gorgehiker Loc: Lexington, Ky

Do the people who wave the Confederate F**g and the f**g of the USA understand what would have happened if the south had won the Civil War? There would be no United States of America as we now know it. We would either be one country known as the Confederate States of America or two completely separate countries. How would black people be treated in the CSA? Would s***ery still exist?

Do the folks who so proudly wave the Confederate f**g and honor Confederate generals just not realize that those generals wanted to destroy the United States just as much as Osama bin Laden did?

tradio Loc: Oxford, Ohio

"Do the folks who so proudly wave the Confederate f**g and honor Confederate generals just not realize that those generals wanted to destroy the United States just as much as Osama bin Laden did?"

Osama, Obama and Democrats in general.

gorgehiker Loc: Lexington, Ky

Confederate troops k**led an estimated 365,000 American soldiers and we have a multitude of statues to honor the Confederate k**lers of Americans. Osama bin Laden k**led far fewer Americans. I guess that Osama bin Laden just didn't k**l enough Americans to deserve a monument like the Confederate generals did.

Blurryeyed Loc: NC Mountains.

Do you really think that the Civil War can be explained so simply and that all blame can be laid at the feet of the southern states? Yes, s***ery was an a*********n and can not be defended, it is a scar on this country's history but that was a different time with different social norms and the Civil War was about more than just s***ery.

Personally I don't support flying the stars and bars and when I see it I find it a rather ignorant statement more about the folks flying it than anything else, but for you to try and make the argument you are attempting to make makes me feel the same about you, just ignorant.

gorgehiker Loc: Lexington, Ky

We agree that the Civil War was about more than just s***ery, but the preservation of s***ery was certainly a major component.

We agree that the flying of the Confederate f**g represents "a rather ignorant statement about the folks flying it".

I try to oversimplify my comments on this blog to make a point concisely without writing a book.

DennyT Loc: Central Missouri woods

Those that cling to the false “ lost cause” fiction first proposed in written in 1867 by Edward pollard as a fight against reconstruction ignore the fact that the south -its leaders committed treason. It is unconscionable that we allow men who committed treason again the United States places of honor.

trainspotter Loc: Oregon

Dilly...Dilly!

pendennis

That is not a "fact", as the Southern States were a "confederation", not a union. It's leaders did not commit treason. The Confederate Army's officers resigned their commissions in the U.S. Army and Navy. Their loyalties were to their native states, and not the Federal union. All the Southern states which seceded, did so with the understanding that voluntary entry to the Union could be countered by a voluntary secession from that Union. At least three states stated as much when they ratified the U.S. Constitution in the 1780's (New York, Rhode Island, Virginia). That the Union considered the Southern States in "r*******n", is the term Lincoln, et al, used. The cassus belli are conveniently ignored by modern and post 1861-1865 war historians. The Confederacy had genuine issues which the North refused to address in Congress. Folks conveniently forget that southern ships were forced to dead-head back to Southern ports after delivering raw cotton to northern states like Massachusetts, effectively doubling shipping costs, and that's only one grievance. There were many more, including the denial of Southern States railroads the ability to purchase land and build cross-country railroads, linking the east and west coasts.

You're comparing the times of the period using today's times. The two are irreconcilable. It's also unconscionable to desecrate the memory of those who gave their lives, regardless the side on which they served. All served to protect the Union, or their home states.

And the logic used by the former Union states when the war was over, stands logic on its head. If the Southern states were merely in r*******n, and those states never left the Union, then why did they have to "reapply" for "admission"? The dirty secret is that the vengeful North wanted to ensure that the Southern States had no political power. The North illegally forced the disbanding of legitimately elected state legislatures, and refused to seat legally elected Representatives to Congress. They even refused to seat a Representative from Maryland, which did not secede.

PS - I fly the Stars and Bars every Memorial Day, and on Confederate Memorial Day.

Blurryeyed Loc: NC Mountains.

Again, you only show your ignorance, do a little research about secession as a state right prior to the civil war.

thom w Loc: San Jose, CA

Joining the union gave them the right to fire on the union?

thom w Loc: San Jose, CA

Sort of like Germany after WWII?

pendennis

Again, you have no understanding of the actual events leading up to the Fort Sumter incident.

Just in case you missed the day which this was taught, here it is in recap:

South Carolina seceded from the Union on 20 December 1860. As such, any property within South Carolina's state was considered state, not Federal. South Carolina asked the Union to abandon Fort Sumter, along with any other former Federal military sites. The Union refused, and President Lincoln ordered Fort Sumter to be resupplied, countering former President Buchanan's policy. The state advised Lincoln that resupplying Fort Sumter would be considered an assault on the state, and it would respond accordingly. Lincoln did, and South Carolina responded accordingly.

Now, how hard is that to understand? You get three semesters of U.S. military and political history compressed into a single, logical paragraph.

pendennis

Not even close. While the U.S. provided a lot of aid, the German people largely rebuilt Germany. The Germans were without a government after 8 May 1945. In 1947 Chancellor Konrad Adenauer changed the German economic model to a free market system, and they became a world power again, even with the country split. Note how West Germany prospered, and East Germany was a basket case.

The Marshall Plan was a failure. It provided for government-to-government payments, effectively keeping bad actors as heads of countries for years.

As to "Reconstruction", it was an abject failure, because it maintained the power of the North while effectively keeping the defeated South powerless in Congress.

The North h**ed Andrew Johnson, a Democrat Tennessean, who wanted to use Lincoln's reconstruction plan, a far more generous plan.

LWW Loc: Banana Republic of America

A way oversimplified bit of reasoning based on several flawed assumptions.

1 - The south could never have won the war. Much like the revolutionary war where the colonists could never have ‘won’ against England.

The military goal in both cases was to be a PITA enough to gain independence.

2 - Had the CSA succeeded it is likely, but not certain, that the two would have reunited by now ... or at the very least assumed very close relations similar to the US:UK.

3 - Mechanization was already eliminating s***ery. What the south really wanted desperately to hold onto was their over representation in the house due to the three fifths clause.

4 - If Lincoln had his way the s***es would have been deported. Had the CSA gained independence it would likely eventually have been the same result.

5 - An amendment that freed the s***es while phasing out, over time, the south’s over representation and guaranteed the right of secession would have probably avoided the entire war. Secession was assumed to be a state’s right until Lincoln, who opposed it and was willing to fight the war over it.

6 - People who wave the confederate f**g usually do it just as an FU to the Yankees because their daddy, and their daddy’s daddy, and their daddy’s daddy’s daddy and so on did it because the CSA was every bit as conquered and occupied a nation as Germany and Japan. Not all southerners support this thinking, but a subset of the population has a generational resentment of the north.

7 - Statues of southern generals were a cultural appeasement between the two sides.

pendennis

Well stated!

This era of U.S. history is several PhD's and masters degrees in study, yet folks do their damnedest to over-simplify the cassus belli leading up to the war. Likewise, they oversimplify the agonies suffered in the South during Reconstruction.

The Northern Army was no army of saints, and neither was the Confederate Army. I'm from Kentucky, and the atrocities committed by both sides is well documented. The Union Army occupied all the Ohio river crossings to prevent Kentucky from seceding, and allowing the North to resupply the Army. Union occupation of Louisville, Paducah, and Covington was anything but peaceful. While not as stringent as New Orleans, the resentment still lives.

The Confederates ran guerilla operations near Louisville and in Central Kentucky, almost to the end of the war. The so-called "Night Riders" were a thorn in the side to Union soldiers, and many a Union sympathizer were murdered by them.