Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
Are We Rethinking Our Civil War Reconciliation?
My family was in Iowa at the outbreak of the Civil War and I have one ancestor that fought for the Union. I grew up in the South but I was always grateful that the North won the Civil War. Slavery was noxious and a great evil in the American experiment. We could have had a peaceful resolution to slavery but the South broke the rules of the game and as they started to lose politically they tried their very, very best to destroy the United States. It was a very good thing that the Confederacy lost the Civil War — and in the long term — it was very good for all the states in the Confederacy that they lost the Civil War.
Having said that, I have always thought that America’s reconciliation after the Civil War is an under-appreciated miracle. The speed at which the country could unite against a common foe during the Spanish-American War — when many Civil War veterans were still alive — is remarkable. Not only that, but the career of Varina Howell Davis is equally amazing, going from being the First Lady of the Confederacy to becoming a celebrated writer in New York City.
Many have talked about the courage of Lee in making sure the Confederate Army did not break up and start guerrilla war against the Union, and rightly so. But equally important was the fact the the South could have just sat out of the American life as well. That would have been disastrous.
There was a brutal and evil price to pay for the quick reconciliation — the Jim Crow regime — and I can’t emphasize enough how much better American would be today if Jim Crow had never existed. Fortunately, we dealt with Jim Crow fifty years ago and, today, the only people that think Jim Crow was or is a good idea are a tiny lunatic fringe.
The best thing about the reconciliation has been the ability of all Americans to celebrate the martial valor of both sides of the Civil War. This has led military tradition of valor that greatly benefits our current military and contributed greatly to our military success as a nation.
When I watch a movie like Gettysburg, I want the Union to win and I would have been proud to make a stand with Chamberlain on Little Round Top. But how could I fail to be moved by the tragedy of Longstreet, or awed by the bravery and sacrifice of Pickett’s division, or not appreciate Lee’s leadership and audacity? I think it is to the nation’s benefit to that I am able to feel and emphasize with the soldiers and military tradition on both sides.
Now, however we have a strong attempt to disqualify that reconciliation to see the all the men of the Confederacy as unremitting evil. To my great disappointment Jason Lee Sterots argues this view at National Review. He thinks we should see all the Confederacy as racist cowards that deserve no respect for their military exploits. I think he writes this, as he writes much else, with little thought to the cultural consequences of his attitude.
I am more on the side of David French who debates Bakiri Sellers here. French takes the view that the reconciliation process after the Civil War is important and the South’s military history is important and distinct enough from the racist cause of the war to be worth keeping. Mr. Sellers who, at one point, uses the word “Sheroes” does not even seem to understand what Mr. French is saying. I pray that “Sheroes” has not become a thing in the United States.
That disturbs me because every great nation has to stand up and fight for its survival at times and its martial culture and courage is a very important ingredient to a nation’s survival. It bears noting that the French had everything they needed to resist the German invasion in 1940 except the will to fight. While many French soldiers fought bravely — as well as a very few French Government officials — it was not sufficient to the task of stopping the German army, whose military élan and determination was in much greater supply.
Whether the Confederate Battle Flag continues to fly anywhere or not, must we jettison the important reconciliation we have achieved after the Civil War? Am I — are we — not allowed to acknowledge that even the best and bravest of men can sometimes fight for the wrong cause? Is that lesson not important for us all to learn? If you throw away an entire tradition of marital valor and courage you do not easily replace it. Do people even bother to pause and contemplate that? I fear they do not, and we could easily lose an important part of American culture as a causality of a lone man’s racist attack.
Published in Culture, Politics
Jason Lee Steorts is a clown. Nothing more.
I have two Confederate ancestors: Col. Santos Benavides of the 33rd Texas Cavalry and Brig. Gen. Barnard Bee of the 1st South Carolina Regulars and the 3rd Brigade of the Army of the Shenandoah. Anyone who demands that I denounce, dishonor, or disavow them in any way can can stuff it.
This, a million times this.
Thank-you very much for this, Brian! I really appreciate someone whose family fought for the other side defending those of us who honor ours. I’m a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, and it had impressed me how some of the members of the Sons of Union Veterans would attend our Confederate Memorial Day celebrations as official representatives. This kind of mutual respect is something that can be hard for many societies to achieve, and we used to have a decent bit of it, although I’m afraid most of that was lost before I was born (I’m 43).
My family didn’t fight to preserve slavery—one branch had freed our slaves decades earlier—and my state, Tennessee, didn’t fight to preserve slavery. Our secession proposal actually failed the first time. It was only after Lincoln called for troops to invade the states who had seceded that we voted to leave, and by a 2:1 margin that time. I have no qualms in my support of my state, my family, and their history, and my respect for the Confederate flag is untainted by any racial feeling. (I’ll note that this is my experience with others in the Sons of Confederate Veterans, where I’ve seen great respect for blacks and with a single exception—one guy who’s a jerk in other ways—NO racism whatsoever.)
I’m frustrated and angered by people like Steorts—the guilt by association and the constant assumption that people like me are morally bad, when I’ve grown up without racial prejudice and rear my children the same way. It’s the reason I dropped my NR subscription. The best I can do is to continue minding my own business and rearing my daughters with the proper respect.
