Posted on 11/18/2017 6:36:43 AM PST by iowamark
On or around this day in 1861, Julia Ward Howe is inspired to write the Battle Hymn of the Republic. Did you know that this much-loved patriotic song has its roots in the Civil War years?
Julia was the daughter of a Wall Street broker and a poet. She was well-educated and was able to speak fluently in several languages. Like her mother, she loved to write. She also became very interested in the abolitionist and suffragette causes.
Samuel Howe was progressive in many ways, but he wasn’t too keen on expanding women’s rights. He thought Julia’s place was in the home, performing domestic duties. Interesting, since he proceeded to lose her inheritance by making bad investments.
One has to wonder if she could have managed her own inheritance a bit better?
After a while, Julia got tired of being stifled. She had never really given up writing, but now she published some of her poems anonymously. Samuel wasn’t too happy about that! The matter apparently became so contentious that the two were on the brink of divorce. Samuel especially disliked the fact that Julia’s poems so often seemed to reflect the personal conflicts within their own marriage.
In fact, people figured out that Julia had written the poems. Oops.
Events swung in Julia’s favor in 1861. Julia and Samuel had decided to attend a review of Union trips, along with their minister, James Freeman Clarke. The Union soldiers were singing a tune about the abolitionist John Brown, who had been killed before the Civil War. The lyrics included such lines as: “John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the grave, His soul is marching on!”
Clarke wasn’t too impressed. He suggested to Julia that she try to write more inspirational lyrics for the same melody. Julia proceeded to do exactly that. She later remembered that she “awoke in the gray of the morning twilight; and as I lay waiting for the dawn, the long lines of the desired poem began to twine themselves in my mind. Having thought out all the stanzas, I said to myself, ‘I must get up and write these verses down, lest I fall asleep again and forget them.’”
Perhaps you will recognize the lyrics that she wrote that morning.
“Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword:
His truth is marching on.”
Julia’s hymn supported the Union army and challenged the Confederate cause. One historian notes that she “identifies the Army of the Potomac with the divine armies that would crush the forces of evil and inaugurate the millennium. . . .”
In February 1862, Julia’s “Battle Hymn of the Republic” was published in the Atlantic Monthly. The song was a hit and Julia’s fame spread quickly. In the years that followed, she traveled widely, lecturing and writing more than ever. She was President of a few associations, and she later became the first woman elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
Julia’s song began as a morale-booster for Union troops. Today, it has grown beyond that to such an extent that most people do not remember its beginnings.
Primary Sources:
On the question of whether Scott, as a slave, had a right to take his matter to the courts then it shouldn't have been that close. But Taney wrote his decision on his own. And his overreach in that was all his own work and not supported by most of the rest of the court.
I don't know that I approve of the decision; I only recognize that it was necessary given the US constitution.
What part of the Constitution forbids citizenship for blacks and denies Congress the power to "make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory and other property of the United States?" Just curious.
Oh, how I wish New York, New Jersey, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Delaware, Maryland and the other slave states had not enshrined slavery into the US constitution!
Of course you don't.
Not if it is needed again, no.
The Nazi’s went wrong in every way I know because they pursued socialist policies and many of their leaders dabbled in the occult. They were bad guys.
Socialist policies like utilizing slave labor? Like implementing confiscatory taxes? Like seizing a set percentage of all farm output without compensation "for the war effort"? Like requiring private ship owners to reserve a set percentage of their cargo capacity for the government without compensation "for the war effort"? Like government control of whole industries like salt? Like requiring citizens to get government permission to travel? Like establishing un-elected Habeas Corpus Commissions that had the power to jail people without trial? Those kind of socialist policies?
Southerners were mostly good guys.
Once you get past that whole rebellion thing I'm sure they were all sterling characters.
But they had this one little quirk.
Oh they were quirkier than that.
They believed: Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
One quirk being that they thought their cause was on the same level as that of the Founding Fathers. It wasn't.
Don’t ask me where they got such a crazy idea.
It's a mystery to me too.
General Eisenhower knew about southerners. And he knew about Nazis. Unlike many today, he never confused the two.
He never missed the point as badly as you do. Over and over.
So Dred Scott was sound judicial reasoning and Texas v. White was "victor's justice".
Interesting.
Interesting.
“So what you’re saying is that 60 shootings in Chicago is thoroughly documented while 2 million deaths from starvation, exposure, and disease in the South is not documented at all?”
It is what it is.
And yet there doesn't seem to be much supporting documentation on DiogenesLamp's claim of 2 million dead. Poor reporting I guess. If only Fox News had been around. Or Breitbart.
