President Ulysses S. Grant Deserves More Respect (born 200 years ago today)

https://www.wsj.com/articles/bicentennial-president-ulysses-grant-deserves-respect-civil-war-general-orders-american-history-slavery-racial-justice-11651002654 ^ | 4/26/22 | Allen C. Guelzo

[DoodleDawg]

He took over after the South had lost far too many men and the war of attrition was wearing them down.

And had spent the years prior to that defeating every rebel general set up against him. When the Confederacy had plenty of men.

He had huge advantages over Lee once he took over and frequently threw mens lives away.

He did what he had to in order to win. As did Lee, who had no concern for casualties himself.

And Shiloh? Grant should have been fired and court-martialed for his buffoonery, laziness and sheer dishonesty.

I notice you didn't mention the 'winning the battle' part.

[larrytown]

+1

[DiogenesLamp]

Spot on. In their day, the KKK was today's version of Antifa and Black Lives Matter.

So the KKK was very concerned about Black Lives Mattering?

Sounds backwards.

Seems like John Brown and his attempted insurrection raid is more like BLM and Antifa.

[central_va]

Secession is not unconstitutional and therefore not treason.

[DoodleDawg]

Mary Todd Lincoln

The well known military strategist. Your choice of sources is as eccentric as ever.

[DiogenesLamp]

He outflanked Lee, cut off the southwest from the rest of the Confederacy, and allowed Sherman to do his thing.

What would he have done without all those ships to ferry his troops?

It's a lot easier to do things when you have massive advantages over your enemy.

[larrytown]

Mary Todd Lincoln - the voice of rational thought.

[DiogenesLamp]

By the time Grant took command the South was penniless, shoeless, had 1/10th the industrial might of the North and woefully outmanned (in sheer #s). The North was fielding fresh conscripts (mostly Irish immigrants). Sherman? He was a war criminal who starved, burned out and murdered civilians.

Finally someone who grasps the reality of what happened.

[DoodleDawg]

By the time Grant took command the South was penniless, shoeless, had 1/10th the industrial might of the North and woefully outmanned (in sheer #s). The North was fielding fresh conscripts (mostly Irish immigrants). Sherman? He was a war criminal who starved, burned out and murdered civilians.

Blah, blah, blah. Having chosen to start the war the South alone is responsible for all the death and destruction and misery that it brought to them.

[Cuttnhorse]

I have often wondered what the war’s outcome would have been if Lee hadn’t fell into the Gettysburg trap?
His generals urged him to ignore Meade at Gettysburg and continue to Washington, D.C.
Lee fought on defense after the battle.

What an impressive, thoughtful battlefield memorial the Gettysburg Park is. Stunning place and the interpretive center is first rate.

[Cuttnhorse]

I guess I’m a Patton guy.

[DiogenesLamp]

The Union Army conscripted less than 10% of its total strength during the war.

It's population was four times larger, so that 10% would be equivalent to 40% for the South, (In numbers of men) wouldn't it?

[Retain Mike]

What follows is a passage from an essay I wrote titled “The Constitution and the Confederacy”. Secession before the Civil War was contemplated by at least New York and another state I cannot remember now. In the 20th century we had an example of peaceful dissolution when Czechoslovakia separated into two countries.

“The Constitution would not have been ratified if James Madison, who was unequaled in among delegates for scholarship of political organizations, had not with others supported positions that states retained sufficient sovereignty to secede as the last resort to a political impasse created by perceived usurpations or abuses of the federal government. This point was further emphasized by the fact the perpetual relationship language binding the colonies and colonists in the Articles of Confederation did not carry over into the Constitution.”

James Madison, Secession, & State Sovereignty

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/alt.war.civil.usa/p5V_C8Hm8yw

[DiogenesLamp]

Mary Todd Lincoln was repeating what other people, including Union military officers were saying at the time.

You just don't like it because it contradicts your narrative.

[DiogenesLamp]

Mary Todd Lincoln - the voice of rational thought.

So you attack the person and not the argument?

Newspapers and other Union officers were saying the same thing, but let's make it about Mary.

Reminds me of another point. If Lincoln was doing God's work, why was his own personal life so filled with tragedy?

[larrytown]

You just don't like it because it contradicts your narrative.

[DiogenesLamp]

Blah, blah, blah. Having chosen to start the war

Blah, blah, blah, having continuously repeated the fake assertion that the South started the war, you simply go onward from that false premise.

Lincoln sent warships. Warships started the war.

What the South did was threaten the money streams of the Rich, Powerful, Arrogant ruling class that controlled Washington DC, (and that same arrogant elite control it today) and they launched a war against the South to protect their finances.

And don't forget, they offered the South permanent slavery before they launched their war to protect their own money streams.

[DiogenesLamp]

“The Constitution would not have been ratified if James Madison, who was unequaled in among delegates for scholarship of political organizations, had not with others supported positions that states retained sufficient sovereignty to secede as the last resort to a political impasse created by perceived usurpations or abuses of the federal government. This point was further emphasized by the fact the perpetual relationship language binding the colonies and colonists in the Articles of Confederation did not carry over into the Constitution.”

+1.

Although 30 years later, Madison was against secession.

[DiogenesLamp]

You just don't like it because it contradicts your narrative.

Hardly. When the facts contradict my narrative, I change my narrative.

As John Maynard Keynes said to a critic:

"When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do sir?"

[LeoWindhorse]

I suppose, but as an ancestral Southerner , I do not appreciate what Grant did to us . Not one bit. Sherman too. Where were the Whitworths when & where we needed them?