I am a Southerner - a native Virginian currently residing in (North) Florida. I do not accept the 'gross' and 'vile' characterizations of "Yankees," nor do I buy into blaming them for everything. (How many lost courthouses, for which the Unionists were faulted, burned in the 1880s, or so?) However, I also do not accept the blanket characterization of all Confederates as "traitors."
I believe many sincerely thought that what they were doing was right, although I admit that they might have rationalized their convictions and actions a bit too much. There were, however, those who really thought of themselves first as Virginians, Georgians, etc. and thus as Americans in those terms - every Virginian is an American after all, right? I do not agree with secession and its excuses, slavery and its claims to legitimacy, but I refuse to apply the same sort of sweeping brushstrokes to paint Southerners as some 'Southernists' paint "Northerners."
If I understood the Union as a compact, and held first loyalty to Virginia, or Florida, I might say, yes, secession is an option at some point - though I might argue about at what point, when and why. Some may argue that this is an unacceptable definition of the Union, but I find certain bandied-around uses of the word 'traitor' objectionable. The Framers did not agree on everything precisely, and very deliberately allowed for a loose enough interpretation to permit all sorts of 'strict constrictionism.' However, one point they were very specific on was the definition of treason, and with good reason. Many of them had functioned with the shadow of the noose hanging over them at one time, because someone could call them 'traitors' at whim, just because he did not like them and disagreed with their claims, and denied their grievances.
The definition of the Union that is now considered legitimate, whether by states rightists on the Supreme Court or consolidationists on your local governing body, is the one that won out. It may be the right one, if you believe in an absolute truth. (I do, though I do not claim to always know what it is).
There is still some 'play' in it, but, generally, no accepts certain "qualifications," even many who claim to do so now.
It surprises me to see the old stories about Sherman and such brought out. I suppose the 'good news' of the "Gospel" of the 'Lost Cause' is that "we" were right even if "we" lost, and what "they" did to "us" after proves it, as recorded in the 'Book of Acts of the Apostates. . . .' It bothers me as much to see the response come in the form it does here, as it though Constantine just been another Diocletian.
I do not reject that acts of my Confederate ancestors. Instead, I try to understand them. Perhaps the more important point is not whether "traitors" acted "treacherously" to the true idea of the Union and the Constitution (which both sides argued the other had done), but whether we can ever get past that whole morality play, by finally coming to terms with it and learning from it, rather than calling it, or some part of it, bad names - all of us, North and South, East and West,. . . .
---
Jarl K. Jackson
On Wed, 15 Aug 2001 18:27:06
Paul Finkelman wrote:
>One might view Sherman as the man who was responsible for freeing more human
>being from bondage than any other person. His march from the Mississippi to the
>Atlantic Ocean resulted in the liberation of more than a million slaves and the
>destruction of a nation, whose "cornerstone," accoring to its own Vice
>President, was slavery. I suppose we should not be surprised that those who
>lost their slaves, and the wealth that came from it, hated General Sherman. His
>tactics, ironically, were no different that those of laster used by Eisenhower,
>Patton (a Virginian) and the rest of the Allied High Command in World War II, to
>prevent the enemy from making war, by destroying the enemy's ability to make
>war. We used the same tactic against Japan, only with carpet bombing and
>firebombing.
>
>Gross and vile? Interesting terms. I am not sure what "gross" means here
>(disgusting, ill mannered, overweight?) Vile. I would reserve that term, at
>least in the American context, to perhaps traitors, who having taken oaths of
>allegience to the United States, made war against the United States when they
>did not like the outcome of a presidential election.
>
>Paul Finkelman (father of a first generation Virginian!)
>
>--
>Paul Finkelman
>Chapman Distinguished Professor
>University of Tulsa College of Law
>3120 East 4th Place
>Tulsa, Oklahoma 74104-2499
>
>918-631-3706 (office)
>918-631-2194 (fax)
>
>[log in to unmask]
>
>
>
>
>Deane wrote:
>
>> Well, let me just say this.
>> I am a 54 year old housewife with nothing but Southern roots on each side of
>> my family, so I admit to a strong bias.
>> My paternal grandparents were born in North Carolina in the 1880's.
>> My maternal grandparents were born in Tidewater Virginia in the 1880's.
>> During my childhood and formative years in the 1950's, it was their
>> reflections on their parents' lives that shaped my thinking and taught me to
>> regard certain aspects of Southern American history the way I do.
>> I certainly will not bore you folks with that.
>> However, it was my beloved and dear and college degreed (i.e., not ignorant
>> red neck) grandparents who taught me that men like Sherman were gross and
>> vile.
>> On the other hand, one of my grandfathers (whose name was Wade Hampton
>> King) had a brother whose middle name was Grant......that brother was named
>> after Ulysses Grant. The family legend has it that my great-grandfather
>> named that son after the Union general out of gratitude for being able to
>> take his horse home from Appomatox.
>> In fairness, I think that it was the horrors of Reconstruction.... the
>> salted fields that the Yankee troops had left behind them along with
>> poisoned water wells, needlessly slaughtered live stock, the ring-barked
>> fruit and nut trees and the resulting starvation that caused the deepest and
>> most induring bitterness.
>> I do not think that Margaret Mitchell's book created myths. I think that
>> when many Southerners read GONE WITH THE WIND they were relieved that after
>> so many decades someone had finally come close to putting it right and
>> putting it down on paper.....and better yet, folks everywhere were reading
>> it and, perhaps, coming to a better understanding, albeit a romanticized
>> one, of what Southerners tended to be like.
>> I could go on and on and on, but I won't.
>> I could tell you about the teacher I had in college in the 1960's who asked
>> me (the only southerner in that small Vermont college), "Is it true that you
>> Southerners despise the blacks, the Jews and the Catholics. And if so, why?"
>> I was so flabberghasted that I could not answer except to say, "Why no. We
>> just hate Yankees!"
>> I could try to describe to you the anguish on my own mother's face as she
>> told me about her own grandmother's stories of eating insects and make 'tea'
>> out of shoe leather after the "Wah".
>> I can hear my mother now, telling me how her grandmother said over and over
>> and over,
>> "We were SO hungry."
>> Deane Ferguson Mills
>> a 13th generation Tidewater Virginian and proud of it.
>>
>> > I agree with your assessment of Margaret Mitchell's role in tarnishing any
>> > understanding of Sherman. But no matter what is written, I'm afraid,
>> some
>> > Southerners, and nearly all Native Americans, will continue having a
>> > difficult time believing Sherman had any noble purpose in waging all out
>> > war, either against the Confederacy, or against the Sioux and other
>> Western
>> > peoples he subjugated in the Indian Wars.
>> >
>> > -Paul Shelton
>> > -----Original Message-----
>> > From: Jim Watkinson [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
>> > Sent: Wednesday, August 15, 2001 3:21 PM
>> > To: [log in to unmask]
>> > Subject: sherman
>> >
>> >
>> > Harold is right. Total war is key. There was a review of a bio of
>> Sherman
>> > 2 or 3 weeks ago in the NYT Review of Books which strongly suggested that
>> > the man who said "war is hell" believed he could end the war sooner -- and
>> > stop the carnage -- by fighting the war in a differrent manner. This
>> seems
>> > to ring true. Margaret Mitchell (and David Selznick) probably did more to
>> > set back the cause of understanding the war than anyone who has ever
>> lived.
>> >
>> > Jim Watkinson
>> >
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