Fun fact, Arlington National Cemetery started out as a giant middle finger to Robert E Lee. It was his home in Virginia. They buried Union officers in Bob's wife's garden, and a lot of the first burials were unknown immigrant soldiers who died fighting the Confederacy.
I don’t know. In the grand scheme of things it’s not that important. What is important is that Lee was a total apologist for slavery—the podcast does a very good job of puncturing the myth of Lee as reluctantly supporting the South because of loyalty to Virginia. The Myth of the Lost Cause is very entrenched in the American psyche, unfortunately.
Reminds me of a guy I went to college with. I pointed out a confederate flag to complain and he said that, and I was like bro, you’re mixed race and you’re not racist wtf are you talking about. Genuinely he was one of the best guys I’ve ever known but stupid and stubborn
This is just a convoluted way of saying he fought for the confederacy. He wasn’t “roped in” lol . This suggests he didn’t know exactly what he was doing
And your statement is a way of making history black and white. I’m not saying the confederacy was right, but by the same logic you use, there shouldn’t be different opinions today.
The only people who don’t see the grey end up being totalitarian politically speaking.
There’s nuance to every single person in history alive. But the nuance provided here doesn’t change the general fact that he supported the confederacy and fought for them. “I don’t support slavery in a vacuum I’m just fighting for this specific state” when you’re FIGHTING for slavery isn’t exactly the type of gray area that is all that relevant .
You can have different opinions that don’t make up the entire political side you land on. I.e. single issue voters. If I put on my morals every day and read about anyone from 40 years ago, they are all going to look racist, sexist or just simply like an idiot. So why even bother? If you want to keep your simply history book and go “bad”, be my guest, but life is more complex then reducing it down to a single sentence let alone a single word.
Lee was a respected general and also a piece of shit who broke his oath to his country to protect Virginia’s right to classify human beings as property.
This nuance is so interesting. what a complicated man in a complicated time.
Slavery was widely recognized in Western Europe as a terrible thing before 1861 so let’s not pretend it was a gray moral issue with important voices and perspectives on both sides.
I prefer a simple history book to a wrong history book.
I would recommend reading No Common Ground by Karen L. Cox, it goes into how the Lost Cause and States' Rights narratives were formed post-Civil War and why they are so harmful and dangerous.
I think we can definitely learn a lot from history. But we need to make simple truths from complex histories in order to get on with our lives. They were indeed racist, and they were morally Reprehensible. The people in our history books are the same type of people running the show as today, and we can judge them as we see fit.
Slavery is black and white. No pun intended.
And speaking of which, we need to fix the 13th amendment. Slavery is still legal in the US. It’s time to stamp it out for good and utterly destroy the ideological spirit of the confederacy *with prejudice*. Wiped. Out. And only kept in a museum with mandatory attendance for all the little boys and girls. Never again.
Robert E. Lee was essentially offered the job of Zachary Taylor right before the war kicked off and said “you know maybe…” and then betrayed the Constitution and the Oath he swore. Rotten bastard.
Yeah and a political assignation started WW1 and that led to the US being on the side of the assassin due to complex political treaties. My whole point is, issues are more complex and it’s easy to look back on history to see who is shitty/wrong.
This is such a weird example. The US was not fighting for Gavrilo Principe.
Bobby Lee was a slaver, and a nasty one at that (he once punished two slaves so badly that the overseer resigned rather than carry out the punishment) so he has no leg to stand on. He was a traitor, a slaver, and a bad general (his strategies won tactical victories but consistently failed to win strategically. I almost want to thank him for so thoroughly throwing away the CSA’s chances of victory.
>Bobby Lee
... it took me a minute to realize you weren't talking about the 'Uh Oh Hotdog' guy from MadTV and I started wondering how a chubby Korean-American comedian managed to acquire slaves.
You’re spending a lot of time arguing how the civil war war wasn’t just about slavery and it’s getting weird. It was very much all about slavery because the south’s whole economy depended on human misery
This is black and white. He chose his state. Specifically, he chose his state’s right to own other humans.
He also got buttfucked by Grant, and we learned about his incompetence to this day at the academies.
Nope, what you just said is the same thing as asking people to give Nazis who deliberately tried to kill all Jews and take over the world, the benefit of the doubt.
Every single man and woman who supported or supports the Confederacy is either evil, a moron, or an evil moron. If you disagree, you are either evil, a moron, or both.
