You all love that part of Steiner's report, and you all completely ignore the sentence that comes right after it: "The fact was patent, and rather interesting when considered in connection with the horror rebels express at the suggestion of black soldiers being employed for the national defense." Link
If black soldiers were included in combat positions with rebel regiments, then why the horror at the idea of black Union soldiers? If blacks were respected members of the rebel army then why did they, time after time, refuse to take blacks as prisoners but instead shot them when they tried to surrender? Fort Pillow, Olustee, Poison Spring, the Crater, Saltville, Plymouth, the history of killing black soldiers rather than accept their surrender is clear. The idea of black combat soldiers was an anathema for the rebel soldier - and their leadership - up until the very end.
Because free blacks and "sponsored" freedmen and slaves in Confederate ranks were not the avenging legions of Dessalines and Toussaint L'Ouverture come to America to slaughter Ol' Massa in his bed?
How about that one?
Or does your ideology exclude the possibility of subtlety in Southern political thought?