Q & A August 31, 2017
Questions and Answers, Comments and Criticisms (08/31/17)
1. Did Lincoln “really” offer to step down? Renowned historian David Herbert Donald disagrees with your conclusion. (Dr. Donald, who died in 2009, won a Pulitzer Prize for his 1992 biography titled “Lincoln”) A reader posed this question based on my blog about the subject in May 2017. I had asserted that Lincoln, in 1863, using Thurlow Weed, a New York based political operative as the emissary, had made such an offer to not one, but two of Lincoln’s political opponents, General George McClellan and New York Governor Horatio Seymour. In 1885, Mr. Weed had disclosed the “offers” to author Charles Allen Thorndike Rice who was seeking remembrances of Lincoln by his contemporaries for a new book to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of Lincoln’s death. Weed said that he had approached the two men on behalf of President Lincoln, who offered to step aside from the 1864 election and support their candidacy; if they would agree to push the Union agenda. McClellan and Seymour subsequently confirmed those conversations to Mr. Rice. Dr. Donald, for whom I have the greatest respect, questioned if Mr. Rice quoted his sources correctly, noting that all three participants as well as Mr. Rice died about the time the book was published and that Lincoln’s secretaries made no direct mention of the offers. He did not deny that such events may have occurred, but could not say for certain that they did. Dr. Donald addressed his misgivings on page 423 of his book. I just disagree and accept Mr. Weed’s and Mr. Rice’s accounts.
2. In your book, “Abraham Lincoln, An Uncommon, Common Man, you summarily dismiss the “Lost Cause” as the justification by Southern leaders for the necessity of secession, for the Civil War which followed only after the illegal invasion by the North, and as the reason the South was defeated. Too many of the brave founders of the Confederacy believed in the Lost Cause, and too many subsequent historians support it, for you to not recognize the validity. I must assume you are anti-Southern to a fault. Well said, but wrong on several counts. I’ll address the last issue first; I am not anti-Southern as most of my relatives were from the hills of Tennessee and Alabama, and I was raised in Southern Illinois; but I am anti-Confederate. I believe that the Lost Cause was a false rationale offered by former Confederate leaders, AFTER the war. They needed an answer for the people of the South, most of whom did not own slaves, but who had collectively lost nearly a generation of young men, were left with devastated towns and farms, and an economy in ruins; the results of a war that gained them nothing. The Lost Cause became the mantra for those whose poor decisions led the South into the War. Some of the basic the tenets of the Lost Cause include: (1) That Slavery was never the cause for secession as it would have died out in a few decades anyway; but rather that “States’ rights” was the issue. (2) That the South only lost the War because the villainous Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses Grant were willing to kill hundreds of thousands of people to impose their will. (3) That Confederate officers were gentlemen in the European tradition, (4) Robert E. Lee was a near saint, and (5) Southern women were loyal and courageous. (That last point is true.) (6) Finally, the lost cause declared that slavery was a benevolent institution which benefited the Negro as it offered a civilized existence, food, shelter, honest work, and Christianity. As to “many” historians supporting the Lost Cause, I suggest otherwise; since those supporters are usually neo-Confederates whose body of work is devoted to maintaining the myth. Frankly, I understand why the former Confederate leaders felt the necessity to concoct the Lost Cause theory at the time it was invented; it was a clever rationale. I have no argument with their desire to preserve some aspects of their pre-Civil War culture, but abhor their insistence that they did not secede over slavery or that slavery was somehow benevolent. However, I have even less sympathy for those in the modern era who continue to argue that States’ Rights, not slavery led the country to war and who still claim that “Slavery was benign.” These basic tenets of the Lost Cause are, I believe, patently false.