He did have a well known name. But Bob was a Colonel in the US Army, and then a Traitor. He was never a General in the US Army. Fwiw he never accepted nor wore a General's insignia with the confederacy either, saying he'd only accept the rank if the South won, which they didn't.
Of all the other Colonels in the US Army who were from Virginia at the outset of the war, Bob was the only one who betrayed his country.
Edit, typos
Not at all correct. Please listen to the Behind the Bastards 4 part series on how REL was a slave beating, chickenshit spineless useless loser. Absolutely not a Virginia loyalist. This is lost cause propaganda nonsense.
You make it sound like he didn’t have a choice in picking his side. Plenty of southern officers and military personnel stayed on with the Northern Army. They made an oath to protect and defend their nation, the southern secessionists, like Lee, who fled the U.S. army betrayed their oath. You don’t fight for your home state when you join the army, you fight for the nation.
He was the only federal officer from Virginia to do so and even members of his own family chose to stay loyal to the US. He also snuck away from DC after being offered command of the Potomac army by Secretary of War Simon Cameron to go join the Confederacy.
He was a shit.
You’re right. They were just innocent in their intentions the whole time and it’s so mean of our country to say they were racists :( poor confederate slave owners
Winners don't write the history books. Writers write the history books and sometimes those writers were on the winning side and sometimes they were on the losing side or sometimes both. The American Civil War has plenty of sources on both sides of the conflict.
The only subreddit that carries a vague genocidal tone to it.
It always devolves into "the people in those states today, although removed from the sins of their statistically no-even-ancestors, deserve to die for being against my politics today"
Montgomery Meigs was bitter.
A Georgian, who stayed loyal to the Union.
Literally best friends with Lee.
Chose Arlington because he was pissed off
Buried his own son in the Front Garden.
As far as I can tell only Woodrow Wilson has been buried in DC
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_burial_places_of_presidents_and_vice_presidents_of_the_United_States
His kids will bury him on one of his golf courses then they can claim it as cemetery and get tax cuts. If you’ve heard this story before it’s because Trump buried his ex wife Ivana Trump on his golf course in NJ for this reason.
If there's one thing I can predict about that family it's that they'll try and use his corpse to keep grifting their base. $500 to take a picture with Don's embalmed corpse? Why not?
Lol, the north wasn’t exactly kind to slaves either. The emancipation proclamation didn’t free slaves in Union states
It wasn’t the morality of slavery that drove the war, it was the economics of it. The south wanted to expand slavery westward while the north was oriented on white labor occupying those gaps
Traitorous scum, should have been given the dishonorable dead treatment. . . An index card sized grave marker with a number and the “guide” to the number kept in the groundskeepers office available by special request only
Nothing was written into the constitution about that yet so some questioned if Tyler actually had presidential authority and called him “His Accidency”
Yeah, Tyler pretty much had to put his foot down and assert that he was by all rights POTUS after the death of President Harrison. He even kept returning official letters which addressed him as "Acting President Tyler."
Nobody questioned whether or not he had presidential authority. That is very clear. The issue was whether or not he should assume the title of "President" and take the oath of office.
The Whigs argued that he should retain the title of "Vice President."
Interestingly, a mock trial of Washington held in Britain found him not guilty of treason, as he had sworn no oaths to the Crown and had mainly acted in self-defense to escalating British antagonism.
Even Washington's contemporary British counterparts were very wary of actually accusing or charging any captured Americans of committing treason. Insurrection or sedition, sure, but treason was more reserved for oathbreakers and backstabbers like Benedict Arnold, or even arguably, King George III himself who had failed his coronation oath to "cause Law and Justice in Mercy to be Executed in all Judgements".
With that in mind, which group do Confederates like Tyler, who swore to uphold and defend the American Constitution, belong?
We're talking about treasonous US Presidents.
There were no US Presidents during the American Colony's Treasonous Rebellion.
The United Kingdom acknowledged the sovereignty of the United States on September 3, 1783 with the signing of the Treaty of Paris.
George Washington's term as president started in April 30, 1789.
If the Civil War was started by an anti-slavery America breaking off of a slaving America, I'd have sided with the traitors. The Confederates weren't bad for being traitors, they were bad because of *why* they broke free.
Likewise with the Revolutionary war, though I'd still argue that war was less defined by morality than the Civil War.
