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Impact of the American civil war on
Effects of the American civil war
American civil war introduction
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No other conflict has brought as much bloodshed, trauma, and division to the United States of America than the American Civil War. While other wars that Americans have fought in may have been fought on larger scales, with grander armies and greater resources, none compare to the lasting effects of the Civil War which continue to plague the Nation to this day. Approximately 618,000 Americans lost their lives between the years of 1861 and 1865. States, cities, and families turned on one another in a desperate struggle; a struggle which was to continue to divide the Nation long after the last guns had been fired. A cessation to the violence which had surrounded the Nation for years did little to calm the hearts of those who had survived it. …show more content…
The Confederate Monument stands at an impressive 32-feet in height, topped with a larger-than life figure of a woman, meant to represent the spirit of the South. In her left hand she holds a laurel wreath crown, the ancient symbol for peace. In her right hand she holds a pruning hook on a plow stock, echoing the agricultural heritage of the Southern people. She stands atop four cinerary urns, each engraved with a year. Each year represents the years of the Civil War. The four sides of the Monument offer scenes depicting Confederate Soldiers in a variety of situations. They are seen answering the call from Minerva, the Goddess of War and Wisdom; depicted as attempting to hold up a women symbolized as the Mother of the South. The Confederate Soldiers are shown as they depart for war, from the young man leaving his sweetheart, to the father leaving his babe in the arms of his African-American nurse. This particular scene is important in understanding one of, if not the primary reason for the Monument’s creation as claimed by opponents of the Confederate Monument and the …show more content…
To this day, there are still many who try to fight the monuments meaning, and stop the annual laying of the wreath at the memorial. While this is a tradition that has been ongoing since the unveiling, some feel that it is keeping the South alive, which is fueling the neo-Confederate movement. The date that the wreath was laid has since moved from June 4 to Memorial Day itself. Even with the change, no President has missed a year of honoring the monument, and the meaning behind it.
One of the most recent and highly publicized controversies surrounding the Confederate Monument can be found in a letter written to President Barack Obama in May of 2009. In this letter, scholars urged that the White House not send a wreath to honor the Confederate Monument, which is a longstanding tradition of the President to honor all of the monuments within Arlington Cemetery annually. The letter
I felt this morbid and realistic presence of the soldiers and for a mere second felt the gloom and menace of the war they were in. I walked around the site to gather more information on what the memorial was dedicated to. I walked past the mural wall and as I did, I paid particular attention to the various images of people and equipment on the wall. All of the facial expressions of the people on the wall gave the memorial a very real presence to it. I continued walking down the granite walk
On March 4th, 1921, Congress approved the commissioning of a tomb of an unknown soldier of World War 1, this soldier will be buried in the new Memorial Amphitheater (“The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier”). On Memorial day 1921, U.S. Army Sgt. Edward F. Younger, was selected to select from four caskets for the Tomb of the Unknown(“The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier”). He
Since the beginning of the Market Revolution, the institution of slavery became the leading factor that intensified the relations between the North and the South. Regarding the geographic differences between the North and South, the South was primarily agrarian and the North was mainly urban. Therefore, the North rapidly industrialized while the South remained relatively rural and cotton-slave based. As a result, the Market Revolution economically separated the North and the South and created a second party system. Thus, the issues of pro-slavery and anti-slavery arose between the Southern Democrats and Northern Republicans in the 1850s. The North desired to halt the expansion of slavery into western territories while the South strongly opposed. These two opposing parties led to radical abolitionism in the North, William Henry Seward and John Brown, and extreme secessionism in the South, James Henry Hammond, and South Carolina Ordinance of Secession. Due to their strict ideologies regarding slavery, both parties could not compromise on the issue of the expansion of slavery. Therefore, according to Americans in the years prior to the Civil War, conflict was inevitable.
The Civil War was partly about slavery. Therefore, many use the flag as a symbol of hatred towards people of different descent, especially African Americans. The idea that “negro is not equal to the white man,” or white supremacy, has caused many racist attacks (Coates, 2015). Most of these attacks have involved the presence of a Confederate flag. Recently, Dylann Roof committed a gruesome attack on nine African American congregants at their local church during a bible study (Henderson, 2015). He claimed to have been motivated by the Confederate flag. Sadly, this violent attack provides a perfect example of the racism symbolically presented by the Confederate flag.
“I think it wiser not to keep open the sores of war but to follow the examples of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife, to commit to oblivion the feelings engendered” written by Robert E. Lee in 1866. Monuments celebrate origins. They demonstrate a community’s symbolic honoring of events and people for qualities it finds indispensable to its identity. But the ones in Virginia do not. They represent a various amount of These confederate monuments ought to be placed in a more private area for individuals who want to view them can. Likewise, these monuments influence individuals to feel awkward in their consistently lives. A few people differ and feel that these remembered monuments not be brought down, and should stay up.
