Robert E. Lee as Military Commander

Great Debates
61

At the beginning of Ken Burns’ CIVIL WAR documentary-miniseries, Memphis based historian Shelby Foote comments that before the Civil War government documents usually referred to the USA as a plural. “The United States of America are resolved that…”. After the Civil War it became singular: “The United States of America is resolved that…”. Essentially (this is oversimplification) the early USA was a collection of 13 semi-autonomous small countries (which is certainly how Britain dealt with them politically- they were seen as different colonies that happened to be on the same continent). It was hardly a unanimous decision that they remain this way- some wanted an extremely powerful central government, others saw little use in a central government at all, but ultimately after screaming and drama and political intrique and death threats and walkouts there was compromise and the Constitution’s drafters did their best to create a strong central government that allowed states to still have strong independent governments. However, 70 years later the states really did not see themselves as a united country.

In the late 1850s states still issued their own currency (Federal standardized currency was also around but it was pretty much a bust) and the battle about who should win in Federal v. State arguments was still hotly debated. There had been numerous moves to dissolve or for one state or another to secede from the union of states and it didn’t always come from South Carolina (though they pretty much wanted to secede if they felt Bostonians were breathing in too much and using up too much air) or from the south- Vermont, New Jersey, and New Hampshire all talked about secession at one point or another, probably others, but it never went past talk. It was not until the very real economic threats of the 1850s that the southern states wanted to not only pull out but form their own separate nation.

The north was [mostly] industrial and small farms while the south was, of course, agricultural with plantations or “super farms” and only limited industry, though both north and south had excellent ports and shipping infrastructure. The economies were so diverse that it was impossible to make trade treaties with other nations that benefitted the south without harming the north and vice versa. Then there was the slavery issue which is too huge to go into.

When they seceded from the union the southern states didn’t see themselves going against the whole point of the American Revolution but in replicating it. “Our great-grandfathers reached a point where they could not keep their way of life and reach their greatest prosperity and happiness as part of the British Empire, so they seceded and formed a country where they could go their own way; we’ve reached the same stage with the United States, so we’re pulling out and forming a country so we can go our own way.” And it’s not completely illogical, plus many of these people would have grown up on the stories and lionization of the revolutionaries (and as a reminder of how close in time it was, Robert E. Lee’s wife was the adopted granddaughter of George Washington [her father was Martha Washington’s grandson and George adopted him when he was orphaned]).

62

The northern states produced food and finished goods and consumed raw materials. The southern states produced raw materials and consumed food and finished goods. And you feel there were insurmountable economic problems? The two halves of the country were perfectly matched to create a functional economy. The civil war disrupted the economies of both sides precisely because both sides lost their natural trade partner.

63

Yeah, but if one side makes the raw materials and the other consumes them, which partner is going to profit more?

I seriously doubt that an independent CSA would ever have been willing to become a part of the Union again, especially only 40ish years after a very bloody four-year war.

64

By 1862 or so – fairly early in the war – Washington DC was the most heavily fortified place on earth. Something like 80 star forts surrounded the capital, and trenches ran between them. At some low points there might have been as few as 75,000 troops manning these fortifications, but usually 100,000 or more – as the figures fluctuated, often the garrison was larger than Lee’s whole army. These troops had more and heavier cannons than Lee, and Northern artillerists were generally better.

Not to mention the mobile elements of the Union armies would have rushed to Washington’s relief in any major attack.

Small bands of raiding cavalry could have attacked Washignton like an armadillo could have attacked a semi-trailer truck.

Sailboat

65

The cotton (and tobacco and indigo and rice) weren’t being stolen away. They were being bought and paid for.

The South likes to portray itself as a bunch of simple but honest farm folk who were bambazooled by the Northern industrial proletariot. But in 1860, there wasn’t really a lot of industry in any part of the country. The main business in both the north and the south was agriculture. The chief difference was that northern farms grew corn and wheat rather than cotton. The big advantage the north had was that when it came down to fighting, they had farm workers they could give guns to.

66

You’re ignoring the effect of tariffs.

Look, there’s no question that slavery was the main reason for the split, but it is wrong to dismiss tariffs as a non-issue. Tariffs had the effect of forcing the South to pay higher prices for finished goods (without the tariff, they could have bought finished goods more cheaply from England) – meaning that the South was effectively being required to subsidize the Northern economy.

67

Well, being required to subsidize the US industrial economy (and tariffs affected consumers in the North, as well. The British companies flooding the market with cheap goods didn’t care who bought them.) But there was nothing stopping southern investors from developing southern industry, other than structural ones that the south brought on itself from the structure of its economy.

68

Yeah, that’s a long-term solution. (Takes a while to develop an industrial base, you know.) In the short term, given where their economies were at the time, the South was effectively subsidizing the North.