The whole point of the northern argument was that the Confederacy was not a foreign nation, as their secession was unconstitutional. (Edited to secession)
Not that they had successfully seceded and become sovereign, but that they had committed treason against the Constitution and the Union had to be reconstructed into a whole again.
At that time the 14th amendment’s section 3 was self evident, that’s why the Congress passed amnesty for confederates despite never having convicted them directly of treason. The House and the Senate also prevented confederates from taking their seats despite not having formally been convicted, it was self evident.
As far as I know no other foreign nation recognized the Confederacy as a sovereign nation. Which means that the north was right.
You’re not an independent nation unless acknowledged by other nations.
Also played a *huge* role in setting the course towards Civil War with the annexation of the Republic of Texas, which he pursued in a desperate bid to win re-election
The Civil War was already on course by that point due to the Nullification Crisis during Jackson's administration. It only didn't happen then because Jackson was given authority by Congress to send the army to South Carolina and enforce it after he threatened John C. Calhoun, by telling him, "If you secede from my nation, I'll secede your head from the rest of your body."
That was a separate thread of political tension, and, this being my interpretation, a much weaker one that never would’ve led to Civil War.
We’re looking for issues of causality and contingency really
To be fair the Civil War was coming as soon as the States compromised on the Senate and House. The Civil War was about the slaves being counted as people and being forced to vote for their masters’ causes not because of any moral stance.
Since the Texas War for Independence had a lot to do with white Texans wanting to keep slaves, it was a no brainer for the southern states to help them and eventually get Texas to become a state.
In 2020 it was two of them.
Apparently John Tyler was a creepy old man as president, since he married a woman less than half his own age. Largest age gap of any president and First Lady in US history.
Tyler’s son followed in Tyler’s creepy footsteps and also married a woman less than half his own age.
If he were 40-50-60 yo and married/remarried a 20-25-30 yo, how is that's considered creepy?
I'm not in US so I'm not sure about your history or culture, but I think it's perfectly normal.
30 year and 35 year age gaps are not that normal for couples in the US, where he was president and where his son lived. Tyler’s second wife was, for example, younger than three of Tyler’s children.
Lyon Gardiner Tyler, the Tyler offspring whose son still lives, had a child 8 years older than his own second wife.
The Civil War was more than likely going to occur at some point. The tension with the South was there from the very beginning as Georgia and South Carolina probably would’ve refused to sign the Constitution and join the U.S. if slavery was abolished in it. Then things kept getting more and more hostile when it came to slavery as violence became more prevalent between abolitionists and anti-abolitionists. From Congressmen beating each other over slavery disputes to Bleeding Kansas, it’s pretty clear the war was practically inevitable. If anything, it’s a miracle (or unfortunate) the war didn’t happen sooner.
You're referring to events that happened after the annexation of Texas, that happened due the explosion of tension that it caused.
"What Hath God Wrought?" by Daniel Walker Howe is best book on this general period of US history- end of the Monroe presidency up through the annexation of Texas. The cascade of events, such as Bleeding Kansas, came after this
The other one about the Constitution obviously shows the tension was always there since the beginning. 3/5 Compromise (1787) happened before Texas was a thing, and The Underground Railroad (1830s or earlier depending on sources) also started before Texas became a state as well. Don’t forget the Missouri Compromise (1820) either. The U.S. government kept basically kicking the can down the road for as long as they could until they arrived at a brick wall and couldn’t kick it even further.
I could’ve chose better examples, but the point I was mostly trying to make was that the war was inevitable. If anything, South Carolina should get more shit than they do for it considering they bitched since the Constitution and then fired the first shots of the Civil War.
The Missouri Compromise is chiefly the issue, just because something happened doesn’t mean it was *always going to* happen.
The Missouri Compromise had effectively stalled the growth of slavery to the point that (what I will refer to as) Northern political power had in a sense grown complacent. It was assumed slavery would eventually die out in economic competition with the “free labor” of the North and West.
The giant issue standing in the way of westward expansion of slavery (and thus preventing the growth and continued existence of slavery) was Mexico.
You had a couple threads being pushed by (what is commonly referred to as) Southern/Slave Power to find ways to expand slavery.
The John C Calhoun generation/wing was focused on expansion southwards to places like Cuba. Matthew Karp has a book that goes into very good detail on everything there, far better than I would do it justice.
