Thoughts on the Civil War

More than 1.5 centuries later, the impact of the Civil War and slavery can still be felt. You’ll notice the lack of a north/south divide or any discrimination issues. America is healed!

I'm still bewildered by Civil War recreationists. Are there German WWII recreationists? Wanna play Nazis and Jews? The gas chamber is goal!

Bullshit. God, what must it be like to teach this stuff to students? Something like this, probably, only way worse. I’d rather find the nearest rock and crawl under it. But, I’m not a teacher and only a few of you read this crap, so I’ll give it a go.

The accepted story was that the Civil War was fought over slavery, yet Lincoln and company were officially concerned about the preservation of The Union. Slavery was an elephant in the room, and for a lot of reasons that defy the parameters of this blog post. History unfolded, tipping points were reached, and then slavery became an Official Reason. What happened?

Item #1: More unintended consequences

Slavery was an important, growing, social issue, certainly among the cosmopolitan. Here’s some perspective in the form of How Slavery Really Ended in America by Adam Goodheart at The New York Times. It’s a solid strand of history that demonstrates how social attitudes can shift, and how unexpected circumstances develop in ways nobody predicted.

General Butler; the unlikely harbinger of change

Back in 1861, three fugitive slaves, under Confederate orders to build an artillery emplacement aimed at Fort Monroe, sought refuge there instead. This put the freshly arrived commander, General Butler, in a bind. He was no abolitionist, and was obliged to return the slaves since that was a constitutional directive.

Butler had not invited the fugitives in or engineered their escape, but here they were, literally at his doorstep: a conundrum with political and military implications, at the very least. He could not have known — not yet — that his response that day might change the course of the national drama that was then just beginning. Yet it was not the first time, nor would it be the last, that an unanticipated bureaucratic dilemma would force the hand of history.

Since the slaves were building something weapony, they, themselves, could rightly be considered contraband. This conflation of person and thing had unintended consequences. The three men were permitted to take refuge. Word of this spread, and more escaped slaves turned up.

Lincoln and his administration, informed, nervous, and cautious, engaged in that time honored American political tradition: waffling. They let Butler do his own thing.

Despite the counsels from Washington, Butler was not turning away “unproductive” fugitives. He replied: “If I take the able-bodied only, the young must die. If I take the mother, must I not take the child?” By early June, some 500 fugitives were within the Union lines at Fort Monroe.

“Stampede Among the Negroes in Virginia,” proclaimed Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, with a double-page spread of dramatic woodcuts showing black men, women and children crossing a creek under a full moon, then being welcomed heartily into the fort by General Butler himself (or rather, by the artist’s trimmer, handsomer version of him). One correspondent estimated that “this species of property under Gen. Butler’s protection [is] worth $500,000, at a fair average of $1,000 apiece in the Southern human flesh market.”

The media ran with it. It re-energized the northern abolitionist movement and dragged the slavery issue back into the dispute over unity. Slavery did become a cause, but not at first, and not thanks to any large, guiding hand. The Emancipation Proclamation was delivered only after the successfully waged battle at Antietam. Issuing it after a military loss would have seemed desperate. The official abolition of slavery didn’t actually affect matters in the uncontrolled south, but it did shut down foreign support for the confederacy.

Item #2: Exploring the reasons

Brad DeLong posted an item that takes its bearings from a question posed by Matt Yglesias:

I’ve always thought there was something about the Lincoln administration’s determination to fight and win the Civil War that was a bit odd. Secession gave the regionally based Republican Party large congressional majorities that wouldn’t exist if southern states had representation in congress. What’s more, the Republican Party’s controversial policy objective of banning slavery from the western territories could have been easily achieved by the much more modest policy of simply ensuring military control over the territories. Some fighting in border states such as Maryland, Tennessee, Missouri, and Kentucky is easy to understand but why try to reconquer the Deep South?

Brad offers two reasons of his own:

1. The goal was not to keep slavery out of the territories but to put slavery on the path to ultimate extinction. Letting the Deep South go does not accomplish that.
2. The union must be preserved because without union sooner or later the pieces of the USA would fight a bloody war. (I know, I know.)

Hoisted from the comments, here are some additional thoughts:

• “Cotton was oil of the 19th century. cotton tariffs represented 87% of the federal tax revenue before the civil war. who do you think subsidized the northern industrialists.” (Austin Texas)
• “If the secession of the South was accepted as a fait accompli sans fighting, a precedent has been set: what happens in the future? Will states threaten to take their ball and go home everytime majority opinion is against them? Is the union a cohesive enough political entity that it doesn’t have to worry about future efforts at secession?” (Bruce)
• “A south that controls the mouth of the Mississippi would have neutered many extra-regional trading ambitions that the north might have had, especially given the hostility that emerged over the life of the civil war. The coasts are surely important, but rivers are often the life blood of nations that want to be big players in the international trade-system.” (Me)
• “When the Constitution was written and adopted there was every prospect that the US’s constituent states would develop into a system of alliances and that eventually the weaker one would tie itself to one or another European country.” (Altoid)
• “The North might have let the deep South go, but the North was not about to give up control of the Mississippi River. Even today, the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers are used to ship large amounts of coal and grain. The North was not about to give up control of the shipping lanes and control of Pensacola or Key West.” (Bakho, who, incidentally, has the longest and most thorough argument that you should just read for yourself)
• “Governments that just let half their country go undermine their own legitmacy and do not last long. Not being able to maintain your territorial integrity is a prima facie description of a strong state.” (Christian)

Scenic Gettysburg

Allen Cook seconds the idea of the importance of a United United States in my Buzz share.

If the only thing keeping the states together was lacking enough military force to be a plausible threat, the USA would be doomed inside of a generation.

I think that’s basically true. Preserve the union or it’ll fall apart, bit by bit. All the lofty goals, inalienable rights, and lone tears at the sound of the national anthem, don’t compare with the sober world of terrestrial political power.

Slavery was abolished at the end of the most brutal war in U.S. history. The Jim Crow era would follow. History continues, but echos remain. Every time I dip my ankles into this particular pool, I’m convinced there’s nothing even slightly romantic about it. But, it shouldn’t be. It’s a goddamn war. All these years later, though, it’s still divisive.