Earl J. Hess. The Civil War in the West: Victory and Defeat from The Appalachians to The Mississippi. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 2012.
A straightforward work of military history which is arranged chronologically, The Civil War in the West makes a case that the war was actually decided in the West, and that western armies deserve a great deal more credit for defeating the Confederacy than is generally given in mainstream acocunts which center their attention on the Eastern theater. The book is generally told from the Union point of view.
The problems of controlling--to one degree or another--vast expanses of conquered Confederate territory is a recurring theme. So is the logistic difficulties experienced by Union forces as they penetrated deeper into the Confederacy, often connected to sources of supplies and ordnance only by rivers and wagon trails of dubious quality. Western armies and their commanders often found themselves forced to fulfill many civic functions in occupied areas, especially when local government officials were either Confederates or of questionable loyalty. And with the acquisition of more Southern territory came contact with more slaves; the question of what to do with them would evolve with time, circumstance, changing policy, and the decisions and attitudes of different commanders.
Western warfare was generally fought at a smaller scale than the famous battles of the East, but were as fiercely fought. Western armies on both sides were generally less disciplined in terms of dress, demeaner, and tendency to plunder (Confederate forces were seemingly about as likely to exploit Southern farms as the dreaded Yankees) than their Eastern counterparts. Another contrast lies in generalship--in the West, the Union held the advantage from the beginning, unlike in the East, and with sporadic exceptions and setbacks the war in the west was marked by a steady succession of Union success. Hess notes that some generals who were successful in the West then failed in the East (Halleck, Pope, etc.), but follows that observation up noting that Lincoln would finally again give command of Eastern forces to a general who had been fighting in the "Western style". (317) That general was Grant, and in collaboration with the much more provincially Western Sherman, Grant applied lessons and tactics learned in the West to the Eastern theater, with decisive results.
A very readable and well-argued addition to Civil War literature.
Monday, November 18, 2013
Wednesday, October 9, 2013
Ecstatic Nation
Brenda Wineapple. Ecstatic Nation: Confidence, Crisis, and Compromise, 1848-1877. New York: Harper Collins, 2013.
Wineapple's book is centered on 'ecstasy' but it begins in apprehension and ends in exhaustion. The United States of America she portrays is wracked throughout this period by extremes of ecstasy triggered by a tendency to appeal to a 'higher law' whether the subject is transcendence, religious revival, territorial expansion, or--and especially--slavery. When the book begins, in 1848, the debate over slavery had become so heated and so grounded in moral absolutes and righteous certainties that sectional conflict seemed inevitable. When the book closes in 1877, the nation's white majority are united in weariness and a desire to put the ecstatic energies of abolitionism, civil war, and a faltering civil rights movement behind them.
The narrative is framed by two funerals, each of which brought the different sections of the nation together although in very different ways. The first, in 1848, was for John Quincy Adams, and the outpouring of respect for the divisive old foe of the Slave Power and its corrosive effect on the Union could not mask the lingering fear that his dire warnings could not be ignored even after he left the stage. The second, in 1877, was for for former US Senator Charles Sumner, one of the great Congressional abolitionists of the "ecstatic era" the country was coming out of. His eulogy, by former Confederate politician-turned US Senator from Mississippi Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar, implicitly called for an end of the political and social divisions that forced whites in both the North and South to acknowledge that the African Americans the Civil War had helped to free were still around, making claims to citizenship and a place in the American polity and American society. But white America was tired, and wanted to believe that this work was done. The answer to that disconnect was burying an ongoing conflict in nostalgia-toned revisionism and acceding to a new racial hierarchy which would ultimately reframe the Civil War as an unfortunate tragedy and Reconstruction as an unmitigated disaster.
Wineapple is a Professor of Modern Literary and Historical Studies, and the book is deeply informed by the literary culture of the era. This is, in many ways, a study of the culture--the zeitgeist--of a tumultuous era that came to a close when the white elite, and much of the electorate, decided that more than enough blood and treasure had been expended on "the negro question" and the values of compromise and conciliation were lauded as fundamental to rebuilding the newly unified nation. American Indians were also victims of this new, determined quest for "order" and peace, even at the expense of justice. The America of the final chapters of Wineapple's book, more than anything, wanted strife and conflict off the front pages of their newspapers. It was time to solidify the economy behind the gold standard and clean up the civil service. A continent was unified, cleansed of both slavery and indigenous people (reservations were just as invisible as the disenfranchised freeman of the South). Further triumphs in the advancement of democracy, further expansions of suffrage, would have to wait for future generations.