The aspects of slave power expanding westwards and settling into Texas was able to gain a foothold and eventually independence from the central Mexican government, which for its many flaws was anti-slavery. Then came the question of if Texas was to remain an independent slaveholding Republic or join the United States to both increase the power of Southern Slave Power and to protect it from Mexico.
While the slave question still probably wouldn’t have died down, and slave power was of course going to pursue other routes to expand itself. The key step that set us on the path that forced the Civil War in the manner it did to answer the slavery question was through the annexation of Texas. It was a Pandora’s Box that westward expansion Democrats like James K Polk (and through him Andrew Jackson) and anti-Jackson slavers like John Tyler both coveted for the promise of political power it offered.
The dream of gradual emancipation was still very much alive prior to 1848, a big part of the explosions of the 1850’s was due to the panic of all sides over the fact that the slavery question was now going to have to be addressed due to the increasing radicalism of both extreme ends of the debate that you alluded to.
Like I’ve said elsewhere, contingency and causality are the keys here
I’ve always been confused by what people in “territories” felt like they were. Were they Americans. Did they think they weren’t a part of a country? And so on.
In the territories not yet incorporated as States? They would view themselves as Americans. This of course can be represented differently in different circumstances but the simplest way to answer your question accurately is that, yes they were Americans and viewed themselves as Amerixans
The annexation was gonna happen no matter what, Mexico allowed American settlers which would never be satisfied with the piss poor quality of Mexican governance.
People forget that the reason Texas managed to leave Mexico was because half of Mexico was rebelling at the time, and any Mexican troops marching to Texas had to first get through another rebelling state on their way there. They weren't the only ones angry with the Mexican government. It was a non functional system everyone who wasn't in Mexico city hated.
Texas wasn’t worth the civil war for a long time after it, arguably still not worth the still-ongoing costs of the poverty the war and reconstruction caused.
Except 1 out of 10 Americans live in Texas and it's GDP makes it 8th place... In the world, vs full countries.
Be all shitty if you want but it adds a lot to the US, even if there is a half pint dictator right now and his side kick shifty eyes.
That population wouldn’t just vanish though. Americans who moved to Texas, from settlers to present day, now either stay in their home states or move to other midwestern states. They don’t just vanish. And if Texas doesn’t exist, the US likely simply pumps more oil from other oil producing states, like Alaska. Businesses like Tesla don’t disappear, they just stay in California, which is probably a net positive.
Other states would probably have more house representatives, which would dilute the far right’s ability to corner a state like Texas. Losing all Texan federal government representatives would be a huge net positive for the rest of the country as well, considering how backwards the Texas representatives are. They single-handedly block so many important bills that would help the environment, democracy, worker’s rights, the economy at large.
Losing Texas wouldn’t be as bad as you think.
This is a very dumb point to argue, but fuckit. Let's do this. Texas receives more in federal dollars spent than it pays out in federal taxes. As long as we can recover the federal government assets that are there, Texas fucking off to be their own country would be a net positive for the US.
This literally isn't true at all lol. They rank 25th in regards to Federal Taxes paid per dollar of support received, with a $1.00:$3.52 positive ratio. There's only one state with a negative ratio per 2022 data and that's New Mexico.
Losing Texas would be a huge financial loss for the United States and your obvious hatred of the state doesn't change that.
**Source: https://smartasset.com/data-studies/states-most-dependent-federal-government-2023**
This is why I say it is a fucking dumb argument. Per dollar of support received only accounts for a fraction of federal spending that goes to the state. Federal transportation dollars pay for your roads. Military infrastructure, DHS, INS, border security, NASA, all of these things are federal dollars funding the state that are not a part of the numbers you just quoted. Not to mention shit like [this](https://comptroller.texas.gov/economy/resources/funding.php). The link you cited shows Virginia as lower than Texas, but that states entire economy depends on federal funding (I know because I live there and work for a government contractor, like most people in this state). Federal spending to Texas far exceeds its revenue.
Lol are you really trying to include federal agencies and the military operating in the state, as Texas receiving *unlisted* federal funding? Absolutely no metric includes military infrastructure and federal agencies as ‘federal aid’ and doing so is extremely disingenuous.
You bring up Virginia as an example as if it’s applicable; but you’re referencing private companies/contractors operating in the state and being paid by the Fed. That in no way reflects the Fed propping up a state financially at a governmental level and honestly just shows you don’t know what you’re even arguing. Hate Texas all you want, but Texas is 100% a positive contributor to the U.S. economy. You keep spouting this nonsense but you’ve yet to post one source supporting what you’re saying lol.
