An Unnecessary War
As I continue to research and read about America's war of brother against brother, I think the case can be made the Civil War was unnecessary.
Over the past year, I have been reading biographies of key figures from both sides in our Civil War. I just finished one on Stonewall Jackson.
After studying these men through their own words, I have reached a conclusion that may seem controversial, and partisan based on my heritage as the descendent of Mississippians who fought in this war.
It is said that in wars, history is written by the victors and it is my opinion (and just mine) that the triumphalism of the Northern history writers obscure the true lessons of a war that, again in my opinion, never needed to be fought.
Slavery was evil and wrong - but the same case can be made for an unnecessary war. Slavery was fast becoming an untenable liability from an economic sense and in the Western world, was being eliminated on moral grounds. I truly believe that had Northern abolitionists not framed their cause as righteously good and the South is uniquely and uniformly evil (not unlike how today racialists stir conflict) and Northern and Southern politicians taken the contradictory actions of intractable positions of aggression and unstainable compromises, a solution - the abolition of all slavery - would have occurred in less time than it took to fight a war that took over 600,000 lives and changed America’s governing philosophy forever.
Too often evil and incompetent men on each side are portrayed as angels and geniuses and men driven by honor and duty (many who despised slavery) are ignored.
If you read about Robert E. Lee, and if you look at him as a person and not as a military commander of the Confederate Army, you will find a religious man of such character to exceed that of many, if not most, of our presidents of the past 60 years.
If you spend time reading about George Brinton McClellan, you might conclude just the opposite. McClellan was perhaps the most malignant narcissist America ever produced.
You would also learn how close many of these men in leadership on both sides were. Many attended West Point together (296 CSA officers graduated West Point and served in the US Army before the war), many others attended other universities and military academies together. Many fought together in prior conflicts and campaigns, the Mexican-American war a big one.
It strikes me that there remains a lot of mythology surrounding the greatest internal conflict this country ever suffered and what has become conventional wisdom through both mistaken and deliberate mischaracterization of both sides, is simply wrong.
What bothers me the most is the mythology and conventional wisdom that join to occlude the very similar forces at work in our politics today and that this blindness often leads to horrific consequences.
History is more than words in a dusty book, it has predictive value to guide our future.
From an FB friend, Janet Burtnick:
Also the North had immigrants from Europe that were Marxists that didn't want the US to survive. Slavery was only 3% and one of the biggest slave holders was a black man from South Carolina, William Ellison. Up until 1862 Lincoln wasn't concerned (in fact wanted to send them back to Africa as a humanitarian gesture since he said in a debate in 1858; paraphrased; "blacks and whites are different socially and economically and can't live together.") The beef was the US wanted to tax the South on with the Morrill Tariff Act of 1861. See link below. He had bad advisers (The Sandcreek Massacre of the Cheyenne of 1864; the execution in 1862 of 39 Dakota men after the US The war began after the U.S. broke its promise to provide food and supplies to the Dakota people. Believed 2 were innocent and their bodies used as medical cadavers...largest mass execution). Prior to the Civil War Jews lived well in the South. The Jews then in 1850 didn't want their European brethran coming here because alot were embracing Marxism. Problems began after the Carpetbaggers created havoc in the South and since alot of Jews settled later in the North didn't help. No Leo Frank lynching if he lived 60 yrs earlier. Lincoln did say about his cabinet near the end of his first term when frustrated "Dixie is smarter than my whole cabinet! And furthermore, she doesn't talk back!”
Poor choice was the German Communist (thought Marx was too conservative)immigrant who became a general August Willich. In 1870 he returned to Prussia to help with the military and refused because of his communist views.
https://www.al.com/.../war-over-slavery_rhetoric_is_i.html
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/August_WillichI'm
The War between the States had consequences that we live with every day. I concur it was unnecessary.