Saturday, August 31, 2013
All on Fire
Henry Mayer. All on Fire: William Lloyd Garrison and the Abolition of Slavery. New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 1998.
History has not been kind to William Lloyd Garrison. For decades he was marginalized as a shrill extremist who did his cause more harm than good, and who was ultimately made irrelevant by circumstance and changing political realities. Henry Mayer set out not only to tell Garrison's story, but to restore his place in American history. The importance of the abolition movement in creating the political context in which Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans operated has received more attention in recent decades, and therefore a reappraisal of the movement's most infamous leader was long overdue.
This excellent biography is extensively researched and impressively comprehensive in establishing the historical context of Garrison's life and work. While at times it might almost seem to double as a history of the abolitionist movement as seen through Garrison's life, the focus is always on Garrison. This can especially be seen in the final section of the book, when events and political circumstance largely passed him by and he became rather peripheral to the ongoing struggle for civil rights and the postwar order. The bulk of the book is taken up with his long career as an abolitionist agitator, and the reader will learn much of that struggle simply because Garrison and his life's work were inseparable. Recent scholarship has led to a reappraisal of the role the abolitionist movement played in creating the political context in which Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans operated. In the decades before the Civil War created the context in which slavery would be destroyed, the abolitionists struggled to change the political realities dictating how slavery would be dealt with. In order to understand Garrison's career and to appreciate his importance, it is necessary to appreciate that story. Too many histories have denigrated the Garrisonians as shrill extremists who hurt their own cause and were ultimately made irrelevant by the Civil War and the career of Lincoln. This book serves as a compelling corrective to that argument.
Mayer also makes it clear that for Garrison, abolitionism was always part of a larger struggle for true, inclusive democracy. This is why he argues that Garrison needs to be recognized as a key figure in the history of the American Civil Rights movement.
The wealth of detail never overwhelms the narrative, and Mayer never loses sight of Garrison the man even as the bulk of the book focuses on his life as an outspoken abolitionist--Garrison and his life's work were inseparable. The only aspect of Garrison's career as an abolitionist which could have used more attention is his shift to political pragmatist in the wake of the rise of the Radical Republicans. Mayer convincingly argues why Garrison did so, but very little attention is given to the process of how this happened. Given that this shift led to Garrison splitting with many former allies within the movement, it would have been helpful had Mayer devoted some space to tracing this intellectual and tactical shift. Given that Garrison had started his career as an outspoken and rather partisan Federalist before ultimately deciding to work outside of the American political system, it would have been interesting to consider how Garrison still maintained a rather keen political sense after so many decades of contempt for the party system.
But that is a relatively minor quibble with a book that sets out to accomplish so much and largely succeeds. Mayer set out to restore a marginalized figure to his rightful place in civil rights history. Highly recommended.
History has not been kind to William Lloyd Garrison. For decades he was marginalized as a shrill extremist who did his cause more harm than good, and who was ultimately made irrelevant by circumstance and changing political realities. Henry Mayer set out not only to tell Garrison's story, but to restore his place in American history. The importance of the abolition movement in creating the political context in which Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans operated has received more attention in recent decades, and therefore a reappraisal of the movement's most infamous leader was long overdue.
This excellent biography is extensively researched and impressively comprehensive in establishing the historical context of Garrison's life and work. While at times it might almost seem to double as a history of the abolitionist movement as seen through Garrison's life, the focus is always on Garrison. This can especially be seen in the final section of the book, when events and political circumstance largely passed him by and he became rather peripheral to the ongoing struggle for civil rights and the postwar order. The bulk of the book is taken up with his long career as an abolitionist agitator, and the reader will learn much of that struggle simply because Garrison and his life's work were inseparable. Recent scholarship has led to a reappraisal of the role the abolitionist movement played in creating the political context in which Abraham Lincoln and the Republicans operated. In the decades before the Civil War created the context in which slavery would be destroyed, the abolitionists struggled to change the political realities dictating how slavery would be dealt with. In order to understand Garrison's career and to appreciate his importance, it is necessary to appreciate that story. Too many histories have denigrated the Garrisonians as shrill extremists who hurt their own cause and were ultimately made irrelevant by the Civil War and the career of Lincoln. This book serves as a compelling corrective to that argument.
Mayer also makes it clear that for Garrison, abolitionism was always part of a larger struggle for true, inclusive democracy. This is why he argues that Garrison needs to be recognized as a key figure in the history of the American Civil Rights movement.