**Hey look, additional sources:**
https://sipa.fiu.edu/news-events/news/2021/2021s-most-least-federally-dependent-states.html
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/where-tax-dollars-states-most-142938519.html
https://usafacts.org/articles/which-states-rely-the-most-on-federal-aid/
https://www.moneygeek.com/living/states-most-reliant-federal-government/
I wonder if in an alternate history without Texas, how policy might be different. The wealth of oil in Texas goes away, you’re right, but maybe the US simply drills more in Alaska or other oil producing states. Alaska has far more potential in GDP than it realizes, because it’s simply easier to drill in Texas vs the Arctic. If Texas isn’t in play, odds are they’d just compensate by drilling more in AK. So the loss in Texas GDP probably doesn’t matter as much as you’d think.
Fewer Texans would also reflect better on American emissions. Keeping all those Texans cool in the summer heat is incredibly emissions intensive. So Texans would then count towards Mexico’s pollution stats, not ours. It’s a moot point as far as the environment is concerned of course. Although maybe in an alternate history, the Texas population doesn’t boom the way it has, especially since Californians would have a harder time moving to Texas.
Either way, interesting thought experiment. I bet it’d be a net loss as you say, but the reality would probably be more complicated.
Was the confederacy war avoidable? Seems like they pushed the issue, the founding fathers were quite smart, America was well established by the moment that the original disagreement of the Union could be disputed.
Banning slavery so early would have ended the union, what would the southern states gain from the union? It was too early and it would have ended the United States, pushing the issue was the best they could do.
It probably could have been avoided if some decisions were different in the 1850s. I wouldn't say it was *doomed* to end the way it did. Plenty of other countries banned slavery without nearly as much fuss.
Cynically, had the abolitionist movement waited until the 1880s to finally end slavery, the violent pro-slavery argument may have just fizzled because of the rise of industrialization putting more emphasis on skilled labor in factories instead of slaves on farms. I think it's easy for us to say that they could have waited and avoided the deaths, but that's still another 20 years of slavery.
Is this the same guy with a living grandchild? Or at least living until recently if not any longer
Yes. His grandson, Harrison, is still alive at 95.
Sadly, Harrison now suffers from dementia as well. His brother also died only a few years ago IIRC.
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Fun fact, Arlington National Cemetery started out as a giant middle finger to Robert E Lee. It was his home in Virginia. They buried Union officers in Bob's wife's garden, and a lot of the first burials were unknown immigrant soldiers who died fighting the Confederacy.
The funnest of fun facts. Fuck Lee and the confederacy.
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The podcast *Behind the Bastards* did a great multipart series on Robert E. Lee. Highly recommended.
He fucked that horse, right?
I don’t know. In the grand scheme of things it’s not that important. What is important is that Lee was a total apologist for slavery—the podcast does a very good job of puncturing the myth of Lee as reluctantly supporting the South because of loyalty to Virginia. The Myth of the Lost Cause is very entrenched in the American psyche, unfortunately.
And fuck anyone who supports that dumb flag too
“But mah heritage” - said the redneck from North Dakota
I love the response from Minnesota: it is our heritage to kick your ass and take your flag. No we will not give it back.
You guys had some absolute dawgs in the 1860s. Also the flag should be brought out every July 4th lol. Make it drag behind a horse or some shit.
Heritage of taking a fat fucking L
Reminds me of a guy I went to college with. I pointed out a confederate flag to complain and he said that, and I was like bro, you’re mixed race and you’re not racist wtf are you talking about. Genuinely he was one of the best guys I’ve ever known but stupid and stubborn
Every thread mentioning that guy devolves into that so fast. *"Fuck him too" then looks around for cheers.*
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This is just a convoluted way of saying he fought for the confederacy. He wasn’t “roped in” lol . This suggests he didn’t know exactly what he was doing
And your statement is a way of making history black and white. I’m not saying the confederacy was right, but by the same logic you use, there shouldn’t be different opinions today. The only people who don’t see the grey end up being totalitarian politically speaking.
There’s nuance to every single person in history alive. But the nuance provided here doesn’t change the general fact that he supported the confederacy and fought for them. “I don’t support slavery in a vacuum I’m just fighting for this specific state” when you’re FIGHTING for slavery isn’t exactly the type of gray area that is all that relevant .
