What makes a people a people?

[Eva Elisabeth]

What makes a people a people, and a nation a nation? Are a people, a federal republic, and a nation the same? Where do they overlap, and what distincts these concepts/ideas?

Mike (brtmchl) wrote on another thread:

"What separates this War (at least to American's) is that we fought against each other...in 1864 the War...was no longer a war to preserve the Union or to put down an armed rebellion. It was a War of conquest."

To me, this wording seems to reveal/represent a basic dilemma/an ambivalence I would like to understand better.

Did you fight against each other or against another state, thus people? Often it has been discussed that the South might have had the right to secede. If that was the case or point of view, I would conclude it was conquering of another people's state, a different people. If it was the same people (Americans), I would conclude it was not conquering but preserving the Union as "this (one?!) nation (of one people?!) under God".

Please note that as a foreigner I'm not intending to judge or claim on "being right or wrong" of any side (north or south), nor do I want to stir up the legal discussion ("Does a state have the right to secede?") again or whether/how it could have been solved another way. I'm trying to understand which way of understanding and which feelings nowadays are (personally) prevalent in descendants of both former (?) "opponents" as for being one people, one nation (despite being a citizen of a state of a republic of federal states).

The reason why I'm trying to figure this out is that this question (what makes a people a people) also is a key question for Germany, and though we didn't go to war to gain reunion, IMO there are certain parallels in the "(re)union" and reconstruction process and history, but you have the way longer "experience" (of 150 years, compared to our 24 years) with the aftermath. Germany, too, is a federal constitutional republic (parliamentary, not presidental though), and underwent, and still undergoes, a process of reunion after an even much longer period of division, and of reconstruction (of the east) as well. People in the east had to give up their entire national identity as citizens of the German Democratic Republic the ideals of which they had to (several probably wholeheartedly did) praise and live in all their daily life and actions. They had to submit themselves to a new form of government, politics, social system, currency, new laws, etc. They had to get used to (the hard contest of) market economy instead of state-directed economy with the same income for whatever efforts. West Germans people were and are not eager to finance "reconstruction east", watching almost all public investions since have been made in the east, plus all the other economical and financial consequences (also regarding higher share in EU finances due to having more citizens), (eastern mass) unemployment, etc. BTW, every now and then especially Bavarians float the idea that Bavaria should seek independence and do her own thing. For me like for many others born after WWII (and no relatives in the "Soviet Occupied Zone") at first was a foreign country, like Austria.

Despite all this, and even though I have no particular patriotic feelings (with the exception of some sports events) and if I had the ("easy") opinion could well imagine to live in another (warmer!) country, without missing Germany, by hindsight I think and feel it was right, and it should be one nation/country (and that's what I think Lincoln believed about America, for it's own sake), but I can't satisfactionately argue and reason why. There seems a con to each pro. (E.g. if common language was a reason - Austrians speak German, too. Common history - the prior - pre-WWII - common history was not a long one, and so on.)

To figure this out, I would like to learn YOUR thoughts/feelings/opinion on the following:

- Is a nation, a people, and a federal union/republic of states the same? Do they overlap? What distincts them if not?

- What is (are) the main unifying factor(s)? And why? Language? Religion? Traditions? Culture? History? Economic reasons? Other?
(Sure there exist smart and exact definitions of the terms in dictionaries, but I'm interested in what you, thus the citizens and people, think and feel.)

- Historian P. S. Paludan wrote: "A divided nation might have been more easily divided again." Where and what would America be now had history taken a different road (economically, socially, politically, globally)?

- This question especially applies to the "southerners", as the focus seems so often on "the lost cause". I do well understand people in those days beweaped it, more difficult I find it to understand to wear black nowadays on April 9. I do not judge this, I just would like to understand. How do you personally feel now about the US being one country? What would it have meant for you and your life, what would your life be like, if secession and southern independence had remained until now?

Personally I believe, in the face of WWII and the aftermath, Germany wouldn't be where and what it is now without a strong, influential, undivided America, it's attitude, set of values, principles, etc. Thus our fate was in the end also linked to and benefited from Abraham Lincoln's will, believes, and efforts.

Thanks for any (honest but peacefully worded) comments and thoughs on this topic! I hope someone will reply.

[Wild Bill]

Ein Volk, ein Reich. . . . huh? Eva knows what I left out. . . . But it is an interesting question.

When I took my PhD orals examination (in my case one faces off with 7 historians or professors) i was asked by my European history professor (my minor was 19th century Europe) what was more important--the wars of unification in Italy and Germany or the US Civil War, all from the 1860s. There is no right answer but there was a political one as far as my major professor was a Civil War scholar. So my answer was essentially what Eva wrote, i.e., "Personally I believe, in the face of WWII and the aftermath, Germany wouldn't be where and what it is now without a strong, influential, undivided America, it's attitude, set of values, principles, etc. Thus our fate was in the end also linked to and benefited from Abraham Lincoln's will, believes, and efforts." Although I, in 1970, applied it more generally to the Cold War, and the US counter to the Eastern bloc. To do this the US united had to be part of the coalitions that defeated Germany in WW I and WW II. (Sorry, not easy to do in our house as we had a soft spot for the Germans, my Dad being an anti-Nazi from Prussia, who left Germany before Hitler took over).

