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Americans owe Confederate history respect
Columbia Tribune ^ | June 10, 2003 | Chris Edwards

Posted on 06/13/2003 6:22:01 AM PDT by stainlessbanner

After attending the Confederate Memorial Day service on June 1 in Higginsville, I found myself believing our nation should be ashamed for not giving more respect and recognition to our ancestors.

I understand that some find the Confederate flag offensive because they feel it represents slavery and oppression. Well, here are the facts: The Confederate flag flew over the South from 1861 to 1865. That's a total of four years. The U.S. Constitution was ratified in April 1789, and that document protected and condoned the institution of slavery from 1789 to 1861. In other words, if we denigrate the Confederate flag for representing slavery for four years, shouldn't we also vilify the U.S. flag for representing slavery for 72 years? Unless we're hypocrites, it is clear that one flag is no less pure than the other.

A fascinating aspect of studying the Civil War is researching the issues that led to the confrontation. The more you read, the less black-and-white the issues become. President Abraham Lincoln said he would do anything to save the union, even if that meant preserving the institution of slavery. Lincoln's focus was obviously on the union, not slavery.

In another case, historians William McFeely and Gene Smith write that Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant threatened to "throw down his sword" if he thought he was fighting to end slavery.

Closer to home, in 1864, Col. William Switzler, one of the most respected Union men in Boone County, purchased a slave named Dick for $126. What makes this transaction interesting is not only the fact that Switzler was a Union man but that he bought the slave one year after the issuance of the Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation. Of course, history students know the proclamation did not include slaves living in the North or in border states such as Missouri.

So if this war was fought strictly over slavery, why were so many Unionists reluctant to act like that was the issue?

In reviewing the motives that led to the Civil War, one should read the letters soldiers wrote home to their loved ones. Historian John Perry, who studied the soldier's correspondence, says in his three years of research, he failed to find one letter that referred to slavery from Confederate or Union soldiers.

Perry says that Yankees tended to write about preserving the Union and Confederates wrote about protecting their rights from a too-powerful federal government. The numerous letters failed to specifically say soldiers were fighting either to destroy or protect the institution of slavery. Shelby Foote, in his three-volume Civil War history, recounts an incident in which a Union soldier asks a Confederate prisoner captured in Tennessee why he was fighting. The rebel responded, "Because you're down here."

History tends to overlook the South's efforts to resolve the issue of slavery. For example, in 1863, because of a shortage of manpower, Lincoln permitted the enlistment of black soldiers into the Union Army. Battlefield documents bear out the fact that these units were composed of some of the finest fighting men in the war. Unfortunately for these brave soldiers, the Union used them as cannon fodder, preferring to sacrifice black lives instead of whites.

These courageous black Union soldiers experienced a Pyrrhic victory for their right to engage in combat. However, history has little to say about the South's same effort in 1865. The Confederacy, its own troop strength depleted, offered slaves freedom if they volunteered for the army.

We know that between 75,000 and 100,000 blacks responded to this call, causing Frederick Douglass to bemoan the fact that blacks were joining the Confederacy. But the assimilation of black slaves into the Confederate army was short-lived as the war came to an end before the government's policy could be fully implemented.

It's tragic that Missouri does not do more to recognize the bravery of the men who fought in the Missouri Confederate brigades who fought valiantly in every battle they were engaged in. To many Confederate generals, the Missouri brigades were considered the best fighting units in the South.

The courage these boys from Missouri demonstrated at Port Gibson and Champion Hill, Miss., Franklin, Tenn., and Fort Blakely, Ala., represent just a few of the incredible sacrifices they withstood on the battlefield. Missouri should celebrate their struggles instead of damning them.

For the real story about the Missouri Confederate brigades, one should read Phil Gottschalk and Philip Tucker's excellent books about these units. The amount of blood spilled by these Missouri boys on the field of battle will make you cry.