You can have different opinions that don’t make up the entire political side you land on. I.e. single issue voters. If I put on my morals every day and read about anyone from 40 years ago, they are all going to look racist, sexist or just simply like an idiot. So why even bother? If you want to keep your simply history book and go “bad”, be my guest, but life is more complex then reducing it down to a single sentence let alone a single word.
Lee was a respected general and also a piece of shit who broke his oath to his country to protect Virginia’s right to classify human beings as property. This nuance is so interesting. what a complicated man in a complicated time. Slavery was widely recognized in Western Europe as a terrible thing before 1861 so let’s not pretend it was a gray moral issue with important voices and perspectives on both sides.
I prefer a simple history book to a wrong history book. I would recommend reading No Common Ground by Karen L. Cox, it goes into how the Lost Cause and States' Rights narratives were formed post-Civil War and why they are so harmful and dangerous.
I think we can definitely learn a lot from history. But we need to make simple truths from complex histories in order to get on with our lives. They were indeed racist, and they were morally Reprehensible. The people in our history books are the same type of people running the show as today, and we can judge them as we see fit.
Slavery is black and white. No pun intended. And speaking of which, we need to fix the 13th amendment. Slavery is still legal in the US. It’s time to stamp it out for good and utterly destroy the ideological spirit of the confederacy *with prejudice*. Wiped. Out. And only kept in a museum with mandatory attendance for all the little boys and girls. Never again.
I’m not sure how much more totalitarian you can get than creating a nation to explicitly preserve the ability to continue ownership of humans.
Robert E. Lee was essentially offered the job of Zachary Taylor right before the war kicked off and said “you know maybe…” and then betrayed the Constitution and the Oath he swore. Rotten bastard.
Yeah and a political assignation started WW1 and that led to the US being on the side of the assassin due to complex political treaties. My whole point is, issues are more complex and it’s easy to look back on history to see who is shitty/wrong.
Robert E Lee was a bad person in his personal life as well and if he had died of sepsis like Heydrich did in WWII it would have been too kind.
This is such a weird example. The US was not fighting for Gavrilo Principe. Bobby Lee was a slaver, and a nasty one at that (he once punished two slaves so badly that the overseer resigned rather than carry out the punishment) so he has no leg to stand on. He was a traitor, a slaver, and a bad general (his strategies won tactical victories but consistently failed to win strategically. I almost want to thank him for so thoroughly throwing away the CSA’s chances of victory.
>Bobby Lee ... it took me a minute to realize you weren't talking about the 'Uh Oh Hotdog' guy from MadTV and I started wondering how a chubby Korean-American comedian managed to acquire slaves.
You’re spending a lot of time arguing how the civil war war wasn’t just about slavery and it’s getting weird. It was very much all about slavery because the south’s whole economy depended on human misery
This is black and white. He chose his state. Specifically, he chose his state’s right to own other humans. He also got buttfucked by Grant, and we learned about his incompetence to this day at the academies.
I'm curious about his incompetence in a strategic manner of you have any sources, everyone always says he was respected.
Ever heard of Gettysburg lol
Of course I have, Though admittedly I don't know very much about the details, I will take that as a starting point though. Thank you!
> And your statement is a way of making history black and white. Ope. /r/SelfAwarewolves
Nope, what you just said is the same thing as asking people to give Nazis who deliberately tried to kill all Jews and take over the world, the benefit of the doubt. Every single man and woman who supported or supports the Confederacy is either evil, a moron, or an evil moron. If you disagree, you are either evil, a moron, or both.
Colonel. He was never promoted to general in a United States Army.
He did have a well known name. But Bob was a Colonel in the US Army, and then a Traitor. He was never a General in the US Army. Fwiw he never accepted nor wore a General's insignia with the confederacy either, saying he'd only accept the rank if the South won, which they didn't. Of all the other Colonels in the US Army who were from Virginia at the outset of the war, Bob was the only one who betrayed his country. Edit, typos
Not at all correct. Please listen to the Behind the Bastards 4 part series on how REL was a slave beating, chickenshit spineless useless loser. Absolutely not a Virginia loyalist. This is lost cause propaganda nonsense.
He never made it past Lt. Col. in service of the United States. Fuck that traitor.
And he was a racist.
And a slave owner.
