Posted on 11/04/2010 3:13:46 AM PDT by markomalley
One tragedy of war is that its victors write its history and often do so with bias and dishonesty. That’s true about our War of 1861, erroneously called a civil war. Civil wars, by the way, are when two or more parties attempt to take over the central government. Jefferson Davis no more wanted to take over Washington, D.C., than George Washington, in 1776, wanted to take over London. Both wars were wars of independence.
Kevin Sieff, staff writer for The Washington Post, penned an article “Virginia 4th-grade textbook criticized over claims on black Confederate soldiers,” (Oct. 20, 2010). The textbook says that blacks fought on the side of the Confederacy. Sieff claims that “Scholars are nearly unanimous in calling these accounts of black Confederate soldiers a misrepresentation of history.” William & Mary historian Carol Sheriff said, “It is disconcerting that the next generation is being taught history based on an unfounded claim instead of accepted scholarship.” Let’s examine that accepted scholarship.
In April 1861, a Petersburg, Va., newspaper proposed “three cheers for the patriotic free Negroes of Lynchburg” after 70 blacks offered “to act in whatever capacity may be assigned to them” in defense of Virginia. Ex-slave Frederick Douglass observed, “There are at the present moment, many colored men in the Confederate Army doing duty not only as cooks, servants and laborers, but as real soldiers, having muskets on their shoulders and bullets in their pockets, ready to shoot down ... and do all that soldiers may do to destroy the Federal government.”
Charles H. Wesley, a distinguished black historian who lived from 1891 to 1987, wrote “The Employment of Negroes as Soldiers in the Confederate Army,” in the Journal of Negro History (1919). He says, “Seventy free blacks enlisted in the Confederate Army in Lynchburg, Virginia. Sixteen companies (1,600) of free men of color marched through Augusta, Georgia on their way to fight in Virginia.”
Wesley cites Horace Greeley’s “American Conflict” (1866) saying, “For more than two years, Negroes had been extensively employed in belligerent operations by the Confederacy. They had been embodied and drilled as rebel soldiers and had paraded with white troops at a time when this would not have been tolerated in the armies of the Union.”
Wesley goes on to say, “An observer in Charleston at the outbreak of the war noted the preparation for war, and called particular attention to the thousand Negroes who, so far from inclining to insurrections, were grinning from ear to ear at the prospect of shooting the Yankees.”
One would have to be stupid to think that blacks were fighting in order to preserve slavery. What’s untaught in most history classes is that it is relatively recent that we Americans think of ourselves as citizens of United States. For most of our history, we thought of ourselves as citizens of Virginia, citizens of New York and citizens of whatever state in which we resided.
Wesley says, “To the majority of the Negroes, as to all the South, the invading armies of the Union seemed to be ruthlessly attacking independent States, invading the beloved homeland and trampling upon all that these men held dear.” Blacks have fought in all of our wars both before and after slavery, in hopes of better treatment afterwards.
Denying the role, and thereby cheapening the memory, of the Confederacy’s slaves and freemen who fought in a failed war of independence is part of the agenda to cover up Abraham Lincoln’s unconstitutional acts to prevent Southern secession. Did states have a right to secede?
At the 1787 Constitutional Convention, James Madison rejected a proposal that would allow the federal government to suppress a seceding state. He said, “A Union of the States containing such an ingredient seemed to provide for its own destruction. The use of force against a State would look more like a declaration of war than an infliction of punishment and would probably be considered by the party attacked as a dissolution of all previous compacts by which it might be bound.”
Were you also taught that a white amn could buy his way out of the Yankee draft? The Yankee war was plain and simple, an act of agression and suppression.
While black men were serving in the Confederate Army, black men in the North were segregated and served primarily as menials, “Glory” notwithstanding.
The legality of Secession, may have been decided by SCOTUS. Morally, the compulsion of a forced Union, is abhorent to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”. For if secession is wrong, and the Constitution forces a central government of unlimited powers, how can we be deemed free?
Forbidding the states to secede deprives ALL states of ANY rights. The states are now subject to the cental government, in direct violation of the Constitution. This is not what the Founders intended, else why a 9th and 10th Amendments?
Conversely, secession and the threat of it makes us a freer nation. How else could we limit the powers of an encroaching government? Look around - the federal government is suing a state because the feds don’t like a state law, a federal agency is telling a state who and how the state may grant licenses, the federal government imposes a DeathCare on all of us, and tells the states to pay for it - the list goes on and on.
The war was truly wrong, for while it freed one segment of the population, it enslaved ALL of us.
Good post NTHockey,
Sooo, what about Texas and their threat if necessary to leave the union?