Recently there has been news about people heavily wanting Confederate statutes to be taken down due to their relation with slavery. While many have their own views on the matter, one in particular stands out. The view of preserving them in a way that’ll keep both sides happy and to preserve the history behind them. This “contextualized” view, as discussed in Gary Shapiro’s “The Meaning of Our Confederate ‘Monuments’” I believe should not only be applied to the Confederate statutes but other monuments and memorials as well. Memorials being made in order to remember an event or person, while a monument is made in order to honor an event or person(Shapiro). While it is in fact very reasonable to want to take these statutes down due to evil background, they are still a part of history. Instead, we should follow the “contextualized” view and add context to all monuments and memorials as their meanings change throughout time.
Many people have disputes over many of the Confederate soldiers such as General Robert E. Lee. To many people the monuments of confederate soldiers remind them of slavery, which was the mainly the whole reason for the civil war. However other people don't want to take down these monuments. They think that the statues remind them of a part of history and that if they statues are taken down, then a part of our history is being ripped away. Pierre McGraw is a descendant of Confederate soldiers and he says “you’re basically ripping out chapters of a history book.”Since there are two different points of view on this issue it is causing a lot of controversy. Many different states have made laws banning the removal of plaques, statues, and monuments.
Washington, DC is a spectacular place. This being my first time in DC, I was in awe of everything and all the historical places I encountered. The presence of the monuments and history is what made the capitol so magnificent. Having only read about the Lincoln memorial, I never had the chance to experience the sensation of being inside such an honorable place of importance. The imposing white marble walls of the memorial and the many people surrounding it could be seen from afar. Arriving at the location, an unknown feeling came over me. I was experiencing history in a whole different level. When I think about a memorial, the term remembrance comes to mind. Seeing the statue of Abraham Lincoln brought pieces of memories from history class and evoked thoughts of what it might have felt like to be in his shoes. I was astonished by the statue’s enormousness and how grand Abraham Lincoln looked in his chair. The size of the statue compared to pictures from books and elsewhere was surreal. Abraham Lincoln was a very “powerful and prominent individual” in the history of our nation, the statue’s design and size reflected upon that. Looking around me, I wanted to know what the others thoughts were on seeing his statue and how they felt in that building. I finally had the courage to ask one or two people what they thought; they all had the same appreciation as me. Hearing about an important person or learning about them in a history book gives you vast knowledge but it doesn’t evoke the feeling of utter appreciation as the memorial does. When Abraham Lincoln was assassinated, many people wanted to build a memorial in honor of him. They wanted to be able to show how important he was to shaping our nation and to “honor his existence”. Ce...
The first Unknown Soldier’s corpse was from a battlefield in France. His remains were then put into a casket and sent to America. On the day of the tomb’s opening there was a large celebration that many attended to show reverence to the unknown, and to other men that died in battle. In America the soldier’s casket was followed by a large parade of military men to his resting place on top of a hill at the Arlington National Cemetery. In the video, US Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, the narrator says, “In the amphitheatre of the Arlington Cemetery President Harding delivered a speech about the tomb. He then placed a congressional medal on the casket.” In this short video you can see the grief on all the civilians’ faces. This ceremony was a special part of America’s history. People were beginning to realize how real war was. People saw first hand that soldiers were putting their lives on the line for the sake of the U.S. citizens’ freedom. There were many soldiers to choose from to put into the tomb from each war. People who were high up in the military
History has a strange way of coming back around when it comes to human civilization. It has been said repeatedly that those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it. However, just because there is a potential for danger in the future, this does not mean that humanity must ignore what once was. History is normally remembered through what is known as a memorial. When a memorial is put into a physical representation, it is then known as a monument.The need to memorialize events or people is complex; in some cases, monuments honor moments of great achievement, while in other cases, monuments pay homage to deep sacrifice. A monument's size, location, and materials are all considerations in planning and creating a memorial to the past. Examples of such feats are the Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, and even Mount Rushmore. For the latter of the
The rolling hills of Arlington were scenic, that is, if you could ignore the hundreds of thousands of gravestones. Here, I saw loss, great loss, in the name of this country in the form of rows of the dead. I shed tears as I watched the finely choreographed march of those participating in the changing of the guard ceremony. I saw the eternal flame. I felt a sense of national pride that carried over to the dark, climate controlled rooms of the National Archives. There, after an hour wait to get into the building, I had to fight through throngs of people all trying to see a piece of paper with faded writing that was the reason for America. I fought, again, to gaze upon the Constitution that so many in this day and age have forgotten the words of. Standing back a moment, looking at the bodies shoving past one another, I suddenly felt angry. All of these people wanted to see these documents so badly, but did they know that they condoned slavery and sexism and every opposite of equality in the book, prior to amendments that fixed some of these issues? Do they not realize that this nation may have been founded on freedom from Britain, but not freedom for all? Perhaps it is not fit to recognize these weaknesses as a citizen of the country upholding them, so I do not recognize them, I simply walk into a much less crowded