Our Confederate ancestors deserve better from this nation. They fought for what they believed in and lost. Most important, we should remember that when they surrendered, they gave up the fight completely. Defeated Confederate soldiers did not resort to guerrilla warfare or form renegade bands that refused to surrender. These men simply laid down their arms, went home and lived peacefully under the U.S. flag. When these ex-Confederates died, they died Americans.

During the postwar period, ex-Confederates overwhelmingly supported the Democratic Party. This party, led in Missouri by Rep. Dick Gephardt and Gov. Bob Holden, has chosen to turn its back on its fallen sons.

The act of pulling down Confederate flags at two obscure Confederate cemeteries for the sake of promoting Gephardt's hopeless quest for the presidency was a cowardly decision. I pray these men will rethink their decision.

The reality is, when it comes to slavery, the Confederate and United States flags drip with an equal amount of blood.


TOPICS: Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: confederate; dixie; dixielist; history; losers; missouri; ridewiththedevil; soldiers; south
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To: archy; raisincane
Yes, many Democrats in Illinois and Indiana did indeed sympathize with the Democrat rebels of the Confederacy. The wartime Democratc candidates for governor of those two states were paid Confederate agents, and the Democrat-controlled legislatures tried to withdraw the state militias from the Union Army.
101 posted on 06/15/2003 6:17:09 AM PDT by Grand Old Partisan (You can read about my history of the GOP at www.republicanbasics.com)
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To: hirn_man
Neo-Confederates are a disgrace.
102 posted on 06/15/2003 6:17:49 AM PDT by Grand Old Partisan (You can read about my history of the GOP at www.republicanbasics.com)
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To: Graewoulf; SAMWolf; Renatus; Non-Sequitur; stainlessbanner
Patriotism is not PC, and the apologists for the hyperviolently unpatriotic Confederates are the ones being PC.
103 posted on 06/15/2003 6:20:01 AM PDT by Grand Old Partisan (You can read about my history of the GOP at www.republicanbasics.com)
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To: Leatherneck_MT
Read President Lincoln's July 4, 1861 address to Congress for a concise refutation to the ridiculous notion of secession.
104 posted on 06/15/2003 6:24:05 AM PDT by Grand Old Partisan (You can read about my history of the GOP at www.republicanbasics.com)
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To: stainlessbanner
Americans owe Confederate history respect

No they don't.
And insisting that they do will only breed resentment and hostility.

As individuals, however, it's an different matter entirely.
Since we, as a nation, are divided (evenly in my opinion) as to whether we should remember, acknowlege and admire things "Southern", as a nation this will forever be problematical.

I am not a southerner and have never even been to the South, but nevertheless know from learning history (on my own, mostly) that there is much to be admired and respected there.
The South was and is a whole lot more than slavery and I will not allow anyone to "make up my opinion" for me no matter how sincere their misguided effort to define the South for me.

It's no less a personal choice than admiring "womens studies", "multiculturalism", moral and "international relativism": Corruptions of good ideas gone psychotic.

To those contolling twits among us, who seem to exist solely to extol the benefits of ignorance and a big mouth I say **** off!

You can try forever, riot and burn and destroy in the name of a "kinder" view of history, but you'll never legislate reality in the hearts and minds of a free people.

I respect and admire Southern history. But I have found little to admire in history elsewhere since the middle of the 18th century.
Certainly not today.

105 posted on 06/15/2003 6:24:08 AM PDT by Publius6961 (Californians are as dumm as a sack of rocks)
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To: tuna_battle_slight_return
The Burns series gets an A++, though no one, me included, agrees with everything in it.
106 posted on 06/15/2003 6:25:13 AM PDT by Grand Old Partisan (You can read about my history of the GOP at www.republicanbasics.com)
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To: stainlessbanner
So if this war was fought strictly over slavery, why were so many Unionists reluctant to act like that was the issue?

