VP Beast Butler?

[Gene C]

According to the Encyclopedia Virginia - "1860 - Benjamin F. Butler of Massachusetts briefly supports Jefferson Davis at the Democratic National Convention before endorsing the split party's nominee John C. Breckinridge."

http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Butl..._1818-1893

Interesting person. He certainly didn't mind changing his politics when necessary.

[Wild Bill]

At one time he was Radical Republican, Doughface Democrat, Green Back, Women's Rights and God knows what else! He rose above principle to practicality as my old mentor T. Harry Williams liked to say.

[DanielC]

(12-03-2014 05:04 PM)Gene C Wrote:  Should we allow Rebels of whatever era decide what to make of Ben Butler? It seems they overlook so much, rationalizing everything as bad because they lost the war. (I read something like this somewhere)

Butler wasn't the best at being the general of an occupied territory, but looking back, there weren't a whole lot of people with experience in this line of work to choose from.

Well put Gene!

[HerbS]

I thought the Civil War was OVER!?

[LincolnToddFan]

[I agree, Thomas. Butler's crimes and reprehensible conduct are covered in detail in his own chapter in Walter Cisco's "War Crimes Against Southern Civilians". That book should be required reading for anyone who thinks the Union Army's only mission was a Divine one to free the slaves]// quote

Sadly, there are a lot of untruths that surround the American Civil War. Alongside the myth that the conflict was mainly a Northern holy war to free slaves is the one that Southerners only went to war to defend their home territories and that the preservation of the institution had little or nothing to do with it, which is imo preposterous. A brief perusal of the Secession Ordinances of each of the Confederate states will reveal, in some detail, primarily why they were seceding.

And unfortunately even though the South lost the war militarily, my opinion is that they won control of the historical narrative and continue to win it. The myth of the happy, content slave singing spirituals and devoted to his master is a prevalent one even today, just as prevalent the one of Northern holy warriors.

[L Verge]

And I think the key to finally getting over the divisions caused by the Civil War is to understand that both sides had their faults and needed a better way to clean up their acts than to kill off nearly 650,000 people and lay waste to large sections of the country that would take decades to rebuild. Did anyone learn a lesson? Look what they did with Reconstruction.

It may depend on where you live, but I think that the Uncle Remus days have been long forgotten as a symbol of the "peaceful" South. If it wasn't dead already, it sure was badly beaten up during the riots of 1969 here in D.C. As for the noble Northern warriors, I dare say that 90% of our population today would be hard pressed to name even ten of the Union's military and political leaders. I can think of three prominent gentlemen in the political/social world today that I would like to put that test to...

[Wild Bill]

Actually, Daniel C, Gene C, and LincolnToddFan are correct as to the historical outlook on the Civil War and Reconstruction, that it was primarily a pro-Southern interpretation in movies and books and articles at least until the North decided finally to win the war and passed the Civil Rights laws of 1964 and 1965, largely in response to student sit-ins and Martin Luther King's nonviolent matches and demonstrations and the more violent Southern response, or as Hollywood aptly called it, Mississippi Burning. Fawn Brodie's article in the NYT Book Review, August 5, 1962, "Who Won the Civil War, Anyway?" was a typical statement of the frustrated, as she wrote her biography of Northern congressman Thaddeus Stevens.

But thereafter, I think that that has mostly changed. The diminished place of the Confederate battle flag is good example of this change. I would classify most historians of the last 50 years as Neo-Abolitionists, or in the language of the Lincoln Assassination buffs, for lack of a better term, as Lincolnites. My critics condemn me for writing proto-Confederate history, my Last Confederate Heroes being a good example.

LTF is correct about the rationale of secession being more than we commonly accept. A good place to see this is in Charles B. Dew's Apostles of Disunion (2001).

I also would like to dispute Laurie's figure for CW dead. Historians commonly now go with the figure of 750,000 dead, based on newer research. I believe that James McPherson's Battle Flag of Freedom, the standard college text of the CW, now uses that figure.

[Linda Anderson]

As a couple of people have told me recently that the Civil War was not fought over slavery, I decided to do a little research and found a 2011 Pew Research Center poll which found that, "There is no consensus among the public about the primary cause of the Civil War, but more (48%) say that the war was mainly about states’ rights than say it was mainly about slavery (38%)."

http://www.people-press.org/2011/04/08/c...-divisive/

I also found an excerpt in "Salon" from The New Mind of the South by Tracy Thompson about how the Civil War was taught in the South. It echoes Wild Bill's comment, "Actually, Daniel C, Gene C, and LincolnToddFan are correct as to the historical outlook on the Civil War and Reconstruction, that it was primarily a pro-Southern interpretation in movies and books and articles at least until the North decided finally to win the war and passed the Civil Rights laws of 1964 and 1965..."

