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The Confederacy required submission.

As one Southern newspaper put it:

These passages in the inaugural are susceptible of a construction just the opposite of peace. … he would be compelled to send upon us obnoxious strangers enough to make mince pies of the southern people and cook them over their blazing dwellings.

I would hope you don't believe that beating Southerners to a pulp for daring to resume their own governance by withdrawing from the voluntary union. If you do think that, you would be at odds with Alexander Hamilton, future Chief Justice John Jay, James Madison and future Chief Justice John Marshall. They agreed during ratification that the Constitution meant that the states/people could resume their own governance. Heck, Madison and Marshall and three other Federalists wrote the Virginia ratification document. From Elliot's Debates, June 25, 1788 [Link]:

Ordered, That a committee be appointed to prepare and {656} report a form of ratification pursuant to the first resolution; and that Governor Randolph, Mr. Nicholas, Mr. Madison, Mr. Marshall, and Mr. Corbin, compose the said committee.

I'm sorry to say this, but you sometimes come off sounding like Sherman (who obviously hadn't read the ratification documents). Here is Sherman from July 1865 in Salem, Illinois:

I resolved in a moment to stop the game of guarding their cities and to destroy their cities. We were determined to produce results and now what were those results? To make every man, woman, and child in the South feel that if they dared to rebel against the flag of their country, they must die or submit.

You speak of depredations against Unionist East Tennesseans. Indeed, that is often all you talk about. I condemned those depredations and asked if you would likewise condemn the depredations by Sherman's men in Places like Columbia, South Carolina. You didn't condemn them. Perhaps that was an oversight on your part. I ask you again, do you condemn depredations, robberies, rapes, and home burnings by Sherman's men?

Oops. Forgot to check whether the Elliot's Debate link worked. Here it is again [Link].

You speak of depredations against Unionist East Tennesseans. Indeed, that is often all you talk about. I condemned those depredations and asked if you would likewise condemn the depredations by Sherman's men in Places like Columbia, South Carolina. You didn't condemn them. Perhaps that was an oversight on your part. I ask you again, do you condemn depredations, robberies, rapes, and home burnings by Sherman's men?

Don't you remember, crimes are not crimes if the target victim is of a certain class.

Some gleanings from FR thread, "The Wisdom Of William Tecumseh Sherman and the War On Terror" July 26, 2010;

"First there are the large planters, owning lands, slaves, and all kinds of personal property. These are, on the whole the ruling class. They are educated, wealthy, and easily, approached. In some districts they are bitter as gall and have given up slaves, plantations, and all, serving in the armies of the confederacy; whereas in others they are conservative. None dare admit a friendship for us, though they say freely that they were at the outset opposed to war and disunion. I know we can manage this class, but only by action. Argument is exhausted, and words have lost their usual meaning. Nothing but the logic of events touches their understanding; but of late, it has worked a wonderful change. If our country were like Europe crowded with people, I would say it would be easier to replace this class than to reconstruct it, subordinate to the policy of the nation; but as this is not the case, it is better to allow the planters with individual exceptions, gradually to recover their plantations, to hire any species of labor, and to adapt themselves to the new order of things." from Sherman's "Memoirs"

"I guess the bottom line here is that Sherman's visit to Columbia SC was no atrocity, unless you were a planter class white secessionist." mac_truck

"Sherman's goal in his own words (see memoirs) was to destroy the planter class of the south" mstar

"An admirable goal. I'm glad he succeeded as well as he did. As individuals, I'm sure many had admirable qualities, but as a political class, the plantation drones were pure evil, greedy for power, politically mendacious and full of contempt for their fellow Southerners of both races." Colonel Kangaroo

"To hell with the lower class, in fact (Sherman) despised them." mstar

"If he did, so did a large segment of the Confederate big shots many of whom were happy to make $$$ by having their slaves grow cotton while the families of the mudsills doing their fighting starved." Colonel Kangaroo

"There was always a sorry crowd in the Deep South who looked down on people who did their own work. The nation is better off that they lost their rebellion. It is a chilling thought that such people might still have real power had they not been beaten down by Lincoln and his liberators." Colonel Kangaroo August 21, 2010

These individuals along with others, have flagrantly slandered a class of Americans as drones, domestic and political criminals, extortionists, depraved individuals with the sole goal of the establishment of a elitist dictatorship by any means of criminal activity including torture and murder. Their private homes and churches have described as pagan shrines dictated to their own likeness. On one thread those defending the south were instructed "to go back and beat your slaves".

So far, not one name or credible documentation has been given as proof of these conclusions.

So I suppose the "The Blue Avengers Comic Book History Club" has concluded a vague class of down trodden workers, aka "those like them", had a CarteBlanche to do "whatever" to another class of their fellow Americans.

So did you guys take lessons with Lenin and their Uncle Joe, in addition to your Uncle Billy?

Did you throw in some classes with Hitler on the subduing and taming of the rouge countries that dare not be a part your plan?

Are you guys hearing what you are saying?

You speak of depredations against Unionist East Tennesseans. Indeed, that is often all you talk about. I condemned those depredations and asked if you would likewise condemn the depredations by Sherman's men in Places like Columbia, South Carolina. You didn't condemn them. Perhaps that was an oversight on your part. I ask you again, do you condemn depredations, robberies, rapes, and home burnings by Sherman's men?

I go overboard about East Tennessee because so many Southerners are unaware what the Confederacy did to those people and it deflates the Lost Cause myth of a United South.

Murder and crime are evil whether committed by Sherman's men or by Confederates. But Sherman never ordered murder and rape and his destruction to further the successful end of the war was legitimate.