Monday, October 14, 2013
Where did the name "Civil War" come from?
As we dive deep inside the causes and repercussion of all out warfare against our fellow country men I feel it is important to understand a crucial point that many disregard or decide not to discuss. This is the naming of the War and how the name civil came about. The first thing to look at is what Civil actually means. Though it can be interpret as nice and polite the term came from the idea of state. Being nice and polite are ways that you should act in a state and hence why we use that term. This originated back in Ancient Rome where battles between different governmental factions were known as civil wars. Basically a civil war is a battle within a nation state. This is why this name is fitting for the purpose of the successful Unioners because to them it was a worth within there nation like a rebellion that they successfully crushed. Now looking at this there are other names that can be attributed to be valuable depending on what side you look at things. For example, during the time period the Confederates believed this war was a showcase of them fighting for freedom and called it the War of Southern Independence. The north knew it as the War of the Rebellion because to them this whole conflict was just one large rebellion. These are the general view points that existed during the time period. As you search deeper into history you can see partisan view points that clearly communicate the ideas of the time period. For example, some confederates believed that the name should be War of Northern Aggression because what it did was showed how forceful the north was being. Finally, a perspective that people don't usually consider when looking at this war was the point of view of the slaves. They believed that this war was all being fought for their freedom and fittingly called it the Freedom Wars. All in all the idea that even the name of the war being a subject of debate and change between different groups of people shows how different this war is and how much of it can change just by differing view points. This is not specifically important but I feel it is an important thing to understand. With history comes controversy.
This is a fascinating post, Ryan! I found the point you brought up about the slaves believing the war was fought for their freedom really interesting. When reading The Civil War the other night, the fact that most northerners didn't really have a strong desire to free the slaves was brought up. Most northerners were fighting the war solely with the intention of preserving the Union, as preached by Lincoln. Yet in order to force the Confederacy into submission, the North needed to destroy the South's backbone: slavery. Hence, although the North may have not personally cared about the individual slaves, the freeing of the slaves was in some sense a political tactic to win the war. It's almost ironic how the slaves called the war the Freedom War, when it can be argued that they were simply being used as pieces in the Unionists plan to force the Confederacy into submission to preserve the Union.
ReplyDeleteThat is absolutely true, that is to say that there were some unionist who were truly against slavery and believed in abolishment however, many did not. This shows how slavery was a catalyst to win the war.
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