The wealth of detail never overwhelms the narrative, and Mayer never loses sight of Garrison the man even as the bulk of the book focuses on his life as an outspoken abolitionist--Garrison and his life's work were inseparable. The only aspect of Garrison's career as an abolitionist which could have used more attention is his shift to political pragmatist in the wake of the rise of the Radical Republicans. Mayer convincingly argues why Garrison did so, but very little attention is given to the process of how this happened. Given that this shift led to Garrison splitting with many former allies within the movement, it would have been helpful had Mayer devoted some space to tracing this intellectual and tactical shift. Given that Garrison had started his career as an outspoken and rather partisan Federalist before ultimately deciding to work outside of the American political system, it would have been interesting to consider how Garrison still maintained a rather keen political sense after so many decades of contempt for the party system.
But that is a relatively minor quibble with a book that sets out to accomplish so much and largely succeeds. Mayer set out to restore a marginalized figure to his rightful place in civil rights history. Highly recommended.
Friday, August 23, 2013
Guns, Democracy, and the Insurrectionist Idea
Joshua Horwitz and Casey Anderson. Guns, Democracy, and the Insurrectionist Idea. Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press, 2009.
A work of advocacy and political science rather than history, but the authors' analysis is deeply informed by a study of three periods of history as well as constitutional and legal history. Their basic contention is that there is an "Insurrectionist" ideology that uses a faulty reading of history, the Second Amemdment, and the Constitution to utilize the broader issue of gun rights to validate an extreme anti-democractic agenda.
The historical eras under consideration are the American Revolution, Reconstruction, and the rise of the Nazi state in Germany. In all three cases, the authors demonstrate that the Insurrectionist version of history is based on a superficial reading of events and a reliance on taking events and quotes out of context.
The authors make a compelling case, and while this book is primarily a work of contemporary political advocacy, it is also an excellent example of how historians and history educators can play a vital role in American society. The argument that a misreading of history is a crucial foundation for Insurrectionism should alert any historian or educator to the value of countering propaganda and misinformed conventional wisdom with informed, nuanced narratives that connect ordinary Americans to their past, and do so with a healthy respect for a wide spectrum of opinion and values.
A work of advocacy and political science rather than history, but the authors' analysis is deeply informed by a study of three periods of history as well as constitutional and legal history. Their basic contention is that there is an "Insurrectionist" ideology that uses a faulty reading of history, the Second Amemdment, and the Constitution to utilize the broader issue of gun rights to validate an extreme anti-democractic agenda.
The historical eras under consideration are the American Revolution, Reconstruction, and the rise of the Nazi state in Germany. In all three cases, the authors demonstrate that the Insurrectionist version of history is based on a superficial reading of events and a reliance on taking events and quotes out of context.
The authors make a compelling case, and while this book is primarily a work of contemporary political advocacy, it is also an excellent example of how historians and history educators can play a vital role in American society. The argument that a misreading of history is a crucial foundation for Insurrectionism should alert any historian or educator to the value of countering propaganda and misinformed conventional wisdom with informed, nuanced narratives that connect ordinary Americans to their past, and do so with a healthy respect for a wide spectrum of opinion and values.
Sunday, July 14, 2013
The Barbarous Years
Bernard Bailyn. The Barbarous Years. The Peopling of British North America: The Conflict of Civilizations, 1600-1675. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2012.
This is a very readable synthetic history of the early colonial period in what became the United States of America. Bailyn is building on his work for the earlier "Voyagers to the West" which also examined the process of "peopling" British North America, but he also has another goal, which is implicit in the title. He wants to strip away some of the bucolic romance that later generations imposed on their memories of the first few decades of settlement along the Atlantic coast. This was, Bailyn wants the reader to understand, a bloody and violent period of conflict not only between settlers and American Indians--he refers to a "race war"--but also between different groups of settlers, between and within colonies, and between classes and races within colonies.
In order to make his case, Bailyn first begins with a chapter on "The Americans", which is not a general consideration of American Indians but rather the specific tribes living in the area under consideration--the Cheseapeake to New England. (The histories of Pennsylvania, the Carolinas, and Georgia are outside the parameters of this study). Respectful without succumbing to idealization, this chapter considers both the general characteristics of American Indian culture in the region as well as the specific circumstances of the time and place. It is a tricky thing to simultaneously consider Indian cultural values of balance and reciprocity while at the same time acknowledging the particular circumstances of history and contingency, and Bailyn manages to do both nicely.
