In common example, the brigadier will permit the attributes of nationhood by demanding a stringent adherence to CSA law while attempting to allege the confederate government's shortcomings under those laws. He simultaneously denies the attributes of nationhood in all matters involving the CSA's standing as a combattant in war under the laws of nations...except, of course, when the CSA is accused of starving prisoners at Andersonville, in which case they are war criminals under those same laws of nations. But that newly acquired status switches back the moment Sherman comes into the picture, in which case he was only putting down "rebellious provinces." Nationhood typically resumes for them when diplomacy between the commands of the two armies come up...only to disappear again when diplomacy with Saint Abe over a peaceful secession in 1861 becomes an issue, though not diplomacy with Saint Abe at the Hampton Rhodes conference 4 years later, in which Saint Abe is always portrayed as extending a hand to "bind up the nation's wounds" or some such nonsense only to be shunned by the evil slavers. Confederate nationhood to them is kind of like a light switch that's in their hands. When it suits them to have it on, they switch it on. When it suits them to turn it off, they switch it off.
Of course all of this ignores and neglects the true de facto nationhood status of the CSA because it has nothing to do with that status, nothing to do with actual facts, and everything to do with the semantical convenience of an argument.
Wonderful post.