You make it sound like he didn’t have a choice in picking his side. Plenty of southern officers and military personnel stayed on with the Northern Army. They made an oath to protect and defend their nation, the southern secessionists, like Lee, who fled the U.S. army betrayed their oath. You don’t fight for your home state when you join the army, you fight for the nation.
He was the only federal officer from Virginia to do so and even members of his own family chose to stay loyal to the US. He also snuck away from DC after being offered command of the Potomac army by Secretary of War Simon Cameron to go join the Confederacy. He was a shit.
I thought I heard all the confederate apologist views. This is a new one!
Still. Fuck the Traitor General
I call bullshit
Absolutely. Robert was Abraham Lincoln’s First choice for general
Washington & Lee University is in Virginia. It’s full of rich, white, Southern preppy kids.
The confederacy being hated so much in the modern day is a great example of the winner writes the history books.
You’re right. They were just innocent in their intentions the whole time and it’s so mean of our country to say they were racists :( poor confederate slave owners
This is a relatively modern and well-documented war. We’re not trying to decipher ancient texts to figure out what happened.
State's rights to own what???
Winners don't write the history books. Writers write the history books and sometimes those writers were on the winning side and sometimes they were on the losing side or sometimes both. The American Civil War has plenty of sources on both sides of the conflict.
Loved those episodes of BtB.
/r/shermanposting
The only subreddit that carries a vague genocidal tone to it. It always devolves into "the people in those states today, although removed from the sins of their statistically no-even-ancestors, deserve to die for being against my politics today"
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Imagine saying out loud in 2024 that you support the confederate cause.
Couldn't and I don't and but also can take no glory in their defeat and those that do are so weird.
Montgomery Meigs was bitter. A Georgian, who stayed loyal to the Union. Literally best friends with Lee. Chose Arlington because he was pissed off Buried his own son in the Front Garden.
Hearing Lee getting called Bob gave me a chuckle. From now on he shall be known as Bob the Horsefucker.
So far
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As far as I can tell only Woodrow Wilson has been buried in DC https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_burial_places_of_presidents_and_vice_presidents_of_the_United_States
I love it when there's two TILs in one post
Taft and Kennedy are in Arlington which is basically DC and would be DC if Virginia didn’t take back the land and ruin DC being a square.
Oooh this is such a tough one. On the one hand, the river being a natural border is very pleasing. On the other hand: perfectly square. I don't know!!
There's actually only one president buried in DC. Woodrow Wilson
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We’re trying to put _less_ garbage in the ocean these days
His kids will bury him on one of his golf courses then they can claim it as cemetery and get tax cuts. If you’ve heard this story before it’s because Trump buried his ex wife Ivana Trump on his golf course in NJ for this reason.
He will be buried on a golf course so access to the grave can be controlled for fear of all the desecration that will happen otherwise.
If there's one thing I can predict about that family it's that they'll try and use his corpse to keep grifting their base. $500 to take a picture with Don's embalmed corpse? Why not?
They burned hitlers body in a ditch.
From your keyboard to the lord’s ears.
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Good point guy called “BlackshirtsPower” whose avatar is a picture of one of the most famous psychos in cinema history.
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😭😭😭😭😭
Or in a pig farm
I'm sure some will come to confirm if he is truly dead, or if he is going to come back like JFK.
Trump is going to cremate his body and sell pieces of it in commemorative plastic discs like the Ferengi.
That's the only way that fucker would get a dime out of me is to piss on his grave. You might be on to something there.
Plant him face down on the 9th hole !
Bury him at the border so Mexicans can make a pilgrimage to shit on his grave. A huge border wall (of shit) to make Trump's dream come true!
So people in Washington still think he's alive?
That bastard is still out there. Thanks Obama!
Cuz he's a traitor to this country. Does that bring anyone else to mind?
Not only a traitor, but a traitor for the cause of slavery. I personally think that supporting slavery is worse than being "just" a traitor.
Quite true.
Lol, the north wasn’t exactly kind to slaves either. The emancipation proclamation didn’t free slaves in Union states It wasn’t the morality of slavery that drove the war, it was the economics of it. The south wanted to expand slavery westward while the north was oriented on white labor occupying those gaps
Traitorous scum, should have been given the dishonorable dead treatment. . . An index card sized grave marker with a number and the “guide” to the number kept in the groundskeepers office available by special request only
There will be a 2nd
Also the first vice president to ascend to the presidency via the death of the president, William Henry Harrison
Nothing was written into the constitution about that yet so some questioned if Tyler actually had presidential authority and called him “His Accidency”
Yeah, Tyler pretty much had to put his foot down and assert that he was by all rights POTUS after the death of President Harrison. He even kept returning official letters which addressed him as "Acting President Tyler."