3. I read an article recently which included the statement, “The North won the war but the South won the peace. Unfortunately, the write did not amplify. Have you heard that catchy phrase? Yes, I have; and I generally agree. By the end of the war, Lincoln, most of his cabinet and the North’s leading Generals, including Grant, Sherman, and Sheridan, believed the defeated South could be forced into recognizing some civil rights for the freed slaves. Congress passed the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments to the Constitution which set that expectation. However, within a few years after Lincoln’s death, Northern citizens grew tired of the cost of keeping a large Union Army presence in the South to enforce the new laws. Although former seceded states were required to recognize those landmark Civil Rights laws, the Southern states quickly reverted to oppressive actions against the former slaves. Jim Crow laws, forced labor through a penal system, sharecropper arrangements, and intimidation by groups such as the Ku Klux Klan became common, keeping the vast majority of southern Black citizens in a second-class situation. Except for the new laws which prohibited their designation as chattel property which could be bought and sold at will, most of the Black population found that their quality of life did not improve very much. On the other hand, the southern agrarian economy still had a cheap labor force. And, as a peculiar political consequence, the South actually gained greater representation in Congress by now counting each former slave as a whole person for census purposes, while during slavery, each was counted as only three-fifths of a person. (Of course, most freed slaves were still prevented from voting.) Further, the limitations of civil rights for the Southern Black communities continued un-abated for another one hundred years. So, while the Southern economy was crushed during the war, and far too many of their young men died, those former Confederate leaders who survived, picked up their way of life pretty much as before. And they remained at the top of an elitist system. Thus, some say, they won the peace.
4. A famous quote of Lincoln’s to explain his commitment to the restoration of the Union, but not to the abolition of slavery, was not in your book and I have wondered why not? The quote paraphrased was; “If I could save the Union by freeing all of the slaves I would; If I could save it by freeing some of the slaves, I would; and If I could save it by not freeing any slaves, I would do it.” Your paraphrase is close enough to an important part of Lincoln’s statement, but he added the following for clarification; “My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and it is not either to save or destroy slavery.” At the time, August 22, 1862, Lincoln needed to clarify why he was pressing the War; (1) to the Northern public, (2) to those in the four “Border States,” which remained in the Union but retained slavery, and (3) to critics who were calling it Lincoln’s Negro War. In early drafts of my book, I included his comments, which were made in a response to a letter from an influential newspaper publisher, who was trying to get Lincoln to declare that the War was being fought to abolish slavery as a mission equal to preservation of the Union. During the editing process, the quote did not survive because I felt I had already explained his position with other anecdotes. In retrospect, I wish I had left it in.
5. Did Lincoln ever address support for the Underground Railroad in writing or in speeches? Not directly, as far as I know, but he must have been aware of its existence as early as 1840 since there was a station (holding house) within a few blocks of his home in Springfield. Also, he was an outspoken critic of fugitive slave laws which required citizens in non-slaveholding states, such as Illinois, to assist (or at least not hinder) efforts to re-capture slaves. The Underground Railroad had no trains and was not underground, but rather represented hundreds of clandestine routes used by escaping slaves to, hopefully, find freedom. The participants, both the slaves and those Whites and free Blacks who aided in their escape, used railroad terms as a code; for example, one who helped move slaves was a conductor, a safe house was a station, and one who would help hide an escapee was an agent. Although there is evidence of the organized escape program dating back to the 1790s, there was a significant increase in use between 1830 to 1860, and throughout the Civil War. The extent of the system was not fully known until after the war, when it became safe to talk about the exploits of the heroes and heroines who helped escaping slaves find refuge in the North. It must be remembered that the fleeing slave was not safe just because they left Confederate territory since four Union States (Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri) still permitted slavery and would incarcerate captured slaves as criminals awaiting possible return to their masters. Even in some areas farther north, the local population would turn away any escaping slave. I plan an article on the subject later in 2017.
6. Where do you stand on the growing public movement to remove statues and other memorials of Confederate officials and commemorations of important Confederate events? Your answer will define your respect for our history. What is it, whitewash history or preserve it?
