th amendment are the most precious writings in the constitution IMHO. I really don’t much care about the motivations for them. If they are an unintended consequence of political machinations of the period, what of it? Also, for all his failings, Lincoln, in addition to being the most canny political mind in history, made no pretense of loving liberty for all Americans. You can feel it when you read his words. That’s not scientific but if I’m going to exhibit woo, it’s over him and his moment in history.
Some of you are getting a little scary with the whole over-simplistic good-guy-bad-guy nonsense. Sounds a little like you’re getting into the Bush/Cheney/Rummy/Kristol mindset. I know most of you are being sure to specify that this judgement is made relevant to our time period. However, I think some people are viewing the North’s actions through rose-tinted glasses.
Aristotle, a man many of you might praise, also held very similar thoughts towards the slaves of his time; that they were of a lower intelligence and, by their very nature, should be slaves. Aristotle had many wise observations — this obviously was not one of them. It is possible for someone to have a fatal character flaw, the one thing that could keep you from liking them. Obviously, the South’s support of slavery during the Civil War would’ve caused me to side with the North. Don’t assume, however, that all Southerners were fighting to keep their slaves — especially since most of the “rebels” didn’t even own slaves.
You’re correct Kyle. Most Confederate soldiers saw themselves as fighting a second revolution against a tyrannical government. The political powers in the south however definitely had commerce and the peculiar institution in mind. They were also very used to having great power in the government due to the three fifths compromise. They were very sensitive to the tyranny of the majority. In the North, most soldiers fought for the preservation of the union, not the abolition of slavery.
It was the main, or even the only relevant issue for several of the seccesionist states. See the declaration of causes they put out.
For anyone who says that slavery was not THE cause of the civil war. It’s like that stupid scene in Gettysburg where Shaara has Longstreet say “We should’ve freed the slaves and then fired on Ft. Sumter.” What rot! Now you can get “meta” and say that the expansion of US territories was the cause because it forced a balancing act between advocates of free vs slave states being added to the union but to claim that slavery wasn’t the cause is just stupid.
The Crittenden compromise was a last ditch effort to maintain the status quo, it failed, the “Black” Republicans won the election and the South fell away. It’s a fairly straight forward proposition. The Southern (mostly royalist and aristocratic in demeanor) folkways lost out to the (FSM help us all) yankee puritan folkways.
Legally the states could secede. It’s true, get over it. Specifically, Texas had the right to secede written into their constitution when they joined the USA before the Civil War. There is a tiny basis where you could argue the other states didn’t have the right of secession, but Texas explicitly reserved that right. There’s no way around it.
As for good guys and bad guys, there’s no such thing in a war. If you’re shooting other people, you’re not a good guy. The whole thing is shades of gray. Some grays are just a bit lighter than others.
As for Southern legislatures representing their populations, the freaking US Constitution defined slaves as 3/5 of a person, regardless of their residence. Slaves in the Union were still only 3/5 of a person and weren’t represented in their legislatures either.
As many people pointed out, there were numerous issues in the war besides slavery. That’s probably why four slave states didn’t secede.
Yes, he was your ally.
“Mainly” is misleading since most of the action was on the eastern front between two dictatorships, with some flawed democracies and non-democracies squeezed between. These ended up on the side of the bad guys or were overrun too quickly to have much of a side.
Maybe you don’t have a problem, but you should. Ask the Balts.
It’s not just a matter of smoothing over some bygones – the “hey, we liberated you, you ungrateful bastards!” rhetoric is a weapon Russia can use to bully newly independent Eastern European countries. So yes, we should point out that it wasn’t a straightforward good guys vs bad guys affair.
There is one work that I know of that does a great job of trying to understand the various reasons why the US split apart and entered in a civil war, that would be Edmund Wilson’s “Patriotic Gore”.
http://www.amazon.com/Patriotic-Gore-Studies-Literature-American/dp/0393312569
It has been about twenty years since I have read this work but one of the things I remember best about this work is this, Wilson makes the argument that Lincoln was a nation builder of the same stature of Napoleon and Bismarck. For Lincoln, the state was paramount and all things must be done to keep it together. While he disliked slavery, he was willing to keep the peculiar institution limited to the south for the sake of keeping the state together.
To say the American Civil War was about slavery is to overly simplify what happened. Yes, there were slave states that stayed in the Union. There were Confederate supporters that were more interested in state’s right then they were in slavery. But there were also Confederate supporters who wanted to expand slavery. In the book there was one chapter devoted to those who argued for enslaving poor whites.
I fear I am not doing a good job of describing this book. I am also feeling the need to reread this work
Janine,
That sounds like a really interesting book. I know that state’s rights has become a code phrase for bigotry, but it didn’t necessarily have the same meaning in the past. There was so much tension in the early days of the country over what rights the federal government had, and all the fear of a powerful federal government. Also, people seemed to feel more patriotism for their state than their country, like Lee who felt that being Virginian trumped being an American. I doubt very many people today think that way.
There’s an interesting grammatical shift that takes place between the Civil War and WWII. People used to say the “United States are.” Someone might say “The United States are going to war.” Now we say “The United States is going to war.” Though we usually abbreviate to US. This is an important aspect of nation building. It was understood prior to the Civil War that the USA was a group of states that were bound together to form a nation. Now people think of a country that is split into states. It’s interesting to me because so many of the people I know don’t seem to get that the states came before the country.