The bulk of the book is taken up by the middle section, which considers the colonies of Virginia, Maryland, New Amsterdam/New Sweden/New York, and New England (the different colonies within New England do receive particular treatment) in light of the circumstances of their development and the origins of the European settlers (it is worth noting that African-American slavery, while not unknown in this period, was a much smaller institution than it would be later in the colonial period). Bailyn has clearly done his research and his command of sources covering both sides of the Atlantic, and a willingness to dig into the details of Dutch politics, Puritan theological disputes, and numerous other conflicts on both sides of the Atlantic is impressive.
I'm not so sure the book adds up to much more than a survey, however. The theme of constant strife and "barbarism" gets stretched pretty far, as it's hard to consider tension in New York between the Dutch majority and the English ruling minority on the same level as armed conflict between Maryland and Virginia militias, or for that matter as being anywhere equivalent to the racial warfare between European settlers and Indian natives. And while the final section/chapter, "The British Americans" is an excellent summary of the changes wrought by and in the first handful of generations of colonists in British, at the end Bailyn somewhat abruptly shifts to an Atlantic point of view. This is not entirely unwarranted--as noted, Bailyn recognizes that in order to understand the earlier colonists we must consider where they came from--but other than providing a neat symmetry with the first section (even as the Eastern Indians were tied to a larger Native world to the south and west, the colonists were tied to a larger world across the Atlantic and in the Caribbean), the shift to this theme in a book which explicitly seeks to deal with the "barbarism" within that colonial world seems either tacked-on or underdeveloped.
However, this book is an excellent introduction to a wealth of research and literature on a era which is too often overlooked or considered piecemeal and out of context.
This is a very readable synthetic history of the early colonial period in what became the United States of America. Bailyn is building on his work for the earlier "Voyagers to the West" which also examined the process of "peopling" British North America, but he also has another goal, which is implicit in the title. He wants to strip away some of the bucolic romance that later generations imposed on their memories of the first few decades of settlement along the Atlantic coast. This was, Bailyn wants the reader to understand, a bloody and violent period of conflict not only between settlers and American Indians--he refers to a "race war"--but also between different groups of settlers, between and within colonies, and between classes and races within colonies.
In order to make his case, Bailyn first begins with a chapter on "The Americans", which is not a general consideration of American Indians but rather the specific tribes living in the area under consideration--the Cheseapeake to New England. (The histories of Pennsylvania, the Carolinas, and Georgia are outside the parameters of this study). Respectful without succumbing to idealization, this chapter considers both the general characteristics of American Indian culture in the region as well as the specific circumstances of the time and place. It is a tricky thing to simultaneously consider Indian cultural values of balance and reciprocity while at the same time acknowledging the particular circumstances of history and contingency, and Bailyn manages to do both nicely.
The bulk of the book is taken up by the middle section, which considers the colonies of Virginia, Maryland, New Amsterdam/New Sweden/New York, and New England (the different colonies within New England do receive particular treatment) in light of the circumstances of their development and the origins of the European settlers (it is worth noting that African-American slavery, while not unknown in this period, was a much smaller institution than it would be later in the colonial period). Bailyn has clearly done his research and his command of sources covering both sides of the Atlantic, and a willingness to dig into the details of Dutch politics, Puritan theological disputes, and numerous other conflicts on both sides of the Atlantic is impressive.
I'm not so sure the book adds up to much more than a survey, however. The theme of constant strife and "barbarism" gets stretched pretty far, as it's hard to consider tension in New York between the Dutch majority and the English ruling minority on the same level as armed conflict between Maryland and Virginia militias, or for that matter as being anywhere equivalent to the racial warfare between European settlers and Indian natives. And while the final section/chapter, "The British Americans" is an excellent summary of the changes wrought by and in the first handful of generations of colonists in British, at the end Bailyn somewhat abruptly shifts to an Atlantic point of view. This is not entirely unwarranted--as noted, Bailyn recognizes that in order to understand the earlier colonists we must consider where they came from--but other than providing a neat symmetry with the first section (even as the Eastern Indians were tied to a larger Native world to the south and west, the colonists were tied to a larger world across the Atlantic and in the Caribbean), the shift to this theme in a book which explicitly seeks to deal with the "barbarism" within that colonial world seems either tacked-on or underdeveloped.
However, this book is an excellent introduction to a wealth of research and literature on a era which is too often overlooked or considered piecemeal and out of context.
Saturday, June 22, 2013
Gettysburg: The Last Invasion
Allen C. Guelzo. Gettysburg: The Last Invasion. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2013. xx + 632. Black & white plates, notes, index. $35.00.
The question to ask is not whether or not we "need another book on Gettysburg", but rather on whether or not the author seems to have something new and fresh to say. Guelzo's book seems to meet that criteria. While it could certainly serve as an introduction to the subject for a novice, he also reevaluates several near-canonical beliefs about the events at this pivotal battle and draws some very new conclusions.