The Civil War has been viewed as the unavoidable eruption of a conflict that had been simmering for decades between the industrial North and the agricultural South. Roark et al. (p. 507) speak of the two regions’ respective “labor systems,” which in the eyes of both contemporaries were the most salient evidence of two irreconcilable worldviews. Yet the economies of the two regions were complementary to some extent, in terms of the exchange of goods and capital; the Civil War did not arise because of economic competition between the North and South over markets, for instance. The collision course that led to the Civil War did not have its basis in pure economics as much as in the perceptions of Northerners and Southerners of the economies of the respective regions in political and social terms. The first lens for this was what I call the nation’s ‘charter’—the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, the documents spelling out the nation’s core ideology. Despite their inconsistencies, they provided a standard against which the treatment and experience of any or all groups of people residing within the United States could be evaluated (Native Americans, however, did not count). Secondly, these documents had installed a form of government that to a significant degree promised representation of each individual citizen. It was understood that this only possible through aggregation, and so population would be a major source of political power in the United States. This is where economics intersected with politics: the economic system of the North encouraged (albeit for the purposes of exploitation) immigration, whereas that of the South did not. Another layer of the influence of economics in politics was that the prosperity of ...
The American Civil war is considered to be one of the most defining moments in American history. It is the war that shaped the social, political and economic structure with a broader prospect of unifying the states and hence leading to this ideal nation of unified states as it is today. In the book “Confederates in the Attic”, the author Tony Horwitz gives an account of his year long exploration through the places where the U.S. Civil War was fought. He took his childhood interest in the Civil War to a new level by traveling around the South in search of Civil War relics, battle fields, and most importantly stories. The title “Confederates in the Attic”: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War carries two meanings in Tony Horwitz’s thoughtful and entertaining exploration of the role of the American Civil War in the modern world of the South. The first meaning alludes to Horwitz’s personal interest in the war. As the grandson of a Russian Jew, Horwitz was raised in the North but early in his childhood developed a fascination with the South’s myth and history. He tells readers that as a child he wrote about the war and even constructed a mural of significant battles in the attic of his own home. The second meaning refers to regional memory, the importance or lack thereof yet attached to this momentous national event. As Horwitz visits the sites throughout the South, he encounters unreconstructed rebels who still hold to outdated beliefs. He also meets groups of “re-enactors,” devotees who attempt to relive the experience of the soldier’s life and death. One of his most disheartening and yet unsurprising realizations is that attitudes towards the war divide along racial lines. Too many whites wrap the memory in nostalgia, refusing...
If public opinion changes cities or private groups have to remove them. This is what happened in the south over the 2016-2017 period and calls for more removals of Confederate statues to be removed continues today. To many African Americans, these memorials are here to remind them of the past when white people, who only had the power would threaten African Americans. Many people argue if this is a remembrance of fallen Confederate soldiers and generals or a racially motivated statement. More reasons people want to get rid of them is cultural values like good and bad luck associated with memorials. The article that talked about the removal of an older cemetery because the Asian business owners near the cemetery believed that a place near a bunch of dead people causes bad luck and will cause negativity on the
Organizations like the United Daughters of the Confederacy and others who supported the Confederacy helped to create memorials to honor the Confederacy and the beliefs the South fought for during the Civil War. Many of the monuments and memorials established after the Civil War were dedicated to people who reflected the Lost Cause. The Commemorative postcard of living Confederate flag in front of the Robert E. Lee Monument in Richmond, Virginia exemplifies how people of the South after the Reconstruction embraced the aspects of the Reconstruction through the perspective of the Lost Cause. Since the picture of the living Confederate flag was a famous postcard in the South in the 20th century, the postcard was likely viewed by a large number of people, especially in the South, which helped spread the influence of the Lost Cause and how the Lost Cause affected the legacy of the Reconstruction. An advertisement in the Confederate Veteran magazine in 1905 proved how monuments influenced people in the South during this time period. Since the Confederate Veterans magazine was a popular magazine in the South, Many people viewed the magazine’s contents and may likely have been influenced by articles in it. People in the South viewed monuments and memorials as a way to remember how life used to be before the Civil War and represent people’s views of the Civil War and the Reconstruction. Lost Cause advocated also believed that the Reconstruction was the North’s way of destroying the Southern way of