Copperheads, Then and Now - The Democratic legacy of undermining war efforts.

National Review Online ^ | March 19, 2007 | Mackubin Thomas Owens

[neverdem]

March 19, 2007, 6:00 a.m.

Copperheads, Then and Now
The Democratic legacy of undermining war efforts.

By Mackubin Thomas Owens

While recovering from surgery recently, I had the good fortune to read a fine new book about political dissent in the North during the Civil War. The book, Copperheads: The Rise an Fall of Lincoln’s Opponents in the North, by journalist-turned-academic-historian Jennifer Weber, shines the spotlight on the “Peace Democrats,” who did everything they could to obstruct the Union war effort during the Rebellion. In so doing, she corrects a number of claims that have become part of the conventional wisdom. The historical record aside, what struck me the most were the similarities between the rhetoric and actions of the Copperheads a century and a half ago and Democratic opponents of the Iraq war today.

In contradistinction to the claims of many earlier historians, Weber argues persuasively that the Northern anti-war movement was far from a peripheral phenomenon. Disaffection with the war in the North was widespread and the influence of the Peace Democrats on the Democratic party was substantial. During the election of 1864, the Copperheads wrote the platform of the Democratic party, and one of their own, Rep. George H. Pendleton of Ohio, was the party’s candidate for vice president. Until Farragut’s victory at Mobile Bay, Sherman’s capture of Atlanta, and Sheridan’s success in driving the Confederates from the Shenandoah Valley in the late summer and fall of 1864, hostility toward the war was so profound in the North that Lincoln believed he would lose the election.

Weber demonstrates beyond a shadow of a doubt that the actions of the Copperheads materially damaged the ability of the Lincoln administration to prosecute the war. Weber persuasively refutes the view of earlier historians such as the late Frank Klement, who argued that what Lincoln called the Copperhead “fire in the rear” was mostly “a fairy tale,” a “figment of Republican imagination,” made up of “lies, conjecture and political malignancy.” The fact is that Peace Democrats actively interfered with recruiting and encouraged desertion. Indeed, they generated so much opposition to conscription that the Army was forced to divert resources from the battlefield to the hotbeds of Copperhead activity in order to maintain order. Many Copperheads actively supported the Confederate cause, materially as well as rhetorically.

In the long run, the Democratic party was badly hurt by the Copperheads. Their actions radically politicized Union soldiers, turning into stalwart Republicans many who had strongly supported the Democratic party’s opposition to emancipation as a goal of the war. As the Democrats were reminded for many years after the war, the Copperheads had made a powerful enemy of the Union veterans.

The fact is that many Union soldiers came to despise the Copperheads more than they disdained the Rebels. In the words of an assistant surgeon of an Iowa regiment, “it is a common saying here that if we are whipped, it will be by Northern votes, not by Southern bullets. The army regard the result of the late [fall 1862] elections as at least prolonging the war.”

Weber quotes the response of a group of Indiana soldiers to letters from Copperhead “friends” back home:

Your letter shows you to be a cowardly traitor. No traitor can be my friend; if you cannot renounce your allegiance to the Copperhead scoundrels and own your allegiance to the Government which has always protected you, you are my enemy, and I wish you were in the ranks of my open, avowed, and manly enemies, that I might put a ball through your black heart, and send your soul to the Arch Rebel himself.

It is certain that the Union soldiers tired of hearing from the Copperheads that the Rebels could not be defeated. They surely tired of being described by the Copperheads as instruments of a tyrannical administration trampling the legitimate rights of the Southern states. The soldiers seemed to understand fairly quickly that the Copperheads preferred Lincoln’s failure to the country’s success. They also recognized that the Copperheads offered no viable alternative to Lincoln’s policy except to stop the war. Does any of this sound familiar?

Today, Democratic opponents of the Iraq war echo the rhetoric of the Copperheads. As Lincoln was a bloodthirsty tyrant, trampling the rights of Southerners and Northerners alike, President Bush is the world’s worst terrorist, comparable to Hitler.

These words of the La Crosse Democrat responding to Lincoln’s re-nomination could just as easily have been written about Bush:  “May God Almighty forbid that we are to have two terms of the rottenest, most stinking, ruin working smallpox ever conceived by fiends or mortals…” The recent lament of left-wing bloggers that Vice President Dick Cheney was not killed in a suicide bombing attempt in Pakistan echoes the incendiary language of Copperhead editorialist Brick Pomeroy who hoped that if Lincoln were re-elected, “some bold hand will pierce his heart with dagger point for the public good.” 