"'I grew up in a cocoon,' Herbers says today, recalling his childhood and the version of history he absorbed. It’s an apt metaphor for what happened to any Southerner born before about 1970, and to a good many of those born since. Although the field of Southern history underwent a revolution at the university level in the 1940s and 1950s, the version ordinary Southerners knew in 1970 and even later had not changed appreciably since 1900. Perhaps 1970 sounds like a long time ago, but in educational terms it’s not: 1970 was when a lot of people who are still teaching today learned what they know, and what they’ve passed on to their students. James Loewen, a sociologist and author of “Lies My Teacher Told Me,” has said that when he speaks to public school educators across the country today, somewhere between 60 and 75 percent say that the Civil War was fought over the issue of states’ rights. Whether the group he’s speaking to is predominately white, predominately black, or racially diverse, the percentage stays roughly the same."

http://www.salon.com/2013/03/16/the_sout...civil_war/

[Thomas Thorne]

As Wild Bild and I agree about the historical pro Confederate inclinations of American historiography and classic Hollywood. If this goes on,we may have to split the costs of smelling salts.

The old Hollywood production code did have provisions about films which might inflame race relations. In practice this was interpreted in such a way as to permit the depiction of Blacks as buffoons or idiots. After "Birth of A Nation" movies toned down if they did not eliminate entirely Civil War subjects which might offend White Northern or White Southern amour propre or reopen old wounds. No classic film dwelt on the horrors of Andersonville or Sherman or Sheridan's depredations.

Civil War films and books had a tendency to romanticize the subject and reinforced the belief that the Civil War was the "American Iliad" populated by gallant American heroes whose beliefs should be respected by all.

Even the film version of "Gone With the Wind" dropped or muddied elements which might be too inflammatory for white audiences. We know that Union troops used Tara as their headquarters and made off with the livestock, food and even Ellen O'Hara rosary but we don't see this and can't be sure how much of this reflected Sherman's expressed desire in the film to "humble" the South. Scarlett is attacked at Tara by a deserter. Unlike the book no one in the movie joins the KKK which in the book but not the film avenges the second assault on Scarlett. In the film,vengeance consists of Ashley and friends just burning the shanties-which we don't see-which housed the ruffians who attacked her.

As GWTW producer David O Selznick was the high priest of Hollywood romanticism, he found the idea of the Old South being the romantic land of "cavaliers and cotton fields" irresistible to himself and his audience. Yet he retained one dramatic scene, Scarlett's hard slapping of Prissy, which inspired a deputation of Southern ladies to wait upon him and assure him that corporal punishment had never been administered to slaves by any
mistress of the house.
Tom

[L Verge]

(12-27-2014 11:57 PM)Linda Anderson Wrote:  As a couple of people have told me recently that the Civil War was not fought over slavery, I decided to do a little research and found a 2011 Pew Research Center poll which found that, "There is no consensus among the public about the primary cause of the Civil War, but more (48%) say that the war was mainly about states’ rights than say it was mainly about slavery (38%)."

http://www.people-press.org/2011/04/08/c...-divisive/

I also found an excerpt in "Salon" from The New Mind of the South by Tracy Thompson about how the Civil War was taught in the South. It echoes Wild Bill's comment, "Actually, Daniel C, Gene C, and LincolnToddFan are correct as to the historical outlook on the Civil War and Reconstruction, that it was primarily a pro-Southern interpretation in movies and books and articles at least until the North decided finally to win the war and passed the Civil Rights laws of 1964 and 1965..."

"'I grew up in a cocoon,' Herbers says today, recalling his childhood and the version of history he absorbed. It’s an apt metaphor for what happened to any Southerner born before about 1970, and to a good many of those born since. Although the field of Southern history underwent a revolution at the university level in the 1940s and 1950s, the version ordinary Southerners knew in 1970 and even later had not changed appreciably since 1900. Perhaps 1970 sounds like a long time ago, but in educational terms it’s not: 1970 was when a lot of people who are still teaching today learned what they know, and what they’ve passed on to their students. James Loewen, a sociologist and author of “Lies My Teacher Told Me,” has said that when he speaks to public school educators across the country today, somewhere between 60 and 75 percent say that the Civil War was fought over the issue of states’ rights. Whether the group he’s speaking to is predominately white, predominately black, or racially diverse, the percentage stays roughly the same."

http://www.salon.com/2013/03/16/the_sout...civil_war/

There must be a kink in my brain somewhere (no comments please!), but for the life of me - no matter what path I take, it always leads back to slavery being the cause of the Civil War. To me, it's that red-hot ember that kept hiding under all the rhetoric and finally burst into flames under the guise of states' rights, extraterritoriality, economics, or whatever.