Stainless, this is without a doubt the most ridiculous article you've posted out of a pethora of ridiculous articles.

It's clear that the secessionists would "rend the Union even by war" to protect slavery.

It's just as clear that loyal Union men fought to preserve the ideals of democratic government. The latter wouldn't have happened without the former.

Walt

107 posted on 06/15/2003 6:27:25 AM PDT by WhiskeyPapa (Virtue is the uncontested prize.)
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To: donmeaker
What a crock.
Since the first sentence flies in the face of reality, I will leave the refutation of this BS to an intelligent third grader who can read small and plain words (and fractions) in the Constitution.

I suppose some people have convinced themselves that repeating a lie often enough actually changes the universe.

I can choose to dismiss those people as morons.

108 posted on 06/15/2003 6:29:13 AM PDT by Publius6961 (Californians are as dumm as a sack of rocks)
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To: WhiskeyPapa; stainlessbanner
Yes, another neo-Confederate lie, but all they have is lies. Ulysses Grant was first, last, and always a patriot, who got his Colonel commission by recommendation from one of Abraham Lincoln's closest political allies. Grant stated the the rebels fought for one of the worst causes ever, and he was right!
109 posted on 06/15/2003 6:30:11 AM PDT by Grand Old Partisan (You can read about my history of the GOP at www.republicanbasics.com)
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To: CJ Wolf
But if you want to wave around a loser flag and somehow feel proud of it, go ahead.

Funny thing is... that is prcisely the way that the Taliban and al Qaeda feel about the American flag.

There's a lesson there somewhere.
At least the lesson is plain enough for me to see.

110 posted on 06/15/2003 6:32:07 AM PDT by Publius6961 (Californians are as dumm as a sack of rocks)
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To: WhiskeyPapa; stainlessbanner
"the S.W. part of the state" -- Yes, the Ozarks and the Appalachians were Unionist strongholds. Many residents conscripted by the traitors went over to the U.S. Army as soon as they could. When the U.S. Army marched into Knoxville, Tennessee, for example, cheering residents waved American flags and placed Confederate flags in the street for the liberators to walk on.
111 posted on 06/15/2003 6:33:43 AM PDT by Grand Old Partisan (You can read about my history of the GOP at www.republicanbasics.com)
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To: WhiskeyPapa
Semper Fi means Forever Loyal to the govenrment -- which is far better than in countires where the military swears loyalty to the "patria" or whatever, leaving them a loophole to fight against the government.
112 posted on 06/15/2003 6:39:54 AM PDT by Grand Old Partisan (You can read about my history of the GOP at www.republicanbasics.com)
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To: azhenfud
Actually, it is only your opinion these men were traitors.

Well, not only.

The Supreme Court called the secessionists traitors in 1863; President Lincoln called them traitors in his special address to the Congress of 7/4/61.

To say the rebels were -not- traitors is Newspeak. It is right out of "1984".

Walt

113 posted on 06/15/2003 6:40:35 AM PDT by WhiskeyPapa (Virtue is the uncontested prize.)
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To: CJ Wolf
You cite battles, I cite the war

A distinction without a difference.
And a series of opinions, masquerading as "fact".

I am amazed daily when listening to the intellectually challenged, punctuate their argument with repeated "..that's the truth!..."

That, in fact, is the signal to me never to engage in a battle of wits with the unarmed or the mentally challenged.
There is reason why the world has never before been allowed to be run by actual or functional 3 to 13 year-olds.

114 posted on 06/15/2003 6:42:22 AM PDT by Publius6961 (Californians are as dumm as a sack of rocks)
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To: archy
You are presumably unfamiliar with the text of the original Thirteenth Amendment passed but not yet ratified,...

You are presumably (but demostrably) unfamiliar with the term straw man.

115 posted on 06/15/2003 6:44:54 AM PDT by Publius6961 (Californians are as dumm as a sack of rocks)
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To: Publius6961
You cite battles, I cite the war

A distinction without a difference.