An interesting book to the contrary was Mackinlay Kantor, "If the South had won the Civil War." The two things I remembered from that was Soviet missiles in Alaska and Texas becoming an independent republic again.

The US has a different kind of Union than most countries, I think. We have a multitude of different peoples, most of whom would fight to the death in the old country, if they had to put up with those who are their neighbors here. Yet essentially we get along here, ok. The great melting pot theory. But sometimes I wonder if that unity is an illusion and we are breaking up in the modern age.

I have always seen the our Civil War as a Yankee revolt against the Founding Fathers, not a War of Southern Rebellion. So maybe I am not the right guy to ask about this.

[L Verge]

First, let me congratulate Eva on a fantastic question that could easily be turned into a college-level semester's course! Here's the synopsis right here: - What is (are) the main unifying factor(s)? And why? Language? Religion? Traditions? Culture? History? Economic reasons? Other?
(Sure there exist smart and exact definitions of the terms in dictionaries, but I'm interested in what you, thus the citizens and people, think and feel.)

While it is said that Americans owed allegiance to their individual states - not the "United" States until after 1865, I personally believe that there was a feeling of nationality from 1607 on, since most of our colonists and later immigrants saw the New World as a source for improvement: personal improvement, economic improvement, later educational improvement, etc. In the back of their minds, they had to realize that "it would take a village" to achieve this. They had common goals, but they chose different ways to achieve those goals - largely based on economics, which was swayed by geography.

I feel that the question of westward expansion with slavery and the rise of rabid abolitionism started the slip/slide into dangerous sectionalism, but I don't know how it could have been avoided. In the end, would it have boiled down to two countries? The U.S. of A. and The C.S. of A with the political form of unity as the main divide - one based on states' rights and the other on a central government? How long would it have lasted?

The citizens who migrated from Europe had witnessed monarchies, revolts, conquering armies, and the like. Maybe there was an ingrain thread through all of them that sought a unified and prosperous country where democratic ideals were fostered, and this remained/s at the core of our country. The word "diversity" is over-used today, IMO, but if one reads American history books, diversity is exactly what created the colonies, separated them from Europe, caused a civil war, and joined us back together again (so we could fight more wars on foreign soils!). Diversity should embrace the whole, however, not be used as a dividing point. The latter is what bothers me in this modern world.

Does any of this make sense? I guess what I'm trying to say is that people came to America from many countries but with common core values that have held us together for centuries.

[Eva Elisabeth]

Many thanks for your great replies.

Bill, I highly appreciate your answer, first as I alway learn from your posts and books, second as I asked for each kind of guy's personal opinion,, whatever it was.

The US has a different kind of Union than most countries, I think. We have a multitude of different peoples, most of whom would fight to the death in the old country, if they had to put up with those who are their neighbors here. Yet essentially we get along here, ok. The great melting pot theory.

This is an aspect I admit I left out in my thoughts, and it will keep me reconsidering for a while.

Laurie, great input for me to think about, too.

"The citizens who migrated from Europe had witnessed monarchies, revolts, conquering armies, and the like. Maybe there was an ingrain thread through all of them that sought a unified and prosperous country where democratic ideals were fostered, and this remained/s at the core of our country."

This is what has fascinated me from schooldays on - how brave people in those days, hunted and persecuted for religious and political reasons, dared to start a new life in a new, widely unexplored world and then to found a new system of self-government while Europe was still dominated by medieval monarchies and rulers.

[LincolnToddFan]

Sometimes I feel that I learn as much or more on this Forum than I did in primary school, or in college.

A big THANK YOU to Eva E., to Bill, and to Laurie!

[Linda Anderson]

Sometimes I feel that I learn as much or more on this Forum than I did in primary school, or in college.

A big THANK YOU to Eva E., to Bill, and to Laurie!

I agree, Toia. And a big THANK YOU to Roger who makes all this possible.

[Thomas Thorne]

Marx was certainly wrong when he stated that the "worker has no country.' Nationalism has been the strongest political force during the past 200 years.

The dilemma of secession by minorities-and I do not confine this to ethnic or religious minorities-from national states in which both sides claim vindication of their national identity requires victory is a constant in modern history. All of us have taken sides in such conflicts and it is very easy to side with the Jefferson Davis in one conflict and the Abraham Lincoln in another . This involves our feelings toward the particular nationalities,religions and ideologies involved.

I remember talking with a very brilliant Indian who was quite eloquent in his denunciation of British domination of India. When asked about the legitimacy of Indian rule over Kashmir, a province whose majority would secede from India if given the chance, he reacted the way Lincoln did to the secession of the Confederate states.