P.S: If the social compact of reconciliation is being torn up, maybe I want to rethink my great-great grandfathers’ surrender. I think the South is in a stronger position these days.
Kidding! ;)
Well, I would certainly take the economic might and vitality of say Texas, Fla, GA, etc over the North East sans Wall Street.
Lincoln seemed to think that everyone who fought and died were Americans.
The new meme seems to be that the people of the CSA were not Americans, don’t deserve to be remembered as Americans, and history should treat them no better than the SS.
Of course, by modern standards, Lincoln was a horrible racist.
I wonder when we get to a ISIS like move to purge the South of all of its Confederate Memorials. Maybe we should also dig up the graves of the men who died?
I think a call to destroy the memorials will happen in my lifetime.
I think we’re already seeing that today, Bryan. Literally today. I just saw on my Facebook “news” a call for Tennessee to remove Forrest’s bust from our Capitol. (Yes, Forrest was the first head of the KKK, but it wasn’t founded as a terrorist group, and when he became convinced that members were targeting blacks, he disbanded it.) True, it’s not yet a call to remove the veterans’ memorials, but I don’t think these people see any functional difference.
Like many, I had family on both sides of the Civil War.
My Confederate heritage is just as important to me as African, Asian, or European heritage is to others. Heritage does not dominate my life, I do not live on the achievements or disasters of my ancestors, but they are an integral part of where I come from. Yet some demand that I deny the existence of my past. What would happen if I demanded that of others? I’d be branded a racist at best.
We don’t talk much about my Union heritage, although I will say, during my military career, I wore blue and I’m proud of it.
Despite what my children would tell you I am not quite old enough to remember the Civil War. I’m very tired of some folks demanding I answer for the sins of my ancestors, whatever sins they may be.
There already is a tsunami starting to remove the battle flag from the union (no pun intended) of the Mississippi State Flag.
And as Luke Russert started to question the validity of Confederate officers having a statue in Statuary Hall in the Capitol building it will only be the start of the attempt of the Left to clean out this history.
Be ready. There will be a growing and loud voice on the Right to try and get out in front of this wave and be louder in their denunciations of the soldiers and sailors who fought in grey.
I fear you are right.
I have always wished to know where my ancestor fought and in which unit. Unfortunately all I know is that my father’s family came to America fleeing Napoleon and by the Civil War they were in Kansas and Iowa and fought for the anti-slavery position in Kansas and then fought the Union with an Iowa regiment. No ones know what unit though. I am very happy for you that you know more of your history that knowledge is a gift.
As for all the revisionists and those who want to destroy all Confederate symbols and memorials: Maoists, the whole lot of them.
My ancestor, Brig Gen Jean Jacques Alexandre Mouton fell at the Battle of Mansfield. He entered the war as a captain and fought at Bull Run, where he was wounded.
His father the former governor and senator, Alexandre Mouton, chaired Louisiana’s secession convention.
My wife had three ancestors who fought for the Confederacy, all three were recent immigrants and were conscripts. One of which had been a professor in Berlin.
As far as flying the “Rebel” flag, it’s fine for kids. Like Christmas tree forts, kinda weird for adults. As my mother would call it, cheap and common. She said that about anything considered “white trash”
Well many Americans don’t have ancestors who fought on either side of the civil war. The problem the Confederate flag has is that it was revitalized during the 50’s and 60’s as a symbol of opposition to the end of Jim Crow and government enforced segregation in the South. Simply put Southerners have flow this flag to fight for slavery and legalized discrimination. It is a flag of opposition to our great Union and has always been used as such.
As to reconciliation its nice and all but time is the true reconciler the further we move away from the Civil War and any living memory of it the less meaning and vitality its symbols will have. Pushing it along a bit faster doesn’t seem that bad really.
Every Southerner who died in the Civil War died in vain because of a foolish collective pride in their unchristian ownership of other human beings. Our reconciliation after the Civil War was simply the North allowing the South to keep up their delusion that somehow their cause was noble and just. It was neither. Once Southerner manage to acknowledge this to a sufficient degree they will put away their rebel flags.
I used to joke about this with some kids from New Jersey when I was in high school in Florida. I think the South would come out ahead in a new contest as well. The cultural and region make ups of the Civil War America don’t exists anymore of course so it were to happen again, God forbid, it would be a very different kind of war. But if the war was some how fought again today the Northern manufacturing and manpower advantages would not be there.
Tim points out that Tennessee voted against secession at first. This is an important but often overlooked point.
Brian, nicely done. But I was slightly put off from the start. You don’t actually say the war was over slavery but you come close. For the sake of simplification, or maybe for the sake of argument, let’s say that the question of secession was originally based on a desire to preserve slavery. When that was the issue, the Deep South voted yes. However, Tennessee and the Upper South voted no. They only changed their mind after the North made it clear that they would not allow secession, and thereby changed the issue to one of state’s rights.