It sure made a difference in Viet Nam. We won all the battles.

Walt

116 posted on 06/15/2003 6:45:13 AM PDT by WhiskeyPapa (Virtue is the uncontested prize.)
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To: Grand Old Partisan
Opinions are like *(censored)*, everybody has one...
117 posted on 06/15/2003 6:47:30 AM PDT by Publius6961 (Californians are as dumm as a sack of rocks)
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To: Grand Old Partisan
Semper Fi means Forever Loyal to the govenrment

No it does not!
You obvioulsly never learned latin.

It is purposely vague, and can be (and is) open to personal interpretation.

Even being uninformed in the minds of the tofu-eating perverts, I can still interpret the phrase as commonly believed by the vast majority of informed and educated citizens: it means Forever Loyal to the Marines.

118 posted on 06/15/2003 6:56:52 AM PDT by Publius6961 (Californians are as dumm as a sack of rocks)
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To: WhiskeyPapa
Thank you for brilliantly supporting my argument.
119 posted on 06/15/2003 6:58:30 AM PDT by Publius6961 (Californians are as dumm as a sack of rocks)
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To: WhiskeyPapa
"All these deaths of U.S. citizens --the death of EVERY U.S. citizen killed by Arab terror in the United States, can be laid directly at the feet of George Bush I." - WhiskeyPapa, 11/15/02
SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/786927/posts?page=452#448

"I'll say again that based on what I knew in 1992, I would vote for Bill Clinton ten times out of ten before I would vote for George Bush Sr." - WhiskeyPapa, 11/15/02
SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/786927/posts?q=1&&page=401#420

"As you doubtless know, the separation of powers in that Pact with the Devil we call our Constitution, gives only Congress the right to raise and spend money." - WhiskeyPapa, 11/15/02
SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/786927/posts?page=432#432

"First of all, the AJC [Atlanta Journal-Constitution] is -not- an "ultra-leftist" newspaper, and you know it." - WhiskeyPapa, 11/13/02
SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/784464/posts?page=70#70

"I feel that admiration for Reagan has rightly diminished over time, and rightly so." - WhiskeyPapa, 11/15/02
SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/786927/posts?page=432#432

"I don't retract any of that." - WhiskeyPapa in reference to the liberal statements found above, 11/26/02
SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/796067/posts?page=146#146

"If you non-U.S. citizens are wondering what the electoral college is and what bunch of ninnies thought it up:  The US Constitution was written by rich white men like Washington, Madison, Hamilton, Randolph, and others.   They wrote it for the benefit of rich white men like themselves.  They didn't trust the common man --at all--, hence the college of electors, who didn't (and don't) necessarily have to vote for the candidate that carries their state.  Here in Georgia, I didn't vote for Al Gore.  I voted for nine Democratic Party hacks that promise to vote for Al when the college meets in December.  Yeah, I know its crazy, but it works." - Walt, aka WhiskeyPapa, explaining the electoral college to Europeans, 11/12/00
SOURCE: soc.history.war.world-war-ii newsgroup

"What the Reagan adminstration did was worse than Watergate. But he was a nicer guy than Nixon, so he skated. Also, despite all the Reagan worship, I don't think he ever made a tough decision." - WhiskeyPapa, 3/10/03
SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/859649/posts?page=38#38

"I think the Bushes both to incompetent clowns." - WhiskeyPapa, 3/10/03
SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/859649/posts?page=38#38

"I'd vote for Gore again over Bush jr. It was a no-brainer that if Junior was elected, we'd have Senior running things, and I bet he is. Surely no one thinks that Junior has enough brains to get all this rolling. Cheney and Powell are going to run the war -- to clean up the mess they made 12 years ago." - WhiskeyPapa, 3/18/03
SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/866612/posts?page=19#19

88

120 posted on 06/15/2003 7:00:06 AM PDT by Godebert
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