American History

In the American Civil War (1861-1865), the North outnumbered the South. However, local knowledge may have offset this. If numbers alone explain the Norths victory, the question arises why did it take four years for numbers to achieve this Why would debate continue about whether the North won or the South lost the war, if superior numbers unambiguously won the war Southerners were determined to fight for states rights and for their way of life. There is no evidence that Southerners lacked fighting spirit indeed the opposite was true. Gifted and skillful generals led their military. However, other factors hindered the south, including rivalry between the executive, the legislature, the states and military officers for control of the war. In the North, there was a clear delegation of military leadership to the field commander. Slavery, which the South wanted to preserve, became a liability as the war continued, with the possibility of slave revolts across the south. Yet if the South had managed what resources it had with greater efficiency, it might have won. Internal political squabbles weakened the South, making a Northern victory inevitable. The Souths failure to win foreign support was also a contributing factor. After discussing why the war began, who was involved and why, the course of the conflict is briefly sketched. After analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of both sides, the conclusion is drawn that the South lost rather than that the North won.

The Civil War causes, actors, course.
The Civil War began April 15, 1961 with President Abraham Lincolns Declaration of War against the seven states that had seceded from the Union. All southern states, they complained about how Northern Aggression imposed high tariffs on them, that the North was determined to destroy their way of life and their rights as sovereign states. Their honor, safety and independence could only  be found in a Southern Confederacy, said Jefferson Davis, elected president of the breakaway nation. Eventually, eleven states joined the confederacy. The issue of slavery divided North from South, with Northern states opposed to slavery, which Southern states supported. Lincoln denied that ending slavery was an aim or cause of the war, initially fighting for the restoration of a slaveholding union. Lincoln believed that the Constitution represented a guarantee of slavery in the states (p. 264). Although he hated slavery, he did not think that legislation could abolish it. Given the number of slave states, a Constitutional amendment would never attract enough votes. By 1862, as the war progressed, he was convinced that the war must end slavery while the Southern states remained determined to keep slaves (p. 270).

The actors in the Civil War were the two presidents and their field commanders, Ulysses S Grant for the Union, Robert E Lee for the Confederacy, their armies and general citizens. The number of people killed over the next four years would be almost equal to those who died in all wars fought by the US put together (McPherson, 1992, p. xix). The idea that the North occupied the moral high ground compared with the less than moral South, says Current, is unconvincing, the two sides must have been about even in virtue and vice, devotion and disloyalty, human strength and weakness (1960, p. 20). After hostilities began, the North moved quickly to neutralize the four border states, Maryland, Kentucky, Delaware, Missouri preventing them from joining the Confederacy (All were slaves states). West Virginia split from Confederate Virginia, joining the Union.

For the first two years of the war, a stalemate developed with the Confederacy winning some important battles. The Battle of Shiloh (April 1862), the most ghastly bloodbath in the history of the Western Hemisphere this far saw the Confederates retreat but only after appalling losses on both sides (McPherson, 1992, pp 228-9). By July 1862, the Unions failure to push beyond Richmond, VA and the high loss of life plunged Northern opinion into the depths of despair (McPherson, 1992, p. 250). After 1862, the Union pursuing the total war concept, which involved scorching the earth, burning crops, infrastructure, towns and cutting off enemy supplies, the Union began to advance through the South. It became a total war  a war of peoples as well as of armies (McPherson, 1992, p. 193). Such as war, says Williams, was bound to be a rough, no-holds-barred affair, a bloody and brutal struggle (1960, p. 35). Finally, April 9, 1865 the Confederacy surrendered.

Argument that the Norths superior numbers won the war
Some historians argue that the Norths greater numbers and economic strength wore the South down over time, making the Confederacys defeat inevitable. Certainly, the North had a larger army. In 1861, when the war began, the union states had nearly three and a half times as many white men of military age as had the Confederacy (McPherson, 1992, p. 184). The Norths economy was considerable stronger than the Souths, more than three to one in value and real estate and more than ten to one in value of products annually manufactured. As the war proceeded, the Souths capacity to produce, already so small by comparison, was made even smaller by a disproportionate reduction of her labor supply which was fighting the war. Some argue that the North managed both the war and the economy better than the South did, making Southern defeat all but inevitable. In this view, although the South may have had a home advantage of fighting a defensive war on familiar territory, even better trained if not better-equipped troops, this was insufficient to compensate for numerical and economic weakness.

Argument that the Souths political culture lost the War
Against the Norths economic and military strength, the South had the advantage of superior animation, knowledge of geography and actually produced more food than the North.

Despite problems of supply, McPherson says thatb It could be argued that history sided with the South, since in previous struggles for liberty, the Dutch had beaten the Spaniards, the Russians had repelled the French, and the Americans had won out over the British against odds as bad or worse than those the Southerners faced in 1861. If the Norths numerical advantage was what won the war, the question is why did it take so long McPherson suggests that the average Southerner probably was a better soldier than his enemy since they grew up hunting, riding and shooting and did not have to be taught to shoot while many Northerners did. Although less well armed than their enemies, Confederate soldiers says McPherson did not suffer from ordnance shortages after 1862 (p. 2000). Lee was able to keep fighting for four years. Did other factors hinder the Souths ability to capitalize on their advantages Arguably, Lincoln was a more competent leader than Davis, leaving military strategy to his generals, while Davis could not resist interfering despite his experiences at West Point, the Military Academy.

Yet in terms of civil rights and democratic values, Davis may outrank Lincoln. Lincoln restricted press freedom, which Davis did not. Lincoln suspended habeas corpus, which Davis did not. In fact, democracy may have cost the South victory. Too many institutions, the central legislature, the states and the executive, competed for power. No single polity emerged. Dissent was not silenced. Democracy even extended to electing officers in the army. In civil rights (except with reference to slaves) the South had an astonishingly libertarian record preserving throughout the war the rights of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom from arbitrary arrest even thought the government was itself debilitated by these rights many of which Lincoln suspended. By suspending some liberties, the North could focus on the war without distraction the South did not do this. Since people were fighting for freedom, they asked, why should they start abridging it.

Conclusion
Despite the Norths numerical and economic superiority, it was the South that lost the war, not the North that won. The South, unlike the North, did not aim to capture enemy territory their aim was to defend their own. It therefore fought a defensive war, which meant that troops had to be constantly moved from one threatened point to another and supply lines established. The better tactic might have been a concentrated mass offensive but this was contrary to Southern culture which focused on the local, not wider situation. If other factors had been equal to the task, given the advantages of local knowledge, high motivation and better troops, had the Confederacy better managed its resources, Southern independence might have been won.