I also think that it was the driving force behind Hollywood's efforts to "recreate" this horrible time for the pure sake of making money -- not setting straight the history. I sometimes wonder what their efforts have done to race relations over the years.

Now, I'd like to pose the proverbial $64,000 question (you youngsters may have to research what that term means to us ancients): What could our forefathers have done pre-1860 to prevent the Civil War?

[Wild Bill]

Nothing

[L Verge]

(12-28-2014 12:15 PM)Wild Bill Wrote:  Nothing

My thoughts too, Bill -- and yet we still continue to point fingers of guilt from both sides as to who caused it.

[STS Lincolnite]

(12-28-2014 11:13 AM)L Verge Wrote:  ... no matter what path I take, it always leads back to slavery being the cause of the Civil War. To me, it's that red-hot ember that kept hiding under all the rhetoric and finally burst into flames under the guise of states' rights, extraterritoriality, economics, or whatever.

Laurie, I share your conclusion. The more I examine the history of the Civil War, it seems to me to become more and more clear. When I have spoken with people on the topic I have tried a couple of different analogies to try to express my thoughts. The topic is of course complex (hence the reason we continue to discuss and debate it 150+ years later) but I try to boil it down to a somewhat simple image.

The one I come back to is this: I think of the "doorway to slavery" as one of those old stone archways. There are a number of stones that form the archway but the keystone carries the archway's weight and keeps it open. That is how I think of slavery. It was the keystone - working with and through all the other stones - that carried the weight and allowed the archway to Civil War to be walked through. Without the keystone, the other stones would not be enough to sustain the archway.

I would also say that the other "reasons" for the war (for example states rights, economics, etc.) when examined, seem themselves to be inextricably tied to slavery. If you were to try to pull out that pesky thread of slavery, the whole "sweater" of Civil War would unravel.

That is not to say that I think slavery was exclusively a Southern problem. It was an American problem. Forged in the crucible of the very foundation of the nation. I'm afraid that is what lead to war being unavoidable in 1860 (per Laurie's question), in my opinion.

[Thomas Thorne]

Any compromise to such a vexing issue as slavery expansion would have required each side to swallow something very repugnant to its beliefs. There were a variety of choices that could have been made.

There could have been a revival of a Missouri Compromiselike geographical division between free and slave territories. Complicating the issue would have been likely Northern insistence that US expansion to the Caribbean and Latin America be prohibited to prevent slavery expansion to the areas most conducive to the cotton economy.

Another formula which might have been acceptable to the North in 1861 would have likely foundered if the South had followed the logic of slavery security to its ultimate conclusion. Suppose the South had accepted the Republican principle of no slavery in the territories but insisted on stringent guarantees there would no interference with slavery in the 15 slave states.

This would have included vigorous enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act,the adoption of the principles of the proposed Crittenden compromise which forbade future constitutional amendments detrimental to slavery and continued prohibition of abolitionist literature distributed by the US mail in the South. Would the South have then insisted in its desire to prevent more John Browns that books like "Uncle Tom's Cabin" be prevented from being mailed anywhere in the United States or circulated in interstate commerce?
Tom

[L Verge]

Could compensation for emancipation/manumission (what's the difference between those two terms?) have turned the tide?

Scott - I just have to make a personal comment related to your idea of slavery being the keystone that holds the ancient arch together. As many of you know, our old Huntt home was destroyed by arsonists back in May - a total loss. Three tall chimneys still stand, and Dutch tiles around the fireplace one in the former dining room are still intact as are red tiles surrounding the fireplace in what used to be the parlor. A lesson to build your home with brick.

What we just realized yesterday, however, is that a large, wooden arch in the main hallway was still intact. This arch was added in 1872, when the house was remodeled, and marked the spot where the old portion (ca. 1840) joined the new portion. Everything around that arch has been reduced to charred rubble, but the arch stands firm.

My creative mind just took your post about slavery being the keystone to the Civil War to make the analogy that the issue of slavery still is a keystone to our country ever being able to successfully overcome racial enmity. 150 years ago, we had charred rubble all around us; sixty years ago, we had riot-based charred rubble around us; just weeks ago, we had charred rubble around us caused by separation of the races. It seems that the fires continue, but Scott's keystone of slavery cannot be pulled down.