I will leave it to specialists and well-read aficionados to sort out how convincing these arguments are. From my own perspective, his contention that Joshua Chamberlain's role in saving Little Round Top has been overstated seems compelling, and I would say the same for the argument that James Longstreet does not deserve the decades of blame he accumulated in the wake of the Army of Northern Virginia's defeat. But the most intriguing argument Guelzo makes is that the main credit for the battle being fought where and when it was--and, by extension, for Lee stumbling into a defeat he might otherwise never have fought--belongs to John Reynolds, for the simple reason that he ignored Meade's orders and intentions and instead took his 1st Corps forward into a confrontation with elements of Lee's army. Again, I will defer to others on these issues, but it is clear enough that Guelzo is doing more than replowing old ground.
The book is accessible to the general reader and avoids weighting the reader down with military minutiae. Guelzo's prose style is clear and supple, and he is adept at sketching the numerous characters with wry wit and knowing characterizations. These are real--often deeply flawed--men, not mythic figures. The dry humor never takes away from a genuine sensitivity to the dreadful carnage being produced. The one real complaint I have is that while there are numerous small detailed maps of individual actions and skirmishes, there is not a larger main map of the entire battle or the entire field of operation to refer back to.
Highly recommended.
The question to ask is not whether or not we "need another book on Gettysburg", but rather on whether or not the author seems to have something new and fresh to say. Guelzo's book seems to meet that criteria. While it could certainly serve as an introduction to the subject for a novice, he also reevaluates several near-canonical beliefs about the events at this pivotal battle and draws some very new conclusions.
I will leave it to specialists and well-read aficionados to sort out how convincing these arguments are. From my own perspective, his contention that Joshua Chamberlain's role in saving Little Round Top has been overstated seems compelling, and I would say the same for the argument that James Longstreet does not deserve the decades of blame he accumulated in the wake of the Army of Northern Virginia's defeat. But the most intriguing argument Guelzo makes is that the main credit for the battle being fought where and when it was--and, by extension, for Lee stumbling into a defeat he might otherwise never have fought--belongs to John Reynolds, for the simple reason that he ignored Meade's orders and intentions and instead took his 1st Corps forward into a confrontation with elements of Lee's army. Again, I will defer to others on these issues, but it is clear enough that Guelzo is doing more than replowing old ground.
The book is accessible to the general reader and avoids weighting the reader down with military minutiae. Guelzo's prose style is clear and supple, and he is adept at sketching the numerous characters with wry wit and knowing characterizations. These are real--often deeply flawed--men, not mythic figures. The dry humor never takes away from a genuine sensitivity to the dreadful carnage being produced. The one real complaint I have is that while there are numerous small detailed maps of individual actions and skirmishes, there is not a larger main map of the entire battle or the entire field of operation to refer back to.
Highly recommended.
Thursday, June 6, 2013
A Disease in the Public Mind
Thomas Fleming. A Disease in the Public Mind: A New Understanding of Why We Fought the Civil War. New York: Da Capo Press, 2013. xiv + 354 pp. Black and white plates, notes and index. $26.99
Thomas Fleming opens his book by noting that the Civil War was both a great triumph and a great tragedy; the former because of the abolition of slavery, the latter because of the enormous suffering and loss of life. This assertion is both clear and unobjectionable. Unfortunately, much of what follows is neither.
The phrase "a disease of the public mind" is attributed to James Buchanan, referring to John Brown and the raid on Harper's Ferry. While Fleming isn't quite so bold as to attempt a restoration of Buchanan's thoroughly-pummeled reputation, by subsequently arguing that 'diseases of the public mind' have been a real, and influential, factor throughout American history, he is at the very least giving him credit for identifying a real phenomenon. Fleming lists several other such 'diseases', making it clear that this is no metaphor--he is arguing that the Civil War was caused by a collective psychological imbalance. Namely, the contending extremism of emancipation in the North and fear of race war in the South. And while he contends that both of these 'diseases' were at fault for the Civil War, the weight of his argument certainly leans towards blaming abolitionism and abolitionists for a war he clearly regards as having been avoidable and unnecessary.
Fleming seems to believe that this is a new argument, but it really isn't. He also argues that his argument is based on the latest historical research, but he leaves out much more recent scholarship than he includes, and he is tellingly vague on what this new scholarship actually is. The idea that the North fought for the Union not for abolitionism isn't particularly new; nor is the idea that fought to defend their homeland rather than the institution of slavery. There is quite a bit of recent scholarship that argues quite the opposite--that slavery was at the center of the war, and participants on both sides knew it. Fleming doesn't rebut these argument--he ignores their existence.