Antiwar Democrats make a big deal of “supporting the troops.” But such expressions ring hollow in light of Democratic efforts to hamstring the ability of the United States to achieve its objectives in Iraq. And all too often, the mask of the antiwar politician or activist slips, revealing what opponents of the war really think about the American soldier.

For instance, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Rep. Charles Rangel have suggested that soldiers fighting in Iraq are there because they are not smart enough to do anything else. Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois has suggested a similarity between the conduct of U.S. troops in Iraq and that of Nazi soldiers in World War II. His Illinois colleagues, Sen. Barack Obama, claimed that the lives of soldiers lost in Iraq were “wasted.” And recently William Arkin, a military analyst writing online for the Washington Post, said of American soldiers that they are “mercenaries” who had little business taking critics of the war to task.

The Copperheads often abandoned all decency in their pursuit of American defeat in the Civil War. One Connecticut Copperhead told his neighbors that he hoped that all the men who went to fight for the Union cause would “leave their Bones to Bleach on the soil” of the South. The heirs of the Copperheads in today’s Democratic party are animated by the same perverted spirit with regard to the war in Iraq. Nothing captures the essence of today’s depraved Copperhead perspective better than the following e-mail, which unfortunately is only one example of the sort of communication I have received all too often in response to articles of mine over the past few months.

Dear Mr. Owens

You write, "It is hard to conduct military operations when a chorus of eunuchs is describing every action we take as a violation of everything that America stands for, a quagmire in which we are doomed to failure, and a waste of American lives."

But Mr. Owens, I believe that those three beliefs are true. On what grounds can I be barred from speaking them in public? Because speaking them will undermine American goals in Iraq? Bless you, sir, that's what I want to do in the first place. I am confident that U.S. forces will be driven from Iraq, and for that reason I am rather enjoying the war.

But doesn't hoping that American forces are driven from Iraq necessarily mean hoping that Americans soldiers will be killed there? Yes it does. Your soldiers are just a bunch of poor, dumb suckers that have been swindled out of their right to choose between good and evil. Quite a few of them are or will be swindled out of their eyes, legs, arms and lives. I didn't swindle them. President Bush did. If you're going to blame me for cheering their misery, what must you do to President Bush, whose policies are the cause of that misery?

Union soldiers voted overwhelmingly for Lincoln in 1864, abandoning the once-beloved George McClellan because of the perception that he had become a tool of the Copperheads. After Vietnam, veterans left the Democratic party in droves. I was one of them. The Democratic party seems poised to repeat its experience in both the Civil War and Vietnam.

The Democrats seem to believe that they are tapping into growing anti-Iraq War sentiment in the military. They might cite evidence of military antipathy towards the war reflected in, for example, the recent CBS Sixty Minutes segment entitled “Dissension in the Ranks.”  But the Democrats are whistling past the graveyard. The Sixty Minutes segment was predicated on an unscientific Army Times poll, orchestrated by activists who now oppose the war. The fact remains that most active duty and National Guard personnel still support American objectives in Iraq. They may be frustrated by the perceived incompetence of higher-ups and disturbed by a lack of progress in the war, but it has always been thus among soldiers. The word “snafu” began as a World War II vintage acronym:  “situation normal, all f****d up.”

Union soldiers could support the goals of the war and criticize the incompetence of their leaders in the same breath. But today’s soldiers, like their Union counterparts a century and a half ago, are tired of hearing that everything is the fault of their own government from people who invoke Gitmo and Abu Ghraib but rarely censure the enemy, and who certainly offer no constructive alternative to the current course of action.

The late nineteenth century Democratic party paid a high price for the influence of the Copperheads during the Civil War, permitting Republicans to “wave the bloody shirt” of rebellion and to vilify the party with the charge of disunion and treason. If its leaders are not careful, today’s Democratic party may well pay the same sort of price for the actions of its antiwar base, which is doing its best to continue the Copperhead legacy.

 —  Mackubin Thomas Owens is an associate dean of academics and a professor of national-security affairs at the Naval War College in Newport, R.I. He is writing a history of U.S. civil-military relations.

[Niteranger68]

Compared to whom? Jefferson Davis and the Southern leadership? Based on their actions during the rebellion I think they were worse in many ways than anything Lincoln was accused of.

We will forever agree to disagree.

[Ditto]

To be 100% correct, you have no idea why I think the Copperheads were closer to right than today’s anti-war crowd and Lincoln was bad not my favorite president.