Blanket condemnation is easy, especially for those who have no ties or attachment to the region. Southerners to this day seem to be nothing but caricatures to people who don’t live here. Calls from those outside the region with whom we agree on most issues that basically say, “Hate your heritage or you’re all racist. Your past has no redeeming value. Shut-up and feel ashamed already,” do not help. That stubborn collective pride is actually one of the qualities that this region cultivates to produce some of the best fighting men the United States has to offer. It also seems to be at least a bastion of sanity from the left’s ideology at least in cultural terms. Perhaps a little understanding by those who have no stake in the matter would be helpful.
Brian Wolf—You make a good point about National Review. It’s a wonderful magazine in most ways, and I always used to read it from cover to cover. The anti-Southern and anti-Confederate articles and asides certainly aren’t the dominant material in it, but to someone who loves both the South and her history, they hurt to read. But you’re right, it’s bigger than just that, and I can probably get by, by flipping the pages and passing over the insults of Steorts and Williams in silence.
A related thought: For the vast majority of us who love and respect our Southern history, and who don’t view our symbols through the lens of prejudice, the fact that there are those who do associate it with the Klan or anti-black racists is a reason for us NOT to put the flag aside in shame. We need more good people connected with it, without those prejudices, to prevent it from becoming exclusively associated with the trashy elements. For the good to disassociate themselves from it leaves only the bad.
I am willing to learn here and this discussion interests me. But the Confederate constitution specifically south to preserve Slavery forever. The Vice President of the Confederacy made it explicitly clear that the war was over slavery. I think it might be true that states like Tennessee thought that the deep South should be allowed to go and keep slavery and they would have stayed in the Union. But if that position had been taken the United States would have been over. Every election could have been held hostage to a secession threat. When the people of Tennessee realized the North would preserve the Union by force that may have been the reason for them to rebel but they knew they were now also fighting to keep slavery as an institution. That has be acknowledged by everyone.
Your point here a great one. I have tried to open the discussion in this vein. I think that the reconciliation that America achieved after the Civil War is under appreciated and more people explicitly making that case, like David French of National Review (!), would be very, very welcomed.
It is at least important for us to understand that by making the Rebel Soldiers un-American we are going to pay a price for it. Losing the military culture of the South will hurt us. In our own Burkean way we have been doing better and better at throwing out and condemning the dirty “bath water” of the South while keeping the baby. Now suddenly we seem to want to get rid of the Baby too without even considering the cost to us as a nation.
Brian W, don’t misunderstand me. I didn’t say the South was against slavery. But both secession and war were about other things. The North needs secession to be about slavery because that’s the only way they can justify war. But it takes a lot of historical stretching to make the case.
Yes, you’re right. Jefferson Davis supported slavery. So did his V.P. Alexander Stephens. But (someone please correct me if I’m wrong), they were both against secession. In fact, in the Deep South it was the big slave owners who voted no on secession, only to be outvoted by the white lower class.
I understand you point. But say the New England states had seceded over the tariff around the War of 1812. I would have supported a war to keep those States in the Union. You can’t have a nation like America when any State can leave over a bad series of elections. We could not really have elections anymore if we did that. So I don’t think that North NEEDS the Civil War to be about Slavery. Preserving the Union was enough. Without slavery though there would have been no secessionist movement in the South.
PS, it may not make sense to many modern people that it was precisely the big slave owners who voted against secession. Abolitionists, though, understood. They, like slaveowners, believed that only the fugitive slave laws kept slavery alive. With secession, fugitive slave laws are null and void. Big slave owners in the Deep South, and the Upper South in general all voted against secession; not because they loved the North so much, but in order to protect slavery.
Garrison’s abolitionist newspaper had as its motto: No Union With Slaveholders! Yes, abolitionists believed the North should secede from the South for the same reasons slaveowners preferred union. Secession, they all knew, would likely spell the end of slavery.
EDIT: Ahh, that’s where we part ways, Brian. I see secession as a sacred right, and an important part of the webs of checks and balances. The American Revolution, for example, was not actually a revolution but a secession. We did not intend to overthrow the government in London, just leave it.
For me, the Civil War has few good guys. It was a war monger elite against a slave driver elite with the common man serving as cannon fodder.
My goodness. After all the population and economic growth of the South in the last 40 or so years, there are still some people who get rather defensive when silly Northerners get a little uppity about their Civil War “victory.”
Get a grip.
Yes we do disagree here. Secession was not a right nor sacred in my view. But for the sake of argument say it was. Then it was a poison pill that would have doomed our nation to destruction. If you leave because elections don’t go the way you like there would be no compromise on big issues. Morally the most important thing that happened from the Civil War was the ending of slavery. For the practical survival of the nation it was the end of the talk about secession not due to tyranny but due to the fact that you lose elections fairly and in the open. Tyranny, win or lose, must be resisted. The South seceded over an election that they fairly lost. No, to allow that is to allow the destruction of America and that was not worth it.
29 is all reasonable, Brian, even if we don’t agree. Well, the very last part is slightly off, I think. Only the Deep South seceeded over a lost election. They were a tad emotional down there. But the much more important Upper South voted to stay in the Union when the issue was the election.