Personally I’m all for it.
The tattoo needs to be PS’ed out, otherwise most acceptable.
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Hyperbole for breakfast?
>>>And yet in 1860 there had been no “usurpations” or “abuses,” and the Deep South did secede “at pleasure.”
This made their secession unconstitutional.<<<
Your ignorance of history is remarkable. Check out the tariff immbalances between the North and South, that got so out of hand that Yankees could purchase some goods from England and sell them to the South cheaper than the South could purchase them directly from England.
There is no question that American Civil War remains to this day a highly charged historical subject. And I’m not really interested in setting everyone’s hair on fire yet again. My comment related strictly to the simple care, handling and acceptance of truth and facts. It is a fact that a certain number of negroes/blacks (both freemen and slaves) volunteered or willingly served with the Confederate army during the “Great Rebellion”. Whether one likes it or not, the historical record is irrefutable on the point.
Mr Williams presented his article with one specific purpose, i.e. - to refute the arguments that textbook claims of negroes/blacks serving in the Confederate army were unfounded. He confined his remarks to that topic and that purpose. He was under no intellectual or moral obligation to expand beyond that point.
With respect to the comment - “...Williams wants us to believe that the service to the confederate cause by any black person was respected by the white populace.” - exactly where in his article did Williams say that?
I can’t stand tattoos at all. Nothing against anyone who does like them, it is a person’s choice.
And again, had the confederacy won their rebellion, if any of them had been slaves during the conflict then they would still be slaves after the conflict was over, unless their owners freed them for their services. And while I don't think that Texas had the same "boot 'em out" constitution that Virginia had, those freed slaves would not be citizens of the confederacy, could never run for political office in the confederacy, and would have no rights that a white man was bound to respect.
Somehow Williams glosses right over that part.
I have none. I am distinctive enough without advertising!
>>Hyperbole for breakfast?<<
Hardly, unless you consider yourself not a slave of the federal government. From DeathCare to MediCare, from NCLB to domination of our schools, from Social Security to food stamps, from redistribution to stealing money, we are all somehow slaves to what the government gives us.
The one thing they don’t give us is freedom.
In my case, it comes from me being permanently marked and hating it all my life.
So y'all claim...
Williams had, I submit, a dual purpose - that blacks served widely and willingly in the rebel army and that their service was valued and respected by white Southerners of the period. The first half has an element of truth in it. The second is plain ridiculous.
I went through Mr William’s article and extracted those parts which could fairly be categorized as opinion -
Opinion 1 - “One would have to be stupid to think that blacks were fighting in order to preserve slavery.”
Opinion 2 - “What’s untaught in most history classes is that it is relatively recent that we Americans think of ourselves as citizens of United States. For most of our history, we thought of ourselves as citizens of Virginia, citizens of New York and citizens of whatever state in which we resided.”
Opinion 3 - “Blacks have fought in all of our wars both before and after slavery, in hopes of better treatment afterwards.”
Opinion 4 - “Denying the role, and thereby cheapening the memory, of the Confederacy’s slaves and freemen who fought in a failed war of independence is part of the agenda to cover up Abraham Lincoln’s unconstitutional acts to prevent Southern secession. Did states have a right to secede?”
The rest of the article consists of historical citations to prove his point, which they in fact do. The opinions he rendered are IMO strictly asides and are not called upon in any way to buttress his argument. Even then, only opinion 4 could be deemed at all “controversal”. I therefore, with all due respect, disagree with your post.
“It is a fact that a certain number of negroes/blacks (both freemen and slaves) volunteered or willingly served with the Confederate army during the “Great Rebellion”
yep...and for a variety of reasons:
1.a sense of adventure
2.to defend their own homes and families
3.to earn their freedom
4.to escape the drudgery of servitude
5.to ingratiate themselves in case the South won
6.the young like to travel
7.and finally,some genuinely got along with their masters and wanted to go with them...Sweeney, Jeb Stuart’s black banjo player accompanied him on all his campaigns
Youse.
Tariffs were uniform in the both North and South. However, if you're referring to the fact that upwards of 90% of all tariff revenue was collected in Northern ports, indicating that the overwhelming majority of all imports were destined for Northern consumers then you are correct and there was an imbalance. The North paid the bulk of taxes on imports.
If your claim is that the South paid a higher tariff than the North did then you're incorrect in that claim.
As could Southerners.
The Yankee war was plain and simple, an act of agression and suppression.
The war was started by the South.
While black men were serving in the Confederate Army, black men in the North were segregated and served primarily as menials, “Glory” notwithstanding.
So by all means please outline how the vast majority of black men were serving the confederate army without being menials. This ought to be good.
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