That is 100% correct -- I don't have any idea why you would think that.

The question is; Do you have any idea why you think that?

[Non-Sequitur]

Or maybe I just don't buy Lincoln's argument that our country was venerable to attack from foreign entities because we were divided.

I don't remember Lincoln ever giving that as a reason for his actions. Lincoln opposed the Southern acts of secession because he believed they were illegal. He fought the war because the war was forced upon him when the South attacked Sumter. Lincoln's sole goal in the war was the preservation of the Union, and I don't have any problems at all buying that.

But honestly, is there any good reason I should have to qualify my opinion?

Just curious on what you based it on.

[Niteranger68]

The question is; Do you have any idea why you think that?

Yes.

[tkathy]

Blaming Lincoln for the self created problems of the south is intellectual dishonesty.

[stand watie]

don't you wish you were correct??? the rebel side was/IS right.

free dixie,sw

[stand watie]

well, you're certainly expert at "DIShonesty", as the ignorant BILGE spewed out by the DYs of FR is that and HATE-filled, too.

free dixie,sw

[KC_Conspirator]

No, actually they were Copperheads were just as much hate America filth as todays leftists.

[billbears]

It would only be fair to add him to your list of monarchists as well, since Hamilton never had bit of power or authority that was not through that old man.

Well actually until late 1775, and Paine's pamphlet, Washington was fighting more for a stalemate and less for independence. Until Common Sense there is an argument that many saw reconciliation still as a possibility

However, it is clear from Washington's stance, less got through to Hamilton, and even less to his worshippers today, of the intent of the federal government. The only thing I wish hadn't happened in Hamilton's life is the duel. If Burr hadn't shot the bastard (legal definition) perhaps his views would have been ridiculed properly by 1820 instead of making him some saint martyr for the 'nation'

[billbears]

Sure is. Pop up to Washington and tell George I'm tired of handing over a large portion of my paycheck needlessly to pay for his programs, not to mention the federal behemoth created by lincoln

[Ditto]

Well actually until late 1775, and Paine's pamphlet, Washington was fighting more for a stalemate and less for independence. Until Common Sense there is an argument that many saw reconciliation still as a possibility

In the words of Jefferson...

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.

Now who exactly was pushing for full and complete Revolution in 1775? (before anyone had even heard of Tom Payne).

It was another one of you enemies --- that dastardly John Adams.

Bill, with all due respect, you devotion to a pack of mid 19th Century slave driving aristocrats who were willing to break the nation and who categorically rejected the founding documents....

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness

... has driven you to the point that you can even call Washington "luke warm" to Independence and creates this artificial Satan in the form of Hamilton, I'd suggest you should reexamine you fundamental premises.

You do realize, I hope, that the "founders" of the Confederacy ridiculed that basic statement of our values and said the Jefferson was wrong. They had to reject what the Revolution was about in order to justify their "institution" which had long since passed the stage of 'unpleasant necessity" that the Framers faced in 1787 and moved into the "positive good" (and positively profitable) rational. Rejecting the founding principles was then their only option.

Hamilton was not a saint. Nor were Washington, Jefferson or Adams. They were all fallible humans doing the best they could through the circumstances under which they lived. I would never attack any of them based upon what seceding generations have done to the institutions they founded.

But if we were to take your 'model' which was the lineage of the Confederates --- the Jeffersonian agrarian model where wealth in land holdings were the future, vs. the Hamiltonian-Clay model that allowed for a multifaceted economy -- agricultural, commercial and industrial, I'd say the US today would have been another Mexico and we would all be figuring out how the hell to get into Canada.

History has vindicated Hamilton. But because of your blind devotion to the Lost Cause Mythology, you are forced to reject plain facts.

And again. As a young man, Hamilton actually ran Red Coats through with his bayonet while at the same time, Jefferson poked at them from a distance with his quill.

They both served, in different ways but to question Hamilton's patriotism is beyond silly and to somehow lay FDR, the New Deal or the Great Society madness on Hamilton is just flat stupid.

[billbears]

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness

Seeing as you're quoting the original document of secession let's go a bit further down that same paragraph

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.

You quote all around it and yet somehow miss that bit.

--- the Jeffersonian agrarian model where wealth in land holdings were the future, vs. the Hamiltonian-Clay model that allowed for a multifaceted economy -- agricultural, commercial and industrial, I'd say the US today would have been another Mexico and we would all be figuring out how the hell to get into Canada.