Eva raised an interesting question about the survival of what I would call a sense of Confederate nationalism. I don't believe there is any to any significant degree. Otherwise we might find ourselves in the situation of 2014 Great Britain in which a referendum will be held in Scotland this year to determine if Scotland will secede from the UK, which might well happen.

One of the problems the Confederacy had was the Confederate state antedated a sense of Confederate nationality. David Potter in his sine qua non book about the coming of the Civil War."The Impeding Crisis" gleefully pointed to examples of antebellum fiery nationalistic oratory that were indistingable from each other whether spoken in North or South indicating the strong sense of American nationalism that existed before the war.

In the Scottish nationalist movement today there is a sense of Scottish nationality that should be asserted for its own sake and does not require the genuine dread that white Southerners felt would lead to servile revolt and death and destruction if they did not secede from the Union.

Such a volatile brew which resulted in the catastrophe of war I believe was not conducive to the creation of a deep seated permanent sense of Confederate nationalism. The mystique of "The Lost Cause" while perhaps of great psychological utility to its devotees did not create a post war or modern Confederate Nationalist movement.
Tom

[LincolnToddFan]

Jefferson Davis-especially toward the end of the war-faced opposition and challenges to his authority from various Confederate states, particularly North Carolina. They resented the draft for one thing and used states rights as a justification to oppose it.

Even if the South had been successful in it's bid for independence, I am not sure how the CSA could have continued it's existence as a separate country with each state continually asserting it's sovereignty whenever it disagreed with the central government.

There was no explicit provision for secession in the new Confederate constitution, so what would have been the recourse for an individual state that no longer saw it's interests being served within the Confederacy?

[HerbS]

What nation puts a suicide clause in their Constitution,of the Right to-secede? But,look at the book-"Animal Farm".

[L Verge]

I have never been quite sure how the 1860s' Confederation of Southern states thought that it would be an improvement over the 1770s' Articles of Confederation that failed after the Revolution. The immediate plunging into war unified the South upon secession, but what would they have done in a time of "peace?"

The economic ties between North and South remained throughout the war -- cotton exchange, black market, etc. Those are pretty strong ties to break and live independently; just ask the young folk who can't find jobs right now and are back living with their parents. Nearly two hundred years of commonality is hard to walk away from, and I wonder if the hot-heads on both sides had just shut up if things could have been different.

Personally, right now, I could live without microphone grabbers on both sides of our society that tend to stir up more trouble than they give help. Our mass media makes it even worse, but I bet there were plenty of ordinary people in 1860 who were being shoved into positions that they really were uncomfortable with. The test of our society is whether or not we overcome the bad points and remain unified to at least some degree.

[HerbS]

Laurie,I agree with you 100%.

[Eva Elisabeth]

As for the EU, for me the most unifying factor despite the fall of the borders was the common currency. Paradoxically, in the US the common currency was established during (or: to finance) a war of secession, and not long before. Had ever before the idea of a common currency occured?

[L Verge]

Now, that's a Bill Richter kind of question...

I would also add that a common core value in America from the Spanish colonization through the mid-1800s was the Christian religion. Various forms of practicing or expressing, but almost all peoples of like mind about Christ as the Son of God. Of course, in wartime, the eternal question is, "Who does God root for?"

[My Name Is Kate]

I have always seen our Civil War as a Yankee revolt against the Founding Fathers, not a War of Southern Rebellion. So maybe I am not the right guy to ask about this.

I agree, and I learned that from reading your book, "Sic Semper Tyrannis". The Yankees did not like the political advantage that the concession to slavery in the Constitution gave to the South, with the added 3/5 of a vote per slave awarded to landowning slaveholders. But I'm wondering why the Northerners didn't foresee that happening, or did they? No wonder some of the slaveholders (including Thomas Jefferson) inbred with slaves. The more slaves, the better. I'm also wondering where Jefferson stood with regard to endorsing slavery in the Constitution, since he owned slaves. Apparently he saw the Missouri Compromise as the death knell of the Union. http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/Missouri.html Why did he feel that way?

[Liz Rosenthal]

I just saw this very interesting thread.

Eva, I think the question you pose is one that great political thinkers over the centuries have pondered - that is, what makes a nation? So there is no easy answer.

In the case of the U.S. Civil War, modern scholars generally believe, and I would agree, that Lincoln was not motivated by "nationalism" in striking down the rebellion. He was, instead, motivated by the abstract notion of republicanism and democracy. As of that time, the U.S. was the only country in the world experimenting with representative government. Permitting the southern states to leave and form their own country as a response to an election result that they didn't like would mean the collapse of representative government. Lincoln seems to have felt very strongly about the success of the great American experiment from the time he was a young man, not just for America's sake, but for the sake of the world. When he said in one of his early messages to Congress that the U.S. was the "last, best hope of Earth," he meant that all other nations looked to the U.S. for inspiration and evidence that they could have representative government, too.