RICHMOND, Va. - History buffs still captivated by Gen. Robert E. Lee planned lectures, a banquet and artillery salutes to mark the 200th anniversary of the Confederate strategist's birth.
Events were scheduled throughout the weekend at Washington & Lee University in Lexington, at Lee's birthplace at Stratford Hall Plantation, and in Richmond, the former Confederate capital.
"Robert E. Lee was an outstanding general, a groundbreaking educator and a profound gentleman," said S. Waite Rawls III, chief executive of the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond. "But perhaps his greatest moments came after the war, when he worked very hard to reconcile a country that was still deeply divided after a bitter internal conflict."...
Read what leading Confederates said BEFORE the Civil War, not after:
"Our new [Confederate] government is founded … upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery—subordination to the superior race—is his natural and normal condition" - Alexander Stephens, "Cornerstone Speech," 1861
There is much mis-information and lack of information reflected in these comments, and several show a dire need to read and study both the Bible (I like the newly-published reprint of the 1599 Geneva Bible), and some current history books like the 2005 release, "The War Between the States - America's Uncivil War" by author and general editor, John J. Dwyer. I'm growing very weary of the revisionist history over the past 100 years that has been written and published by Northern authors and publishers with a clear socialist/communist political agenda that still smacks of Lincoln's economic mercantilism. Karl Marx personally congratulated Lincoln on his defeat of the Confederacy. One is known by the company they keep.
Our nation is in the mess it is today because of the incredible disregard by Abraham Lincoln for our Constitution, and the poor example he set for those coming after him. God mercifully delivered the country from Lincoln's dictatorship, but as yet, has not directed a restoration of our Founding Fathers' original intent for our nation. This was clearly indicated in the first 100 years of our history, even to the pronouncement of the Supreme Court declaring us to clearly be a Christian nation.
Mike,Your post doesn,t make sence? WHO or where did I say I was better than any other American, only you of course.Defending your dear America As I said, it seem most class themselves as American first then Christan.God is not American or any other race. This what you should have posted of me..Isaiah 6:5 Then said I, Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts. Isaiah 6:8-11 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me. And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not. Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed. Then said I, Lord, how long? And he answered, Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land be utterly desolate, Isaiah 6:12 And the LORD have removed men far away, and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land.
That Lee and many of his contemporaries were godly or principled men is not in dispute. Like most people then and now, though, they had their blind spots. We should take heed lest we fall here, too. Lee was big on "duty," but surely, one of them would be to redress evils instead of wishing them away like Jefferson. Be it noted, most Northerners were what today would be considered racists too (note NYC's race riots). Sherman was very frank about his.
At least Lincoln took the trouble to find out what black men actually thought of his resettlement proposal.
Since we're on the issue of slavery here, has anyone ever noticed in the Bible that Paul saent a slave back to his master. paul never fought against the issue, he just admonished Philemon-a christian slaveholder (how's that for an oxymoron) to treat his slave as a brother in Christ. Let's not make such a big deal out of the political aspect of this when it really boils down to a spiritual issue. Can a person do things that are wrong and still be a believer? (I hope no one says no, because then none of us are believers). I'm not saying slavery was right, but let's not allow our politics to determine our level of spirituality.
Neil: If you are making the case that slavery in modern times is immoral...I am with you. If you are making the case that slavery is the primary cause that started the so called American Civil War, I an not entirely there. Certainly there were problematic issues about slavery that go back to the beginning of the Republic. Even the US Constitution declared that blacks were to be counted as 3/5 of a white citizen. But in the times leading up to the Civil War there were also issues about economics, sectional power, and unfair tarriffs. The South saw the hand writing on the wall and decided that secession was her only out, since the Northern states would always carry more impact than she. But, it was the decesion to secede that actually started the war. Many in the North weren't in favor of freeing the negro. Even Lincoln wished to send them back to Africa. Slavery in the OT and NT seem to be accepted and sanctioned, but the form of slavery practiced by the American South was not only harmful to the South but destructive to the poor people who found themselve its prisoner. We thank God to see its oppression lifted and hope to see any modern practice of it eliminated.
Lest Southern apologists & Recons beguile us with postwar "Lost Cause" fables about the South's supposed love for the Constitution, this is better representative of what they really believed:
"On the brink of the Civil War, [Alexander] Stephens gave his famous Cornerstone Speech in Savannah, Georgia on March 21, 1861. In it he reaffirmed that 'African Slavery ... was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution'. He went on to assert that the US Constitution with its 'assumption of the equality of races' was 'fundamentally wrong'. 'Our new [Confederate] government is founded ... upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery—subordination to the superior race—is his natural and normal condition', and also: 'With us, all of the white race, however high or low, rich or poor, are equal in the eye of the law. Not so with the negro. Subordination is his place. He, by nature, or by the curse against Canaan, is fitted for that condition which he occupies in our system.'