69

Nitpick: Davis was never in S.C. while fleeing Richmond, IIRC. He was captured near Irwinville, Ga.

I believe that Lee was a military genius. No one else did more with less, and for a longer time, in U.S. military history other than George Washington during the Revolution. Lee’s victories at Chancellorsville and Fredericksburg were remarkable. He was tremendously inspirational to his army. He was also very fortunate in the generals who took the field against him - until Meade, they were all bunglers, to one degree or another. Luck counts for a lot in a general.

At Gettysburg, though, Lee was not at the top of his game. He was overconfident and also somewhat in the dark because of J.E.B. Stuart’s cavalry jaunt. He also, as Sampiro noted, was having heart problems and was not in the best of health. (I disagree as to Sampiro’s suggestion that Longstreet hated Lee, however. Longstreet admired and enormously respected Lee, from all I’ve read - but he recognized when Lee was making bad decisions, and had the gumption to criticize Lee in his memoirs, published after Lee’s death. By then, the Cult of Lee was well-established, and Longstreet was shunned in the South - becoming a Republican and accepting a Federal post from the hand of President U.S. Grant didn’t help, either).

Lee was not perfect. Smithsonian magazine did an analysis of the top Confederate generals’ own forces’ casualty rates a few years ago. Lee was at the top, followed closely by Jackson. They were waging aggressive war, which is what their CINC Jefferson Davis wanted, but it was ultimately a foolhardy strategy. The North could far better afford that kind of war than could the South.

May I say, Lee’s very first and biggest mistake, IMHO, was in not accepting command of Union forces when it was offered to him at Blair House in 1861, at Lincoln’s behest. All of Lee’s professional advancement up to then had been in the U.S. Army, not the Virginia militia. His oath as a military officer had been to the United States, not to Virginia.

And a sidenote: I wholeheartedly agree with David Simmons’s praise of Gen. George H. Thomas, “the Rock of Chickamauga.” A stalwart, skillful and still largely unappreciated general… and a Virginian who, unlike Lee, saw where his loyalty really lay.

70

Yeah, but the reason the tariffs disproportionally affected the south was itself a result of slavery, so really, the tariffs issue is tied up with the slavery issue.

Ultimately, the South seceded because it was trying to artificially preserve an inefficient, cruel, and destructive economy and society.

71

No, it was a result of the South’s agrarian economy. I think the South’s economy would have been agrarian at that point with or without slavery. Certainly it continued to be primarily agrarian long after the Civil War.

So I don’t think the tariff issue is inextricably intertwined with the slavery issue.

72

The tariff wasn’t as regional an issue as all that. As I wrote above, the northern states, like the southern states, were predominantly agricultural. It wasn’t case of the South subsidizing the North - it was Northern and Southern farmers subsidizing industry.

But realistically, what choice did the federal government have? There was no income tax back then. A tariff on imports was virtually the only source of income the United States had. And finished goods were the main import back then. A tariff on cotton and wheat might have theoretically benefitted American farmers, but in actuality nobody was importing agricultural products to the United States.

You can be sure that if the Union blockade hadn’t made the point moot, the first thing the Confederate government would have done was enact its own tariff on imported industrial products. Richmond needed a source of income just like Washington did and the CSA would have sought to protect and develop its own industries just like the USA did. The cotton growers would have complained but the politicians would have had no choice.

73

It was one of a constellation of regional issues, slavery of course being the primary issue and the proximate cause of the split.

No doubt, agrarian Midwestern states were as aggrieved by the tariffs as the South. All agrarian states were effectively subsidizing the Northeast. But of course, the tariff was not a grievous enough problem by itself to suggest secession as a solution. If it were (as some Confederate revisionists insist) the Midwestern states would have seceded right along with the South.

74

Right, but the slave economy of the South had some effects that discouraged industrialization. For instance, because most of the southern rich were slaveholders, most of the wealth in the south was illiquid. Plantations might have had impressive balance sheets, but they were cash poor, which limited the amount of money that could be invested in industry.

75

That’s just another way of saying that Southern planters were mortgaged to the hilt (which is true). They were, in effect, vassals to Northeastern bankers. That is likely an unspoken reason many of them greeted the idea of secession so warmly - as a way to escape their debt. (That was, by the way, one of the motivations of Revolution-era Southern planters for seeking independence from Britain-- to escape British creditors.)

But I don’t think you can blame illiquidity on slavery. Illiquidity is a feature of an agrarian economy, whether or not slavery enters the picture. Illiquidity is a common situation for farmers right down to the present day. Farmers in my state often call themselves “land poor,” meaning they own real estate which may be worth a small fortune, but they don’t have any cash.

76

Best line to come out of the Civil War.

77

We had the Whiskey Rebellion and Shay’s Rebellion less than 10 years after gaining independence. While those weren’t full blown wars they were serious enough to require military intervention.

Marc