I. Big questions to consider
- What effect did an ideology of states’ rights have on policy making?
- How did the centralization of power in the Confederacy breed dissent?
- How did it lead to conflicts within the Confederate leadership?
- What does the level of dissent on the home front say about the strength of Confederate nationalism?
- Was the Civil War really lost on the battlefields?
II. Centralization in the Confederacy
- Like Lincoln, Pres. Davis dealt with dissent:
- suspending habeas corpus; limiting freedom of speech and the press; declaring martial law in some places
- But Davis had to go farther
- Regulated railroads and other key industries
- Nationalizing industries
- Iron industry
- Impressing slaves
- Paradox: To fight for states’ right, they had to have a strong and meddlesome federal government
III. Conscription
- Conscription first instituted in 1862 (Conscription Act)
- Covered all abled-boded men between 18-35
- Conscripted them for 3 years
- Including those who had volunteered and already served nearly a year
- Deeply angered early volunteers
- Including those who had volunteered and already served nearly a year
- Exemptions
- Government officials and clergymen were exempt
- Policy of substitution—could hire someone to go in your place
- Oct. 1861: Slave-owning households: one white man exempt for every 20 slaves
- Idea was to protect white women; ensure production
- But it stirred great resentment; seen as favoring the elite
- Government ultimately had to amend the law and exemptions only for household owned by women and minors
- Thus, mainly wealthy widows benefited; other plantations mistresses embittered
- Upshot: when push came to shove, it was more important for the Confederacy to mitigate class conflict among male voters than to address concerns about protecting white womanhood
IV. Subsequent conscription laws
- Grew more draconian
- Age range expanded: 17-50
- Service now for the duration of the war (no time limit)
- Cases of officers refusing to release minors
- Taking men regardless of physical conditions
- 1864: even deaf-mutes
- Growing resentment of those elites (around 50,000) who bought substitutes
- Critics argued that conscription was government despotism—exactly what the CSU was supposed to be fighting against
V. Taxes
- Historically, people in the South were not used to paying high taxes
- 1861: Confederate govt enacted a “war tax”
- But it proved difficult to collect, and people paid it in rapidly deflating currency
- So, the govt imposed a “tax in kind,” taking 10% of what everyone produced
- Ultimately accounted for about 50% of the state’s revenue
- But it infuriated people
- Yeoman farmers asked: why aren’t slave owners being taxed on their slaves?
- Yeoman farmers asked: why aren’t slave owners being taxed on their slaves?
VI. Impressments of goods
- Confederate officers routinely seized food and livestock from civilians
- Would pay farmers whatever they chose, in promissory notes that rapidly declined in value
- Seemed unfair, arbitrary, capricious
- Here again, ordinary southerners increasingly began to view their government as an imposing onerous duties and obligations—a force of oppression
VII. Jefferson Davis as a leader
- How much is he to blame?
- Micromanager; did not trust cabinet members to manage their departments
- Seen as cold and humorless by many
- But he faced an all but impossible task
- Had to unite two factions
- Those who believed the most crucial thing was to gain independence, even if it meant trampling on states’ rights
- Those who believed the whole point of the CSA was to protect states’ rights and slavery
- This faction Included his Vice President, Alexander Stephens
- This faction Included his Vice President, Alexander Stephens
- Had to unite two factions
VIII. Significance of the fact that the CSA was a single-party state
- Confederate leaders were against political parties or “factionalism;” believed they were going back to the nation’s founding ideals by jettisoning parties
- But what this meant was that there were no established channels for managing dissent
- As a result, disputes tended to devolve into personal attacks: pro-Davis and anti-Davis factions
IX. Davis’ leading critics
- Robert Toombs, Georgia
- Had been a longtime senator in US Congress
- Appointed Sec. of State of the CSA, but soon stepped down in frustration and joined the military
- 1863: launched a major attack on Davis
- Opposed conscription and the suspension of habeas corpus
- VP Alexander Stephens
- Abandoned Richmond
- Argued that Davis’s policies were “leading us to despotism”
X. Dissent
- 10% of southerners were “unconditional Unionists”
- Never supported secession; some engaged in or supported guerilla activity
- During the war, many others who lost faith in the Confederate cause—“pragmatic Unionists”
- Concluded the costs of war were too high
- Wanted a peace settlement; prepared to rejoin Union
- Rise of “pragmatic Unionists” pointed to class conflict
- Wartime suffering not equally shared
- Wartime suffering not equally shared
XI. War’s effects on ordinary civilians
- Food production declined; scarcities
- Blockade meant that it was impossible to get most previously imported goods; prohibitively expensive
- Candles, soap, paper, clothing, shoes, coffee
- Eventually, even the elite were sometimes reduced to wearing homespun
XII. Food shortages
- Butter, flour, salt became very expensive
- No meat except for bacon
- Confederate officers looked the other way when soldiers engaged in outright theft
- People ate food previously only given to slaves
- Demoralizing; undermined solidarity
- Many examples of women trading with the enemy; even buying goods from Yankee peddlers who entered the South
- Many examples of women trading with the enemy; even buying goods from Yankee peddlers who entered the South
XIII. Food riots and desertion
- Spring of 1863, outbreak of food riots
- By this time, inflation growing at a rate of 12% a month
- Biggest riot in April in Richmond
- Women demanded to buy good at government prices
- Cried “bread or blood”
- Looted at least 20 stores
- Jefferson Davis appeared and tried to calm the crowd—ineptly
- Aftermath
- War Dept ordered papers not to print the story
- Some 44 women tried; 12 convicted
- Soldiers in the field eventually responded to women’s desperate appeals for help
- More than 100,000 had deserted from the Army by the war’s end
- More than 100,000 had deserted from the Army by the war’s end
XIV. 1864 Election
- Southerners voted nearly 40% of elected officials out of office
- Many of the winners had openly campaigned as peace candidates
- But very few called for a restoration of the Union as it was; most urged a negotiated settlement
- Many of the winners had openly campaigned as peace candidates
- How to interpret? What did people want?
- Not entirely clear, but more they seem to have been more “anti-government” and “anti-Davis” than “anti-Confederate”
- Election best seen as a no-confidence vote for Davis