That would be disservice enough to the reader, but an arguably graver sin is his reliance on secondary sources to support claims completely at odds with the source he is quoting. A historian is under no obligation to agree with the fellow scholars he quotes, but Fleming's contemptuous portrait of John Brown relies quite heavily on David Reynolds' largely sympathetic "John Brown: Abolitionist", and his equally disapproving portrayal of William Lloyd Garrison refers frequently to Henry Mayer's "All On Fire", a frankly admiring biography. Fleming is free to disagree with those authors, but he owes them and his own readers to acknowledge his disagreement with the very sources he is relying on. Let alone the obligation to explain the basis for his contrary interpretations.
Other examples of his use of information are less deceiving but more disturbing. Early in the book, he presents the bald statistic that only 6 percent of the white population in the South owned slaves, and roughly half of those slaves were owned by a small minority of planters; i.e., men who owned 50 or more slaves. Later in the book, he makes the argument that abolitionist claims about the sexual exploitation of slaves by their masters were grossly overblown; his evidence to support this claim is that only around 10 percent of slave women were mulatto. The reader might question whether or not 'only' one out of ten black children under slavery having been notably mixed-race refutes charges of the sexual exploitation of slaves by masters; when the reader recalls that fewer than 1 percent of Southern whites owned around half of all the slaves in the South, that 10 percent figure actually looks damning. And this is not, sadly, the only instance in which Fleming argues rather too strenuously that slavery was not as thoroughly degrading and loathsome as abolitionist rhetoric would have it; particularly given that he is far more sympathetic to Southern fears of a race war than he ever is to abolitionist "hatred" for southern whites.
Given that Fleming offers several counter-histories throughout this book--he regards Robert E. Lee's decision to serve for the CSA rather than the Union to be a great "what-if" in American History (he blames this decision, in part, on Nat Turner and John Brown)--it is fair to note one counter-history he does not really offer. Namely--how was slavery to be eliminated? He brings up the southern ideal of "diffusion" several times without making his own feelings on that dubious theory clear; he also hints at compensated emancipation. And at the same time, he dismisses abolitionist fears about Texas given that it "only" had a few thousand slaves (but would still have two pro-slavery Senators; a fact he ignores), one of numerous examples where he dismisses and even outright mocks the very idea of a "Slave Power." Yet none of those mid-nineteenth century developments led to any demise in slavery as an institution. Fleming regards the Civil War as a giant waste of life which was not really fought over slavery anyway, yet cannot offer an alternate scenario which is even faintly possible.
This is less a history student than an admittedly well-crafted assemblage of anecdotes.Fleming is also a novelist, and in this book he seems to have borrowed far too many techniques from fiction. The main lesson here is that American history is rich in sources, and if one wants to argue that abolitionists were hateful maniacs who ignored Southern white fears of race war and plunged the country into armed conflict, one can easily find sources to buttress that ready-made conclusion. That is what Fleming has done here; something that looks like objective history at first but quickly unravels.
Thomas Fleming opens his book by noting that the Civil War was both a great triumph and a great tragedy; the former because of the abolition of slavery, the latter because of the enormous suffering and loss of life. This assertion is both clear and unobjectionable. Unfortunately, much of what follows is neither.
The phrase "a disease of the public mind" is attributed to James Buchanan, referring to John Brown and the raid on Harper's Ferry. While Fleming isn't quite so bold as to attempt a restoration of Buchanan's thoroughly-pummeled reputation, by subsequently arguing that 'diseases of the public mind' have been a real, and influential, factor throughout American history, he is at the very least giving him credit for identifying a real phenomenon. Fleming lists several other such 'diseases', making it clear that this is no metaphor--he is arguing that the Civil War was caused by a collective psychological imbalance. Namely, the contending extremism of emancipation in the North and fear of race war in the South. And while he contends that both of these 'diseases' were at fault for the Civil War, the weight of his argument certainly leans towards blaming abolitionism and abolitionists for a war he clearly regards as having been avoidable and unnecessary.
Fleming seems to believe that this is a new argument, but it really isn't. He also argues that his argument is based on the latest historical research, but he leaves out much more recent scholarship than he includes, and he is tellingly vague on what this new scholarship actually is. The idea that the North fought for the Union not for abolitionism isn't particularly new; nor is the idea that fought to defend their homeland rather than the institution of slavery. There is quite a bit of recent scholarship that argues quite the opposite--that slavery was at the center of the war, and participants on both sides knew it. Fleming doesn't rebut these argument--he ignores their existence.
