Southern Home Front

This week's readings captured the complexity of life on the southern home front during the Civil War and its impact on the outcome of the war.  It raised the often overlooked implications of war being fought on home soil such as outside occupation, mistreatment of civilians by enemy troops, and decreased morale of the soldiers due to worries of family mistreatment by the enemy.  It also offered a look at the fact that the Confederate politicians were not in lock step with one another, and because one of the causes of the rebellion was "states' rights," the individual states naturally clung to their right to have independent voice.

Week 7 Posts

In President Lincoln's first Inaugural Address, he waxes lawyerly as he makes his case for why the Union can not be broken.  He suggested that both universal law and the Constitution disallow the dissolution of the Union and furthermore that the Union even predates the Constitution itself.  Though Lincoln is adamant on his stance of Union perpetuity, he concedes much when he speaks of federal enforcement of this ideal.  He states that he will not use force to enforce unless absolutely necessary and  gives the greatest concession when he states that he would not force the acceptance of federal officers if the south found it to be undesirable to submit to their authority.

Lincoln wastes no time getting straight to the topic of secession in his address, which expresses the significant importance which he felt this issue would have upon his presidency.