Yes and tax the citizenry for their own good to build this system. Considering taxation of the citizens of the separate and sovereign states at this level would be foreign to the Framers, you can't very well argue they would have advocated what it took to build Hamilton's 'dream'.

History has vindicated Hamilton.

Actually it hasn't. We are finally facing the logical end to Hamilton's view. A nation that is dependent upon more and more taxation whose infrastructure is failing because the government can't keep it up. What's the government solution? More programs and more laws to collect funds to pay for it. However Hamilton's plan taken to its logical conclusion creates nothing but political slush funds, as the 'illustrious country lawyer' and his friends could attest to if they were still alive. The corruption from the railroad system alone would be enough to send any current politician to jail.

But because of your blind devotion to the Lost Cause Mythology, you are forced to reject plain facts

And what 'plain facts' would those be? That the 'American System' was rejected out of hand by many? That it bankrupted every state internal improvements were tried? That all states had flatly outlawed such programs by the middle of the 19th century? Or that the 16th President's economic policy was forced down the throats of the nation at the barrel of a gun? Or the fact that a National Bank had been tried, more than once, and failed?

And again. As a young man, Hamilton actually ran Red Coats through with his bayonet

His desire for adventure or desire for monarchy is not in question.

while at the same time, Jefferson poked at them from a distance with his quill.

But yet you'll selectively quote from him to make your argument.

They both served, in different ways but to question Hamilton's patriotism is beyond silly and to somehow lay FDR, the New Deal or the Great Society madness on Hamilton is just flat stupid.

No, not at all. Except that FDR's programs, Johnson's Great Society, and Bush's government waste (of which there is apparently no end) are the logical next steps in Hamilton's 'American System'. A citizenry that looks to one centralized power for handouts and leadership. Fortunately, for us, he didn't get his king. Well he didn't. But the way the general public looks to DC, we may yet one day.

[Ditto]

Seeing as you're quoting the original document of secession let's go a bit further down that same paragraph

Not a secession at all. It was a Revolution... and they justified it.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

I have seen no similar list of grievances from you Confederate heroes. Their only complain was that they lost an election. Typical Democrats.

[M. Espinola]

"Union soldiers voted overwhelmingly for Lincoln in 1864, abandoning the once-beloved George McClellan because of the perception that he had become a tool of the Copperheads."

Copperheads, venomous traitors. In 2007 the Dems have not changed.

[DreamsofPolycarp]

Thank you for your measured, thoughtful, and balanced post. Although we may disagree on whether we are at a point where we need to suspend a constitutional privlege enumerate in the constitution, your reasons at least are articulate and enumerated.

I am for swift, aggressive, and overwhelming response to any peoples or state who do us harm or seek to do so. I do see a large group of conservatives willing to cede freedom to the state for "emergency" purposes, on the idea that we can stroll back over and expect the state to surrender it back to us when the "emergency" is over. The fact that it has been done before is NOT, imo, a legit argument. I would also submit that "saving the union" (aka preserving the government) was not a legit reason to go to war (although slavery WAS a legit reason). I see nothing sacrosanct about preserving this or any state, if the freedoms guaranteed by the state do not exist. However, that is a horse to beat at a different time.

The scattergun accusation of "fascist" does not belong to you, and I am sorry for the pellets sprayed your way. However, suspending personal freedoms so that we can deal with a bunch of unwashed 60s rejects and their murdering raghead empathizers DOES enable the fascists on the left and the right. Far easier to do a state department search for expired visas, and institute some kind of "anti-jihad" pledge to those here on legit visas. Then, if they are involved in flakey activity, we just tell them they violated the terms of their visa and deport them. Suspending habeas corpus for legit citizens is like using an impact wrench to adjust the thermostat. Way too much firepower for the job.

I get nervous when the state says it needs to keep an eye on them, er, us, uh, well, you know what I mean. I just don't trust em, whether they invite gay rights advocates or bible believing preachers into the White House. Danger is ultimately the same.

[Niteranger68]

No, actually they were Copperheads were just as much hate America filth as todays leftists.

So were they not an inadvertent tool of the Confederacy?

[TexConfederate1861]

Who says it isn't true?
Lincoln started the ball rolling...

[TexConfederate1861]

The Yankee Army didn't have to worry about losing men, as they signed up every Irishman & German that stepped off "the boat"......The Confederacy had to deal with a loss of manpower.

[Ditto]

Really? Tell us how.

[Ditto]

How come those Irishmen or Germans were not stepping off the boat in the South?

BTW. Just a point of fact. Immigration into the US during the Civil War was markedly decreased.