Also, thanks to the cotton gin, slavery was very profitable and was not going to die out by itself anytime soon. Many Southerners wanted to bring it to Latin America & the rest of the Union too.
cont'd "I have fought against the people of the North because I believed they were seeking to wrest from us our dearest rights. But I have never cherished toward them bitter or vindictive feelings, and I have never seen the day when I did not pray for them." Robert E. Lee
That much-quoted anecdote breathes the air of utter sincerity, however we may assess the cause for which he fought.
Whether slavery would have withered away in the normal course of things without a war can only be speculated. The tragedy was that in the post-war period emancipation became an abstraction: the lot of the Negro was little improved.
Mike, Thank you for your post. I must say that I agree with you almost entirely.
My own thought is that the Emancipation Proclamation for Lincoln was partly a conscience one, but significantly a political one too. Because of the Confederate military successes during 1862 there was a real prospect of foreign recognition of the Confederacy, which would have been an unmitigated disaster for the Union. With such recognition all the South's war aims would have been achieved, as it was, I believe, from their viewpoint a War of Independence (they saw it as the second Revolutionary War).
A tacit, if left-handed, recognition of this "two independent countries" view was accorded when early in the war General Benjamin Butler refused to return runaway slaves under the Fugitive Slave Act, citing as his reason that Virginia claimed to be a foreign country, and the Act did not apply to foreign countries.
Lee had little choice but to pledge loyalty to his state in a situation of rival allegiances. He was no traitor, but a man of conscience and sublime character. cont'd
You have a better understanding of that war than most here. But the winners do get to write most of the history books.
It is certainly true that the war did not have slavery as a primary issue in the beginning. Because of the distaste among many in the North over going to war against Americans from the South, slavery as an immorality issue was brought in after the war was in progress, in order to rouse needed anger.
Those who say the South fought to keep slavery are wrong. Perhaps some did. But how many of those dirt farmers had slaves? They were fighting for their homes, their independence, and their way of life. That's why the Southerner doesn't call the war the Civil War, but the War Between the States, or the War for Southern Independence. (I think I have that right) Those who say the North fought to defeat slavery are only partially correct. Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation only freed the slaves held by States in Rebellion, not those held by States supporting the Union. Some Emancipation!
You're right about the difference between Lee and Sherman as well.
Zach (and A believer), "I agree with Henry Adams: Robert E. Lee should have been hanged. "
If that had happened, would he have paid the price of crime, or merely the price of defeat?
The Civil War exposed many anomalies: Union officers who believed in slavery fighting a war to emancipate the slaves (at least after Sept., 1862); and certain Confederate officers, like Lee, who did not believe in slavery (who actually released all his slaves prior to the outbreak of war) fighting a war to retain slavery.
But perchance the South was not fighting primarily to retain slavery, but to maintain their civilisation, which the War ultimately destroyed. Hence they fought tenaciously when the Northern armies invaded the South (as in the Wilderness and Cold Harbour).
In my view the real villain of the War was not Lee (a gentleman and a Christian), but Sherman, whose "March to the Sea", and into the Carolinas, devastated the landscape with rapine, pillage, and wanton destruction against fellow Americans. He left Atlanta, Savannah, and Columbia in ruins.
Ming from US say: "I am glad you agree in general the heart of America of today just like Babylon. Can you see through pride yet."
Welcome to Babylon, Ming. Aren't you thankful you're not like the rest of the American sinners? What are you doing to change your part in the way things appear to you?
Luke 18:11 "The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican."
Ming...first, I question whether you know the heart of America. Second, I question what you know about Babylon. Third...of all the crime in Russia, the murder in Iraq, the oppression in China, the slavery in Sudan...and only America is like Babylon???? Boy...have you got some blinders on!
I am glad you agree in general the heart of America of today just like Babylon. Can you see through pride yet. Some people are Americans first then Christian. God punisher Sin Idividually as well as collectivlly. Adam was as well as Sodom. God bless America. 1 Samuel 15:30 Then American said, I have sinned: yet honour me now, I pray thee, before the elders of my people, and before Israel, and turn again with me, that I may worship the LORD thy God.
I'm wouldn't classify myself as a Yankee or a Southerner, but my heart would probably have been with the North during that terrible time.
However, I have to admire this man's courage and his boldness in his statement that he would fight to the death for his beloved state. That's what touched me most of all.
He was an American. No one can deny that. And though I know, not think, know he did wrong in supporting a side that instituted slavery, I believe his case was more noble than that.
As you said, GG, I do believe he freed his slaves after the war and tried to bring back a nation that was almost ruined by wrong ideas of racism. Wrong side, right idea.
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Can you see through pride yet. Some people are Americans first then Christian. 
God punisher Sin Idividually as well as collectivlly. Adam was as well as Sodom. God bless America. 
mike from new york: "
lisa
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i don't condone this gay persecution of..."
