All sorts of people want to write history in a manner in which such is distorted in a way, that it can become for these people, a call to a specific “lost cause” – though, in truth, such never really existed at that time and age. For instance, some people in the South, even of today, want to desperately believe that the Southern rebellion against their National Government was honorable, justified, a principle of States’ rights, and therefore the right thing to do; though, truth be told, this is a lie, that deserves no quarter, whatsoever. For instance, though Lincoln did not win a single Southern State, he won enough States that the election of 1860 was fairly won by Lincoln, and thereupon Lincoln became the 16th President of these United States. Those of the South, would not countenance such an election result, though, and thereby decided to secede from that Union of States. The thing is, that such discussion of secession, had been dealt with previously by President Andrew Jackson, who made it abundantly clear that secession was misguided, unconstitutional, and “…disunion, by armed force, is TREASON.” Further to the point, Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address stated that “In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The Government will not assail you. You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors.” The very reason why Lincoln stated what he stated, was his absolute belief that the highest law of the land was our Constitution, and of which, that Constitution, did not forbid slavery, nor did it permit the abolition of slavery, and therefore, despite Lincoln’s personal animus towards slavery, Lincoln would not interfere, without rebellious circumstances, with that peculiar institution.
One would think, that if there were any sensible people of importance in the South, that Lincoln’s Inaugural Address would have been music to their ears; for if the most important institution in the South, was that peculiar institution of slavery, then Lincoln, so made it clear, that he as the Executive of that nation, would not interfere in such. Instead, the South, deliberately chose to secede, and further to the point, took up arms against the United States of America. It was these combined treasonous acts, which thereupon led to the Emancipation Proclamation of January 1, 1863, and subsequently the ratification of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which together, meant the death kneel of slavery as an institution in the United States of America.
In other words, the South never had a “lost cause,” but rather took the law into its own hands while also negating the National ballot box, to do what they thought they had a right to do, thereby instituting that great civil war, which saw the lives of hundreds of thousands of citizens so perish or to become injured in such; along with the massive amount of property so destroyed and damaged. The fact that those that were defeated, felt a need to attempt to rewrite history in a manner in which there was some sort of justification for their actions, is a disgrace to these United States, and a smear upon all those that gave their last dying breath to this nation, founded upon freedom, opportunity, justice, and equality. All those that brought trouble, where trouble need not have been brought, should be remembered for who they really were – unpatriotic, uncivil, traitorous, and the damned.