[stainlessbanner]

good read

[Hodar]

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.

And that says it all. They may have disagreed, but they were men of honor. They surrendered, they gave their word not to bring up arms again, against the US; and they kept their word.

Now don't forget .... all cultures are equal < /sarcasm>

[Puppage]

the Confederate flag offensive because they feel it represents slavery and oppression

They FEEL, well then, let's not let FACTS get in the way. I'm OFFENDED that they pay no mind to all the people that died to FREE THEM!

This is America...you have the RIGHT to pursue happiness.....

You do NOT have the right NOT TO BE OFFENDED

[Budge]

Very good read, Stainless.

Do you have your asbestos suit on?

I'm certain we of the South will be 'fired upon' again today! :)

[Non-Sequitur]

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.

No they didn't.

[Graewoulf]

We look at history,
But not at ourselves.
We see what we want
Ourselves should be.

The lie begins:
"If I were living
Way back then --- ."

And so we continue
To look, but not to see.

[Blood of Tyrants]

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,

But we KNOW from the liberal history books that the ENTIRE war was about slavery. (/disgusted sarcasm)

Pretend for a minute that it was the year 2103 and the War of Northern Conquest had been fought in 1991-95 instead of 1861-65 for the same reasons (state and individual rights vs. preserving the union) and with the same outcome. The liberal history books would undoubtedly claim that the war was fought because bigoted Christian Southerners wanted to jail homosexuals, turn women into slave baby factories, and form a theocracy on the nation and only through the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of northern heroes was the socialistic paradise unmatched since the fall of the Soviet Union that everyone currently lived in possible. Praise Karl Marx! (/sarcasm)

[CJ Wolf]

I agree that the slavery association tied to the confederate flag is a red herring used for race baiting. However, that said...the confederate flag is unwanted and a disgrace simply because it represents a bunch of losers. People don't go waving the nazi flag around in Germany or the Baath Iraqi flag in Iraq any more. Many more examples can be found in flag trashcan of history. But if you want to wave around a loser flag and somehow feel proud of it, go ahead.

[LiteKeeper]

SITREP

[sharktrager]

The issue in my mind has alot less to do with what the war was about, because no war is ever as balck and white (excuse the pun) as advertised.

For me the issue comes down to the motives of those who want to fly the flag today.

Some truly are very proud of their southern heritage, and this is one of the few symbols that they can use to represent that pride.

Some see the good things that were part of the south prior to the war, and realize that this was a time that simply can never exist again (and I do not mean slavery). There is a desire to focus on the gentile society that defines the south for many. The flag represents the last gasp of this era.

Some simply like the flag because they are told it is offensive, and don't like being told what to think. While not my favorite reason, I also don't much care for forced compliance with the prevailing opinion, even if it's an opinion I share.

The problem is that the fourth group has co-opted the flag, perverting it. This group has an irrational hatred of anyone different from them. They love the flag for what conventional wisdom says it stood for: opression. They are not proud of southern heritage. In fact, they don't even understand southern heritage. They are not the sons of the south. They are more like the opportunistic carpet baggers who pillaged the south for their own gain. They believe they have a right to exert control over others simply because they are different.

Unfortunately, of the four groups, the one that seeks and receives the most attention is the fourth, and, frankly, with good reason. They are the group that represents a potential danger to our way of life. They do not support the constitution, despite their claims to the contrary. They typically do not want state's rights. They want a strong government that they control. They use the flag specifically to enrage those who oppose them.

We are forced to accept that overcoming this group will be difficult. To achieve it requires those who support the flag for other reasons to strongly and forcefully denounce those who use it for their own evil purposes. Often we are so busy defending our stance we forget that freedom of speech includes the right to criticise those we oppose.

This is a fight that can not be won on the defensive, which is how those in the first three groups choose to fight in general. It is a two front war. The idea that the enemy of my enemy is my friend does not apply if the enemy exists primarily due to your link to the "friend". I hear lots of people defending their reasons for supporting the flag, but few who use significant energy to condemn the true enemies of the flag for their perversion of it's meaning.

Unless the last group can be defeated, this is not a winnable war. The options become to either give up, or to find another symbol, and let the racists keep this one, eventually leading to it's demise. I am not from the south, so I have no personal connection to the falg, it's history or southern heritage. I do, however, respect those with honorable motives for loving the flag. Unfortunately, their fight is being defined not by their beliefs but by those whom they ought oppose.

[POhara71]

Thanks for the post. I don't know when American's began being tought that the Confederacy was something to be ashamed of but it's time it stopped. I was taught respect for the sacrifice Southerners made for what they believed in. The end of slavery was never taught as the direct cause of the Civil War but as positive result brought about by compromise to preserve the union under the countries most difficult time. Now the left is rewriting history and its shamefull.

[Renatus]

Robert E. Lee, "Stonewall" Jackson, J.E.B. Stuart, James Longstreet, Johnston, etc. were TRAITORS because they had
all taken an oath (made a vow) to defend and protect the
Constitution of the United States. Their choices to rebel led to a bloodbath that resulted in the deaths of over a half a million Americans. Nothing honorable about that.

[Corin Stormhands]

Bump.

[wardaddy]

Bump!

[betty boop]

Ulysses S. Grant threatened to "throw down his sword" if he thought he was fighting to end slavery.

I understand Mrs. Grant owned a slave or two.

It's been said that the victors get to write the history. I guess it's true. Still, I deplore the hypocrisy and revisionism of the "standard" treatment of this crucial period in American history. Few people today seem to be aware that it marked the beginning of the apparently irreversible downhill slide of the Republic, and its replacement by the strong centralized state, with all the trappings of so-called "pure democracy".

Great post, stainlessbanner. Thanks!

[WhiskeyPapa]

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.

Absolutely false. Typical Neo-confederate lies.

Walt

[WhiskeyPapa]

In reviewing the motives that led to the Civil War, one should read the letters soldiers wrote home to their loved ones.

From the diary of James B. Lockney, 28th Wisconsin Infantry, writing near Arkadelphia, Arkansas (10/29/63): "Last night I talked awhile to those men who came in day before yesterday from the S.W. part of the state about 120 miles distant. Many of them wish Slavery abolished & slaves out of the country as they said it was the cause of the War, and the Curse of our Country & the foe of the body of the people--the poor whites. They knew the Slave masters got up the war expressly in the interests of the institution, & with no real cause from the Government or the North."

Walt

[WhiskeyPapa]

History tends to overlook the South's efforts to resolve the issue of slavery.

"It is all an hallucination to suppose that we are ever going to get rid ofslavery, or that it will ever be desirable to do so. It is a thing that wecannot do without; that is righteous, profitable, and permanent, and that belongs to Southern society as inherently,intrinsically, and durably as the white race itself. Southern men should act asif the canopy of heaven were inscribed with a covenant, in letters of fire, that the negro is here, and here forever—is our property, and ours forever—is never to be emancipated— is to be kept hard at work and in rigid subjection all his days."

-- Richmond Examiner, May 8, 1861

Walt

[WhiskeyPapa]

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.

Ignorance or willful deception.

The rebel congress passed legislation to allow blacks to serve only in 1865; Douglass made his comments in 1861.

Walt

[WhiskeyPapa]

To many Confederate generals, the Missouri brigades were considered the best fighting units in the South.

Ha. I'd like to see a quote of two to support -that-.

Walt