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| Getting ready for a reenactment |
This intense interest in the Civil War may seem like an obsession to some, but Fr. Dave isn't alone in his fascination with this bloodiest of American wars. I've known many men who have made themselves amateur historians on the conflict (I'm sure there are some women too, but I haven't run into any). They can tell you, in detail, the state and county of origin of particular regiments, the movements of the armies, troop strengths, commanding officers, strategies employed and maneuvers that failed, along with casualty numbers, and they often go off on rather detailed narratives of the events. The best ones can fool you into thinking that they were really there, at Manassas, at Antietam, at Gettysburg, during the heat of battle, their command of the information is so great.
This dedication to keeping alive the memory of a conflict is only rivaled by some people's interest in World War II. But war was a "simpler" thing in the 1860's. It's much harder, to say the least, to reenact the Battle of Midway, or the D-Day landings than it is to re-stage Pickett's Charge. Getting your hands on a Civil War period rifle isn't easy, but I defy you to get your hands on a Higgins Boat and a couple of aircraft carriers, and then get yourself half way around the world to where the battles were fought. The Civil War was fought right in the continental United States, using technology that can be more easily reproduced or refurbished and obtained. What's more it was a war between American, and the bromide that it was a matter of brother against brother is true. It changed forever how the U.S. views itself. As was pointed out in Ken Burns' land mark documentary, prior to the war people would say, "the United States are," and after we say "the United States is." In other words, it settled the question as to where a citizen's primary loyalty should be directed - to their state or to the Federal Government (or, so it seems). The fact that this was a family war, fought in localities within driving distance to most people in the eastern part of the country; that we can walk the fields where so many lost their lives, and relive, even if in a shadowy way, the events of that time, only increases the sense of intimacy and urgency that devotees feel toward the conflict.
In spite of the war ending in 1865, the argument continues, though, as to why the war was fought. As was the case with every good school boy growing up the Northeast in the 1970's, I was taught that it was a war to free the slaves. We were taught not to despise Robert E. Lee, in particular, and while I can't say that the Confederacy was portrayed as evil, they were clearly on the wrong side, defending the evil, oppressive institution of slavery. It was also the time when the TV mini-series Roots appeared on ABC, depicting the horrors of slavery, from capture in Africa, through the Middle Passage and onto the the plantations. It was required viewing for students of all ages. By today's standard it's pretty tame stuff, but in 1977 it was considered shocking. It too pretty much followed the narrative that the war was about freeing slaves.
As I don't need to say, most historians today dispute this interpretation of events. They will say that the North was fighting to preserve the Union, and the South was fighting to protect the sovereign rights of the individual states against federal incursion. Lincoln, far from being a die hard abolitionist, said that if liberating the slaves would hold the Union together, he's do it, but if keeping slavery legal accomplished the same ends, he's do that. And if a solution came around that set some slaves free and kept others in bondage, he's go for that, too. On the Confederate side, most people didn't own slaves, and didn't necessarily see it as an issue, apart from the notion that they were Virginians, Alabamans or Georgians first, and the central government needed to stop meddling in the internal affairs of the states. As the most famous, and articulate, amateur historian of the war, the late Shelby Foote, put it, the attitude of the average Confederate soldier toward his Unionist counterpart was, "I'm fighting, because you're down here."
I have always had a problem with the "slavery had nothing to do with the Civil War" argument that I sometimes hear (and yes, some people, some otherwise pretty smart people, do speak that way). It's not because it contradicts the narrative of my youth, but that it flies in the face certain realities. Some of the southern states had tried to secede during the time of Andrew Jackson over protective tariffs that hurt their cotton trade with Europe. That movement never really got anywhere. In giving it's reasons for secession in December of 1860, South Carolina's declaration did indeed discuss state's rights, but always in the light of the slave issue. The problem, rooted in slavery's inherent contradiction with the Declaration of Independents' claim the all men are created equal, imbued with certain inalienable rights, particularly life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, had been kicked down the road since the nation's founding. There had been legislative compromises, Supreme Court decisions and even de facto civil wars in the territories leading up to the conflict - all revolving around slavery. Abolitionist John Brown's failed 1859 raid on Harper's Ferry, to steal weapons meant to arm slaves for a rebellion, polarized the country and set the South on edge, convincing many that civil war was inevitable. Yes, the Confederacy appealed to the principle of states rights in making their case for secession, but they weren't citing some vague notions about federal tariffs or over regulation to justify their course of action. It was that their rights to "private property," in the form of human beings held in bondage, was being endangered by the federal government. To say that slavery had nothing to do with the Civil War is sort of like saying a person's cancer had nothing to do with his demise because the death certificate says that he died of septic shock. Well, he wouldn't have gone into shock if he hadn't had cancer, and I doubt the southern states would have been so motivated to secession if slavery, and the immediate economic implications of its abolition, hadn't been in play.
What I'm saying is that this is a complicated issue, and as the aforementioned Shelby Foote also said, it's just as foolish to say that slavery had everything to do with the Civil War as it is to say it had nothing to do with it. The world isn't that simple.
Here we are, a century and a half later, still fighting over the legacy of the war, what it's symbols mean, and even the nature of what the Union is, and if secession is possible. At the same time progressives are now calling for the removal and destruction of Confederate monuments, and the permanent banishing of the Confederate Battle Flag, others, particularly in California, are calling for secession in light of the election of President Trump. Ironically, these activists are at once condemning the Confederacy while at the same time some in their ranks are seeking to follow the Old South's goals of separation from the federal government. These are, as I've already stated, complicated questions. I agree with those who think that we are in the process of foolishly erasing our history, and we shouldn't be so quick to want to tear down statues and deface monuments. But just as we have to make an honest assessment as to what the causes of the Civil War were, we also have to understand what the symbols of that war meant at the time, and how they may have been later appropriated in such a way as to render them unusable. We are still fighting the American Civil War because, just as the problem of slavery was kicked down the road prior to the war, the process of reconciliation, integration and reparation after the war was botched. On these questions I will opine the next time out
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