That would be disservice enough to the reader, but an arguably graver sin is his reliance on secondary sources to support claims completely at odds with the source he is quoting. A historian is under no obligation to agree with the fellow scholars he quotes, but Fleming's contemptuous portrait of John Brown relies quite heavily on David Reynolds' largely sympathetic "John Brown: Abolitionist", and his equally disapproving portrayal of William Lloyd Garrison refers frequently to Henry Mayer's "All On Fire", a frankly admiring biography. Fleming is free to disagree with those authors, but he owes them and his own readers to acknowledge his disagreement with the very sources he is relying on. Let alone the obligation to explain the basis for his contrary interpretations.
Other examples of his use of information are less deceiving but more disturbing. Early in the book, he presents the bald statistic that only 6 percent of the white population in the South owned slaves, and roughly half of those slaves were owned by a small minority of planters; i.e., men who owned 50 or more slaves. Later in the book, he makes the argument that abolitionist claims about the sexual exploitation of slaves by their masters were grossly overblown; his evidence to support this claim is that only around 10 percent of slave women were mulatto. The reader might question whether or not 'only' one out of ten black children under slavery having been notably mixed-race refutes charges of the sexual exploitation of slaves by masters; when the reader recalls that fewer than 1 percent of Southern whites owned around half of all the slaves in the South, that 10 percent figure actually looks damning. And this is not, sadly, the only instance in which Fleming argues rather too strenuously that slavery was not as thoroughly degrading and loathsome as abolitionist rhetoric would have it; particularly given that he is far more sympathetic to Southern fears of a race war than he ever is to abolitionist "hatred" for southern whites.
Given that Fleming offers several counter-histories throughout this book--he regards Robert E. Lee's decision to serve for the CSA rather than the Union to be a great "what-if" in American History (he blames this decision, in part, on Nat Turner and John Brown)--it is fair to note one counter-history he does not really offer. Namely--how was slavery to be eliminated? He brings up the southern ideal of "diffusion" several times without making his own feelings on that dubious theory clear; he also hints at compensated emancipation. And at the same time, he dismisses abolitionist fears about Texas given that it "only" had a few thousand slaves (but would still have two pro-slavery Senators; a fact he ignores), one of numerous examples where he dismisses and even outright mocks the very idea of a "Slave Power." Yet none of those mid-nineteenth century developments led to any demise in slavery as an institution. Fleming regards the Civil War as a giant waste of life which was not really fought over slavery anyway, yet cannot offer an alternate scenario which is even faintly possible.
This is less a history student than an admittedly well-crafted assemblage of anecdotes.Fleming is also a novelist, and in this book he seems to have borrowed far too many techniques from fiction. The main lesson here is that American history is rich in sources, and if one wants to argue that abolitionists were hateful maniacs who ignored Southern white fears of race war and plunged the country into armed conflict, one can easily find sources to buttress that ready-made conclusion. That is what Fleming has done here; something that looks like objective history at first but quickly unravels.
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
Freedom National
James Oakes. Freedom National: The Destruction of Slavery in the United States, 1861-1865. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2013. xxviii + 596 pp. Illustrations, maps, notes, and index. $29.95.
In writing a history of Republican antislavery policies over the course of the Civil War, James Oakes has in some limited sense brought our understanding of the destruction of the instituation of slavery full circle. Early histories of the end of slavery lauded Lincoln as "the Great Emancipator" and focused on the Emancipation Proclamation coming as a providential stroke of liberation. And for many decades after, it was widely accepted that the Republican Party in general sought the end of slavery. But two very different counter-narratives undermined that former consensus. The "Lost Cause" mythology wanted to deny that the war was about slavery at all; and beginning a few decades ago, many historians came to question the sincerity of Republican anti-slavery. Republican efforts to destroy slavery were presumed to be convenient ideological excuses to justify economic imperialism over the agrarian South by the increasingly industrial North, or a belated--and thoroughly cynical--tactical move to ensure military victory.
This has all led to the wide dissemination of a seemingly 'balanced' conventional wisdom regarding the subject: Lincoln and the Republicans were forced into supporting emancipation almost against their will by circumstance; they wanted to fight a war purely to preserve national unity and only reluctantly shifted to a war to destroy slavery as military necessity dictated. And the Emancipation Proclamation was, depending on who you ask, either a radical break with previous policy which changed everything, or a transparently opportunistic propaganda ploy which changed nothing--i.e., 'it didn't free a single slave.'