Or in their case, Salon...
Rebs go away?
Free cheese day at the mission...
First, let's see that quote from Anderson.
Second, as we've now reviewed frequently, Lincoln's alleged "war fleet" was ordered "no first use of force".
Once resupply was accomplished, they were to return home in peace.
Third, it was not a "war fleet" because by Lincoln's own understandings, it was incapable of defeating Confederates surrounding Fort Sumter, but only strong enough to possibly accomplish its stated purpose of resupplying Union troops in Fort Sumter.
Finally, whatever Major Anderson may have predicted, or to whom, Jefferson Davis ignored the warnings of his own Secretary of State Robert Toombs:
So please explain why is it that Confederate Secretary of State Robert Toombs intuitively understood something which today, over 150 years later, "geniuses" like DiogenesLamp and jeffersondem can't figure out?
DiogenesLamp wishes us to focus on the bright-shiny object, Lincoln's "war fleet", while ignoring the real first act of war: Confederates' demand for Fort Sumter's surrender under threat & use of military force.
Lincoln's "war fleet" was only his response to previous Confederate attacks on previous Union resupply efforts, notably the Star of the West.
In short, Confederates were at war against the Union from almost Day One.
Lincoln's "war fleet" was merely a first, tentative, response.
Your problem is, you post only those quotes which best support your opinions and ignore any others, such as these final orders to Lincoln's resupply mission commanders:
The primary object of the expedition is to provision Fort Sumter, for which purpose the War Department will furnish the necessary transports.
Should the authorities of Charleston permit the fort to be supplied, no further particular service will be required of the force under your command, and, after being satisfied that supplies have been received at the fort, the Powhatan, Pocahontas and Harriet Lane will return to New York, and the Pawnee to Washington.
Should the authorities at Charleston, however, refuse to permit or attempt to prevent the vessel or vessels having supplies on board from entering the harbor or from peaceably proceeding to Fort Sumter, you will protect the transports or boats of the expedition in the object of this mission -- disposing of your force in such a manner as to open the way for their ingress, and afford, so far as practicable, security to the men and boats, and repelling, by force if necessary, all obstructions to provisioning the fort and reinforcing it; for in case of resistance to the peaceable primary object of the expedition, a reinforcement of the garrison will also be attempted."
In short: resupply only, no first use of force, if force required, then only to resupply & reinforce Fort Sumter.
There were no orders -- none, zero, nada orders -- to attack Confederates surrounding Fort Sumter.
There are no reports -- none, zero, nada reports -- of ships not entering Charleston SC harbor for fear of Union troops in Fort Sumter.
So DiogenesLamp's argument on this is totally bogus.
DiogenesLamp: "The Confederacy did not need a war.
All they wanted was to trade with Europe without 40% or more of their money ending up in Washington DC and New York."
In fact, Davis did need war to flip Unionist states like Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee & Arkansas to the Confederacy (which did happen).
Civil War might even turn Border States like Maryland, Kentucky & Missouri from Union to Confederacy, (which did not happen).
Without war there was no way those states would leave the Union, so Davis needed war.
DiogenesLamp: "Lincoln needed the war, otherwise the North would have been devastated by the collapse of their manufacturing and shipping."
In fact, the Union economy did not collapse during the Civil War, thus demonstrating DiogenesLamp's claim here is bogus.
Of course, some Northeastern Democrats were motivated by economic concerns, but Republicans like Lincoln were not beholden to such Democrats and not overly concerned with their issues.
Republicans in 1861 were more concerned with preserving the Union & Constitution, and with stopping the expansion of slavery.
DiogenesLamp: "One had a serious financial motive to start a war.
The other did not. "
For both sides the issues were far more than mere finances, they were existential.
In April 1861 the 7-state Confederacy was a failure since the majority of slave-states (8 of 15) had voted against secession and nothing short of war could change their minds.
So Davis needed war to double the Confederacy's size & population.
For Lincoln, in April 1861 the existential issue was: could the United States survive at all, or must it split into its various regions?
Specifically at Fort Sumter the question was whether the Union would push back against Confederate aggression or simply give in anywhere & everywhere Confederates demanded.
But DiogenesLamp's excessive, exclusive focus on a few Northeastern Democrats' financial concerns tells us that DiogenesLamp is not himself Republican and has no background to understand viewpoints beyond his own narrow focus.
DiogenesLamp: "Even DoodleDawg knows that possibility was not even remotely true."
