Illustration, College of Charleston, by Britt Spencer

The Civil War once again commanded headlines around the world as we marked its 150th anniversary, especially here in Charleston. In order to better understand “the Recent Unpleasantness,” we asked one of our resident Civil War experts to share his thoughts on the importance of knowing the origins of the conflict and its impact today.

by Bernie Powers

For a variety of reasons, our small state has grown used to national attention. Famously or infamously, depending on your perspective, South Carolina’s most well-known claim to fame remains the dramatic events that occurred 150 years ago, when its political leaders orchestrated the state’s secession from the Union. The eventual results were the formation of the Confederate States of America, four years of civil war and a level of human carnage unmatched by all the other wars fought in American history.

Beginning in the fall last year and building to a crescendo in April, South Carolina was again in the national spotlight. This time it was due to the myriad efforts, principally focused on Charleston and the Lowcountry, commemorating or celebrating the sesquicentennial of the Civil War. Charleston’s abundant Civil War historic sites were awash with men dressed in blue and gray (mainly gray) uniforms and women, sometimes gaily dressed, but more often with dour looks and wrapped in mourning attire. Between April 12 and 14, at various times, cannons roared and belched smoke, muzzles flashed and the atmosphere was punctuated with a mixture of blood-curdling rebel yells and “John Brown’s Song.” But the salvos fired at Fort Sumter and during various reenactments were, of course, symbolic, completely lacking the lethal force of their historic counterparts.

Illustration, College of Charleston, by Britt Spencer

Illustration by Britt Spencer

Even today, however, the Civil War is capable of generating deep emotional and even embittered debate among those who dare discuss its more controversial aspects. As a professor of history and as a member of the Fort Sumter–Fort Moultrie Trust, which helped to sponsor, coordinate and publicize various events, I had the opportunity to observe and participate in several Civil War–related activities. These were just the beginning of a series of activities that will continue for the next four years highlighting important Civil War episodes.

Charleston is the perfect venue for this because it’s a place of deep memory. More than most others, this city illustrates William Faulkner’s insight about the nature of history when he observed in Requiem for a Nun, “The past is not dead, it’s not even past.” How absolutely true this is, particularly in the South. Just remember, despite the fact the country is now engaged in multiple military conflicts, in Charleston the phrase “The War” is usually reserved for the Civil War.

The power of memory can be the source of controversy, though, because memory is often selective and sometimes purposely so. On Dec. 20, 2010, the Sons of Confederate Veterans organized the “Secession Ball” to celebrate and honor those responsible for South Carolina’s break from the Union. This drew an immediate rebuke and demonstration by the Charleston NAACP, which argued, among other things, that the war and secession were not events to be “celebrated.” Lively email exchanges and face-to-face discussions ensued over how the sesquicentennial ought to be recognized. Should it be “celebrated” or “commemorated” – or simply “observed”? Of course, individuals and organizations reached different conclusions. This important debate showed how problematic and emotionally fraught the language of the sesquicentennial could be, even before fundamental issues were raised.

Generations of historians have debated the causes of the Civil War, but after many years, the broad agreement today has been reached among professionals in the field on the important role slavery played as a source of the conflict. However, many in the general public fail to understand this point and even reject it. In a recent Pew Foundation survey, 48 percent of Americans believed the Civil War was a conflict over states’ rights, and – among younger Americans (those under 30) – 60 percent agreed with this. Such a disparity says much about us as contemporary Americans and the way we understand the most tragic and defining episode in our history and its implications for the present. It also makes a powerful case for redoubling our efforts to promote an accurate understanding of the past.

The documentary record is replete with evidence of slavery’s centrality as a major cause of the Civil War. Its architects, such as John C. Calhoun (considered the intellectual father of both the proslavery and states’ rights arguments) and Alexander Stephens, the Confederate vice president, say so unabashedly in their writings. Furthermore, even the most cursory reading of South Carolina’s 1860 Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union, a document similar to the Declaration of Independence, makes it abundantly clear. President Lincoln, who certainly knew the nature of his foe, also identifies slavery as a powerful catalyst of war in his second inaugural address.

Yet the vacuous argument for states’ rights separate and apart from the right to hold slaves continues to seduce the public, and this requires explanation. First, there are many Americans, especially in the South, who have never been properly educated on the role of slavery in the shaping of their society and America at large. Many Southern teachers have been woefully unprepared or unwilling to engage such issues. Northerners cannot be let off the hook either, because many have not cared much about this “Southern” issue. Not surprisingly, the sesquicentennial has attracted comparatively little attention in the North today. This is also why, a few years ago, when an exhibit opened in New York City devoted to slavery in that colonial city, many there were shocked to know that at one point their hometown contained more slaves than Charleston.

Second, after the Confederacy’s defeat, Southern leaders’ selective memory altered the original rationale for the war. It had become awkward and embarrassing, even painful, to embrace the former rationale after an ignominious military defeat and emancipation. Thus, the new Lost Cause tradition began emphasizing Southern honor, conflicting regional civilizations and states’ rights – all to the complete exclusion of slavery. Decoupling race and slavery from the Civil War allows many today to romanticize the war and to pay homage to Southern military heroes. Just last year, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell reinstituted Confederate Memorial Day in a proclamation that never even mentioned slavery. The ensuing controversy led him to reissue the proclamation acknowledging slavery as a catalyst for the war. This is only one example of how the historical record gets continually distorted.

Third, many people simply refuse to acknowledge the potency of race in American history. Of course, giving slavery its due exposes what has been the Achilles’ heel of race in American history from the very beginning – and even down to the present. Ultimately, it was America’s inability to reconcile democracy and individual rights with slavery that erupted into civil war. Although emancipation was one of the war’s greatest outcomes, the freedmen’s rights were soon eroded by disfranchisement, segregation and racially inspired violence.

That the Civil War ushered in an incomplete revolution was readily seen in the circumstances of the centennial of the Civil War. Fifty years ago, racial segregation was still widespread, the bloody Freedom Rides were occurring and major civil rights laws were not yet achieved. The social context of the sesquicentennial is far different – and thankfully so. The Civil War preserved this republic and through emancipation made it “more perfect.” It nevertheless took the Civil Rights movement to more fully implement and define our ideals of freedom.

But this was, in the broadest sense, fulfillment of the Founding Fathers’ unique conception of America as a country perpetually in the process of inventing, reinventing and perfecting itself. The great tragedy is that it took a bloody conflict to further the process in the mid-19th century. Americans must always be mindful of this as we chart the nation’s future in light of its past, however painful that past might be.

– Bernie Powers is a professor of history.