Oakes deftly restores Lincoln and the Republicans to a central role in this saga, arguing that the supposed conflict between a war for Union versus one to end slavery simply didn't exist. The war was always fought to restore national unity, and slavery was always regarded as the cause of the rebellion. Republicans were united on those two key principles from the start.
Why, then, didn't Lincoln seek to destroy slavery immediately? There were several reasons. For one thing, his Constitutional scruples--shared by most Republicans--were genuine. But while subsequent generations have taken abolitionist rhetoric about the national government not interfering with slavery in states where it existed as evidence for satisfaction with the status quo, Oakes reconnects wartime arguments over wartime emancipation, state emancipation, and other partial measures within the context of what was by 1860 a well-developed abolitionist doctrine that by containing slavery inside a "cordon of freedom" it would eventually die. The point is repeatedly made that an admission that the Federal government could not overtly end slavery in a state was not incompatible with a belief that the government could and should do all it could to undermine the continued viability of slavery in the States which held on to it.
One of the recurring themes of the book is that the history of emancipation during the Civil War--of the long, bitter struggle to destroy slavery completely (a struggled which outlasted the war itself and Lincoln himself)--has been lost partly because we no longer acknowledge the context in which the Emancipation Proclamation, for example, was written in. Statements by Lincoln, such as the famous line in which he 'admits' that he would have, among other options, kept all slaves in bondage if it would have saved the Union, have been ripped from the specific political contexts in which he said them. Policy decisions and legislation which seem inconsistent and even hypocritical when viewed in isolation appear much different when restored to their place in the larger, coherent narrative that Oakes has crafted.
This is an important book, and a compelling one. Because he is explicitly countering a great weight of conventional wisdom and historical literature, Oakes builds his case slowly, which sometimes leads to repetition of incidents and examples which are sometimes repeated without acknowledgement that he is doing so--possibly a minor failure in editing or simply a rhetorical device that produces a couple of awkward 'double takes' on the reader's part. But that is a very minor complaint with an otherwise first-rate reclamation of a "lost history" of one of the most important developments in American history.
This has all led to the wide dissemination of a seemingly 'balanced' conventional wisdom regarding the subject: Lincoln and the Republicans were forced into supporting emancipation almost against their will by circumstance; they wanted to fight a war purely to preserve national unity and only reluctantly shifted to a war to destroy slavery as military necessity dictated. And the Emancipation Proclamation was, depending on who you ask, either a radical break with previous policy which changed everything, or a transparently opportunistic propaganda ploy which changed nothing--i.e., 'it didn't free a single slave.'
Oakes deftly restores Lincoln and the Republicans to a central role in this saga, arguing that the supposed conflict between a war for Union versus one to end slavery simply didn't exist. The war was always fought to restore national unity, and slavery was always regarded as the cause of the rebellion. Republicans were united on those two key principles from the start.
Why, then, didn't Lincoln seek to destroy slavery immediately? There were several reasons. For one thing, his Constitutional scruples--shared by most Republicans--were genuine. But while subsequent generations have taken abolitionist rhetoric about the national government not interfering with slavery in states where it existed as evidence for satisfaction with the status quo, Oakes reconnects wartime arguments over wartime emancipation, state emancipation, and other partial measures within the context of what was by 1860 a well-developed abolitionist doctrine that by containing slavery inside a "cordon of freedom" it would eventually die. The point is repeatedly made that an admission that the Federal government could not overtly end slavery in a state was not incompatible with a belief that the government could and should do all it could to undermine the continued viability of slavery in the States which held on to it.
One of the recurring themes of the book is that the history of emancipation during the Civil War--of the long, bitter struggle to destroy slavery completely (a struggled which outlasted the war itself and Lincoln himself)--has been lost partly because we no longer acknowledge the context in which the Emancipation Proclamation, for example, was written in. Statements by Lincoln, such as the famous line in which he 'admits' that he would have, among other options, kept all slaves in bondage if it would have saved the Union, have been ripped from the specific political contexts in which he said them. Policy decisions and legislation which seem inconsistent and even hypocritical when viewed in isolation appear much different when restored to their place in the larger, coherent narrative that Oakes has crafted.
This is an important book, and a compelling one. Because he is explicitly countering a great weight of conventional wisdom and historical literature, Oakes builds his case slowly, which sometimes leads to repetition of incidents and examples which are sometimes repeated without acknowledgement that he is doing so--possibly a minor failure in editing or simply a rhetorical device that produces a couple of awkward 'double takes' on the reader's part. But that is a very minor complaint with an otherwise first-rate reclamation of a "lost history" of one of the most important developments in American history.
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