In fact, DiogenesLamp provides no evidence to refute rockrr's statement and in his next post DiogenesLamp admits it's true, sort of...
rockrr: "Or so they told us."
DiogenesLamp: "I have read many opinions to the effect that this was indeed what they said, but it was intended as subterfuge for their real reasons, which was economic independence."
Sure, issues in global finance-logistics doubtless did motivate a few elite secessionists, but the secession sale-closer for the vast majority of Southerners was the alleged threat to slavery represented by "Ape" Lincoln and his "Black Republicans."
That's not just what they said, it's also what they believed.
DiogenesLamp: "At least this is what one Northern newspaper believed."
The Boston Transcript, March 18, 1861:
Sure, some Northeastern Democrats would be concerned about such matters.
Normal Republican voters, not so much.
Republicans were more concerned about the Union, Constitution and slavery.
Wrong.
Passage of the 13th (1865), 14th (1868) & 15th (1870) amendments represented the free-will choice of a majority of voters in those states at that time, and those choices have never since then been repealed.
Of course, for some years after the Civil War voting franchise was restricted to those who had not participated in the rebellion.
The original 27 ratifying states included nine Southern:
Nine other states did not ratify the 13th at the time, but all have since ratified, the last being Mississippi, certified in 2013.
Consider: our pro-Confederates often tell us that average Confederate soldiers did not own slaves and were not fighting for slavery.
Fair enough, and average Union soldiers knew nothing of and cared nothing about "the pockets of wealthy robber barons."
What they did care about was preserving the Union and, by war's end, defeating slavery.
Once again: in those days, Northeastern "wealthy robber barons" were Democrat globalist allies to the wealthy Southern planters before 1861 and again after 1865.
DoodleDawg post #141: "Protect slavery to an extent that it wasn't protected under the U.S. Constitution.
For example, ensuring that slavery could not be outlawed in any state."
DiogenesLamp post #150: "My reading of Article IV, section 2 causes me to believe that it could already not be outlawed in any state.
The Supreme Court also verified this interpretation in the Dred Scot case."
One problem with both DiogenesLamp's "reading" and the Dred-Scot ruling is that both ignore Founders' Original Intent.
Clearly there was no intent -- zero, zip, nada intent -- by Founders to prohibit abolition by states.
This can be seen, for example, in President Washington's compliance with Pennsylvania abolition laws while Washington lived in Philadelphia.
So both Dred-Scott and DiogenesLamp's "reading" are new & novel interpretations neither intended by Founders nor approved by Congress or voters.
In short they are perverse opinions only, rendered null & void by history.
It was not even slightly capable of performing that mission. It would have been swatted like a fly and all those ships sunk and most of those men killed. It was in fact a suicide mission had the Powhatan showed up as all the ships had believed it would.
I've read what the Confederates had set up. Anderson had passed this information to his leadership, and so they too knew what sort of cannon fire they would be facing. Only a small portion of the cannon force fired on Sumter. The bulk of it was held in reserve to deal with the force Lincoln sent down.
It is clear to me that it was no accident that the Powhatan did not rendezvous with the other ships and force their way in. Anyone who knew what was arrayed against them would have realized they would have been destroyed.
Lincoln only needed the Confederates to think he was sending in an attack, and that's why he let the ships orders go through normal channels, while his secret order to Lieutenant (two ranks below captain in the Union Navy at that time.) David Porter sent the command ship elsewhere without anyone knowing it wasn't going to Charleston.
Mister history buff. Find out how many cannon batteries were held in reserve to deal with the attacking fleet. Then tell me if you think those ships could have survived that.
In his desperate efforts to "prove" that "Lincoln fired the first shot" DiogenesLamp here ignores the first paragraphs of this order which clearly imply: No First Use of Force.
DiogenesLamp quoting Confederate Secretary of State Toombs: "...if any change were resolved upon, due notice would be given to the Commissioners. "
Commissioners? What commissioners?
The ones Seward never met?
I don't think so.
Regardless, due notice was given, to South Carolina governor Pickens.
And the immediate Confederate response was: surrender or war for Fort Sumter.
So regardless of how much DiogenesLamp spins it, in fact, Confederates started war at Fort Sumter.
Following from DiogenesLamp link makes clear this is not a quote from Lincoln himself, but rather a Jesse W. Weik 1889 interpretation of Lincoln's law partner William Herndon's decades later interpretation of Lincoln, made while Herndon suffered alcoholism in the years before his death in 1892.
In fact, Lincoln worked for railroad companies and was not opposed to them on principle.
The quote itself sounds like 1890 era urban Progressives rather than 1860s rural Republicans.
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