Wow, such a loaded question! Apparently, to you the issues we face in this world as it changes over time are black and white; pun intended. First, it is important to understand how and why many of these memorials were created. Most were funded by chapters of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, which was formed in the 1890s with the express purpose of raising funds to help preserve their southern heritage by honoring individuals and events from Confederate history. Then, over the first forty years of the twentieth century, the chapters commissioned literally hundreds of statues, memorial plaques, and stone carvings for placement in predominantly southern communities.
Now, about today’s contentious arguments. Actually, I tend to seek common ground. I do want to preserve historically significant monuments, but it might be more fair to all citizens if some were placed in a museum setting rather than in the middle of a town square. I believe many of those who declare that they will fight to protect and preserve some of these symbols of their southern and Confederate heritage, fail to recognize, or simply disregard, the negative symbolism some monuments project. Unfortunately, the Confederate Battle flag (stars and bars), which is often depicted in memorials, has been confiscated by some white supremacists, exacerbating the tensions. On the other hand, my concern with those who are offended by any Confederate symbol, or for that matter any memorials to the Founding Fathers or early Presidents who owned slaves, is that they would be willing to erase history.
I do not have a problem with the re-placement (but not destruction) of memorials and statues which glorify a person whose only significance in history is that they defended slavery and fought against the United States.
On the other hand, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Andrew Jackson were noble Presidents and the fact that they were born in an era when slavery was legal and they owned slaves, should not be the overriding definition of their lives. Robert E. Lee was, for all but four years of his life when he believed he needed to defend his state of Virginia, a patriot who served his country honorably in several military engagements and, after the war, accepted his defeat honorably and supported the United States. Further, he did not own slaves and had stated that slavery was a moral and political evil; but his memory is also under attack as if his whole life was degenerate. There are even demands to remove President Woodrow Wilson’s name from a University building; although his accomplishments on behalf of our country, in my opinion, far outweigh his prejudices.
One of the most difficult memorials to rationalize for the future, is the carving at Stone Mountain in Georgia. It is by far the largest Confederate monument, stands over 400 feet high, and depicts Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Jefferson Davis in heroic poses on horseback. It was also funded primarily by the United Daughters of the Confederacy when they purchased the land in 1916 and contracted for the design. Construction was delayed for long periods on several occasions, because of disputes with the original designer and carver, and it took nearly 40 years to complete. Compounding the tensions surrounding this monument, the original title transfer included the right for the Ku Klux Klan to hold meetings at the site in perpetuity. The monument was acquired by the State of Georgia in 1960 using, in part, the condemnation process, which allowed the “Klan Covenant” to be removed; however, the state included a protective clause that the monument could not be altered in any way. Several compromise proposals have been floated which call for the addition of educational exhibits which might include a history of slavery and justification for the Union’s (and Abraham Lincoln’s) willingness to wage war to defeat the Confederacy, to re-unite the nation, and ultimately, to abolish slavery. I do not wish to see the monument destroyed, as some suggest, but a solution satisfactory to the various factions will not be easy.
The unfortunate fact is that most White Americans, not just southerners, who lived during the 17th through the 19th centuries, were taught at home, in schools, and in churches that their race was superior; and although many of those same people did object to slavery on moral grounds, few would have supported equal rights. So, today, if a person or group is going to demonize historical figures who lived at that time, based only on their racial views, hardly any founder of our country, nor military hero, nor any successful political figure, should have a memorial that survives the ages.
I sometimes wonder if we, and our current generations, are doing something, or failing to do something, as a society, which one-hundred years from now, will cause us to be seen as unworthy of respect. If history holds any lesson, there will be something!
The most balanced article on this subject I have read was by William C. Davis, in the July 10, 2015 edition of the Wall Street Journal, titled “The Right Way to Remember the Confederacy.” Dr. Davis was the Director of the Virginia (yes Virginia) Center for Civil War Studies at Virginia Tech. The article is available on line.
Contact the author at gadorris2@gmail.com