Replies

“(snicker, this oughta be good)”

It might be. Be careful what you wish for.

“You may want to lean on the words of commies (mistaken, dead, or otherwise), but I think I’ll pass, thank you.”

I’m not surprised you want to “pass” on dealing with Marx and Engels. Radical support for the Union cause does complicate your effort to rewrite history, or redefine terms, or whatever the hell it is you’re trying to do. Sometimes it’s hard to put a proper name on ignorance.

The two original communist godfathers were only two of many revolutionaries who saw the cause of Lincoln and the North as their own. They were veterans of the Revolutions of 1848 that had swept Europe. Many had emigrated to the US. For them cause of the North meant progress and a chance to reorganize society. Radicals have always longed for the chance to be able to tell other people how to live and the Civil War looked like a crisis that shouldn’t be allowed to go to waste.

The Union Army had at least a couple of ‘48ers that were general officers, Franz Sigel and Carl Schurz. A full one fourth of the Union Army was foreign born and many of them were 48ers. By contrast the Confederate Army was over 90% American born and many of their generals were sons of Revolutionary War soldiers. A whole different sort of revolutionary heritage than the 48ers of the North. I don’t know of any European revolutionaries who supported the Confederacy, but maybe you can produce a few to buttress your argument that ‘There was nothing “conservative” about the confederacy.’

Domestically, the Republican Party had a large radical faction in it, the powerful Sumner-Stevens faction. Oddly enough they are known to history as the Radical Republicans. Maybe they could have called themselves the Conservative Republicans to help your version of history, but they didn’t. The Radical Republicans became the dominant power in the Republican Party and the whole country after Lincoln’s death. America was a one-party state for years with southern states dissolved and run as military districts. It was a model that would be greatly admired by progressive political organizers to come who would regard elections as unnecessary.

In the lead up to the war radicals played a role in both popular culture and behind the scenes political activism. The transcendentalist literary circle of Boston did both, in print aggravating the sectional conflict and in secret funding John Brown’s terrorist campaign. Now perhaps someone regards John Brown as a model conservative, but I’d say he is more like a role model for modern terrorists who think that they are on a mission from God. He was certainly lionized in the North whatever he was.

The Confederacy was attempting to preserve the same traditional slave-holding agrarian society that it had been since the Planter Class was composed of Washington, Jefferson, Madison and Monroe. Which makes me wonder what you have to say about those early Presidents, in light of your opinion of their practices:

“How is perpetuating the Planter Class and the abominable practice of slavery a conservative principle?”

Doesn’t sound like these men get to be conservatives in your world. Sounds like in the Great Class Struggle the Planter Class ends up in the dustbin of history. So, are you consistent and condemn them for their abominable practice of slavery? Or do they get the usual free pass where slavery is abominable in 1860 but not 1800?

And another thought concerning these men comes to mind; the British granted freedom to any slaves who would fight as loyalists against the rebels during the Revolution. Moreover these Planter Class rebels were waging war against the rule of law, the legitimate government, and they had unlawfully seized assets including arms that rightfully belonged to the Crown. Sounds a good deal like what you condemn the Confederacy for doing a few decades later. Looking back at all this do you side with America’s Planter Class or poor old King George?