I am very happy though that we have a federal government that has the power to overrule the states on some issues.
It was the only issue that people were willing to secede and go to war over.
Several of the states, after their legislatures moved to secede, published their reasons for doing so. There was only one issue that is common to all of them, and for some of those statements it’s the only reason given: slavery. One of them (one of the Carolinas) went so far as to be bitching about the abolition of slavery in the free states as being an outrage.
That confederate constitution, ever notice the one “states’ right” that they explicitly banned? The ability to abolish slavery.
What was it about Lincoln that caused the avalanche to secede? Was it his tax policy? His foreign policy? His economic policy? Nope, his position on slavery.
What did the generals and politicans at the time (during and after), on both sides, say the war was about? Give you one guess, and tarrifs and taxes aren’t eligible.
The American Civil War was about slavery. One side was fighting at all costs to preserve the ability to enslave people. While the Union was not fighting to end it, everyone knew (even before the Emancipation Proclomation) that the end of slavery was a hell of a lot more likely if they won.
Keith, your view is still very skewed. Lincoln, in personal letters, has said:
“There was more than a year and a half of trial to suppress the rebellion before the proclamation issued, the last one hundred days of which passed under an explicit notice that it was coming, unless averted by those in revolt, returning to their allegiance.”
-Abraham Lincoln; 1863 letter to James Conkling
If that doesn’t directly contradict what you just implied, I don’t know what does. Lincoln wanted the support of the border states and was, to an extent, very unwilling to sign the proclamation. The above excerpt is an admission that if the states “rejoined” the Union, the EP would be shelved.
Regardless, it’s a good thing that he DID sign it. I’m just saying that this was not a war about slavery; it was a war about slavery plus some other things. These “other things” aren’t necessarily in line with my personal philosophies, but that doesn’t change the reasoning behind the war. I keep hearing 2nd grade versions of Civil War history being repeated.
Additionally, insisting that official government proclamations from the seceding states speaks on behalf of all of the people of those states is silly. I’m from Georgia, and in no way would Sonny Perdue be able to represent my feelings on any subject, nor could he do so for many of my fellow Georgians. Politicians tend to represent the rich & powerful, and I can’t imagine why things were any different (if not worse) in the mid-19th century.
OT, but: Let’s not forget that Sonny unequivocally supported keeping evolution in, and creationism out, of the Georgia state science curriculum. That’s worth a nod, isn’t it?
Keith, I don’t think anyone posting here thinks that the Civil War would have happened if slavery hadn’t existed. So why do you emphasize slavery as the only issue people went to war over when even your own post states “While the Union was not fighting to end it”? If Canada had slavery, would we have invaded them to put an end to it?
The South fought primarily because of slavery, the North to preserve the union.
If Canada had slavery
To hear the Bloc Québécois tell it, we do.
Here’s one Southerner who is glad of the outcome.
Most Southerners have been stupid for over 146 years. Who else would fight and die to protect an institution (slave-based plantation agriculture) that few actually participated in, or could afford to?
And what does that say about the Scots-Irish stock ancestral to much of the South?
And what about the North, who settled into a war of attrition?
All ’round, a dark chapter in US history.
— CV
“Don’t assume, however, that all Southerners were fighting to keep their slaves — especially since most of the “rebels” didn’t even own slaves.”
I think it’s fair to say that the black confederate soldiers weren’t fighting for slavery. I was very surprised when I learned that the confederacy had back soldiers in the field before the union did.
-jcr
Yes jcr, and whereas all (or essentially all) black troops were segregated in the North, many were integrated in the South, especially in the early goings. But all these little facts don’t fit in the simplistic views of some.
There have been a number of good posts recently, by Janine, tritonesub, Pygmy Loris, Kyle, you etc.
I wish the video quality had been clearer. I think it was recorded on someone’s cell phone or digital camera. It’s one of the exhibits at the Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. There are a couple of still shots of it on their site but not the video itself (the bootleg copy has also been removed from YouTube). It would be impressive to see in person.
Here are two points about the war:
1) The book review seems to argue that keeping the country together was ll that mattered.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/30/books/30grimes.html?8dpc
THE BLOODY SHIRT
Terror After Appomattox
By Stephen Budiansky
Stephen Budiansky
Tony Cenicola/The New York Times
Not quite. As Stephen Budiansky reminds us in “The Bloody Shirt,” his impassioned account of Southern resistance to Reconstruction, the war was won, but the peace, up for grabs, would be lost, done in by Southern intransigence and Northern apathy.
“In all except the actual results of the physical struggle, I consider the South to have been the real victors in the war,” Albion Tourgée, a North Carolina state judge, said caustically in 1879. “The way in which they have neutralized the results of the war and reversed the verdict of Appomattox is the grandest thing in American politics.”
2)Why is Kosovo allowed to secede but not the South?
Heard this on Burns’ special the other night [copied from Wikipedia]
In his written response to Horace Greeley’s editorial …, after having already discussed a draft of the Emancipation Proclamation with his cabinet, he says, “If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that…I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men everywhere could be free.” In actual practice he freed all the slaves in confederate territories.