Posted on 02/18/2005 11:27:18 PM PST by churchillbuff
Well said, and true.
Many of our brethren on the right are deep south conservatives, still fighting the frickin' Civil War. While I stand shoulder-to-shoulder with them in fighting the battles of the 21st Century, I refuse to join them in re-fighting the battles of the early 1860s.
M'kay, the slaves wanted to stay slaves, and the slaveholders wanted them to be free, but the damned fools just wouldn't go because them northerners were kkeping them slaves. The south was a paradise for slaves until Lincoln screwed it up. Thanks for the educatin'. LOL!
While Lincoln may have misread the upper south's intentions, I think Lincoln saw war as inevitable, but according to his inaugural address, he wasn't going to fire the first shot. He lured the confederates into that at Ft. Sumter.
Am I alone thinking it well to honor a Lincoln and a Lee?
Not at all. I consider Lincoln our greatest president, and Lee as one of the greatest generals, greatest leaders, greatests example of character and honor, greatest Virginian, and one of the greatest Ameicans ever. I find great inspiration in both men.
Excellent post. Bravo.
You should write a column for American Heritage or some other mainstream history magazine; you're able to take concepts usually reserved for academic study and present it in an understandable way without being glib.
My pet peeve is the casual way contemporary ax-grinders try to slap our present-day moral standards on times past. They seem to forget that we have the advantage of the passage of time, and the accumulated learning and exhanging of ideas over years, decades, centuries.
One excellent point you brought up which I have never read in these threads is the CHANGING reasons for wars. As the war progresses and specific strategic goals become apparent, the actual nature of the war, the tactics, also change. (A tiny illustration: the first Gulf War, which started as being about expelling Saddam from Kuwait and at least in part became about defending Israel.) I do think Lincoln was against slavery from day one (I used to think he simply thought up a new angle of attack until I actually read about Lincoln) and would have ended it at some point; that he chose to do so as a tool of war seems to irk some, who want to claim it was ONLY as a way to defeat the south.
Anyway, great post.
Surely you realize that Stowe had never even BEEN South and wrote "Uncle Tom's Cabin" from so-called accounts by abolitionists. You misunderstand my meaning here. I am not saying things were perfect, they weren't. But there were people in higher places, like Robert E. Lee, that abhored slavery, and there were plantation owners like my ancestor, who hated it as well. It might have taken 20 years, but eventually slavery would have died of natural causes. Anything would have been better than the death of 600,000 men. I do not romanticize anything here, I am simply pointing out that Lincoln had an agenda. The South was a hindrance to that agenda. If not Ft. Sumter, he would have found a different excuse. I myself have done quite a lot of research, and that is how I came to my conclusions concerning Lincoln.
Personally, I have no desire to fight the war, but I detest it when people insult my ancestors, and the cause they fought for.
That has been my whole contention here friend, but Lincoln is treated as GOD by some, so it is hard to get the point across. Good seeing you posting again old pard! Where have you been?
How so?
Lincoln destroyed the government of the states, and replaced it with a Centralized Government, no longer subject to the states.
In what way?
OK, so now we're supposed to take Lerone Bennett's word for it? Lerone Bennett believes that the white population of this country owes blacks trillions of dollars in reparations for slavery. You'll forgive me if I don't sign on to that scheme with you.
To say that Robert Lee 'abhorred' slavery is quite an exaggeration.
I disagree. It is quite evident that he opposed it, and secession. His first love was Virginia.
Speaking of conspiracy theories, you've got something to back that claim up, of course?
The confederate constitution prevented that.
Would he?
"If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it." -- Jefferson's first inaugural address.
"The importation of negroes of the African race from any foreign country other than the slaveholding States or Territories of the United States of America, is hereby forbidden; and Congress is required to pass such laws as shall effectually prevent the same." -- Article 1, section 9, confederate constitution.
Try again.
Yes, a story in Civil War Times....
OK, then how about a recap. What made you say that Lincoln himself personally ordered the murder of Davis? After all, General Meade investigated the matter at the request of General Lee and issued a written assurance that "neither the United States Government, myself, nor General Kilpatrick authorized, sanctioned, or approved the burning of the city of Richmond and the killing of Mr. Davis and his cabinet, nor any other act not required by military necessity and in accordance with the usages of war." So how could he have missed this personal order of Lincoln's that you claim existed?
Well, this article claims that Kilpatrick's raid was EXPRESSLY for that purpose, and gives some good reasons and backs it up. I will try to dig up the issue # etc.
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