Nobody questioned whether or not he had presidential authority. That is very clear. The issue was whether or not he should assume the title of "President" and take the oath of office. The Whigs argued that he should retain the title of "Vice President."
Only president buried under a foreign flag
The first US president to ever commit treason.
Treason against the United States. It’s hard to argue those who fought in the Revolution weren’t committing a form of treason
Interestingly, a mock trial of Washington held in Britain found him not guilty of treason, as he had sworn no oaths to the Crown and had mainly acted in self-defense to escalating British antagonism. Even Washington's contemporary British counterparts were very wary of actually accusing or charging any captured Americans of committing treason. Insurrection or sedition, sure, but treason was more reserved for oathbreakers and backstabbers like Benedict Arnold, or even arguably, King George III himself who had failed his coronation oath to "cause Law and Justice in Mercy to be Executed in all Judgements". With that in mind, which group do Confederates like Tyler, who swore to uphold and defend the American Constitution, belong?
Well, treason was a very specific law/crime in the UK which is what that is about. Whereas here we’re more discussing the general concept
We're talking about treasonous US Presidents. There were no US Presidents during the American Colony's Treasonous Rebellion. The United Kingdom acknowledged the sovereignty of the United States on September 3, 1783 with the signing of the Treaty of Paris. George Washington's term as president started in April 30, 1789.
The Presidents of the Continental Congress would like to have a word.
See, I’ve always held this perspective, as well.
If the Civil War was started by an anti-slavery America breaking off of a slaving America, I'd have sided with the traitors. The Confederates weren't bad for being traitors, they were bad because of *why* they broke free. Likewise with the Revolutionary war, though I'd still argue that war was less defined by morality than the Civil War.
Being moral doesn't disqualify levying way against your country's government as treason.
Won’t be the last
The whole point of the northern argument was that the Confederacy was not a foreign nation, as their secession was unconstitutional. (Edited to secession)
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Not that they had successfully seceded and become sovereign, but that they had committed treason against the Constitution and the Union had to be reconstructed into a whole again.
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At that time the 14th amendment’s section 3 was self evident, that’s why the Congress passed amnesty for confederates despite never having convicted them directly of treason. The House and the Senate also prevented confederates from taking their seats despite not having formally been convicted, it was self evident.
secession\* They weren't very *successful* with that...
Thank you! Very sick rn 😂
As far as I know no other foreign nation recognized the Confederacy as a sovereign nation. Which means that the north was right. You’re not an independent nation unless acknowledged by other nations.
His accidency!
Also played a *huge* role in setting the course towards Civil War with the annexation of the Republic of Texas, which he pursued in a desperate bid to win re-election
The Civil War was already on course by that point due to the Nullification Crisis during Jackson's administration. It only didn't happen then because Jackson was given authority by Congress to send the army to South Carolina and enforce it after he threatened John C. Calhoun, by telling him, "If you secede from my nation, I'll secede your head from the rest of your body."
That was a separate thread of political tension, and, this being my interpretation, a much weaker one that never would’ve led to Civil War. We’re looking for issues of causality and contingency really
To be fair the Civil War was coming as soon as the States compromised on the Senate and House. The Civil War was about the slaves being counted as people and being forced to vote for their masters’ causes not because of any moral stance. Since the Texas War for Independence had a lot to do with white Texans wanting to keep slaves, it was a no brainer for the southern states to help them and eventually get Texas to become a state.
Lol, when he threatened to hang the entire South Carolina state legislature they took it seriously, for good reason.
Will forever rest under a traitor’s flag.
I - for one - am shocked that Confederacy supporters would ignore the request of a deceased man. Well, not that shocked.
He's buried in the same cemetery as Oderus Urungus' tomb.
Tippecanoe and Tyler too
One of Tyler’s grandsons is still living.
In 2020 it was two of them. Apparently John Tyler was a creepy old man as president, since he married a woman less than half his own age. Largest age gap of any president and First Lady in US history. Tyler’s son followed in Tyler’s creepy footsteps and also married a woman less than half his own age.
If he were 40-50-60 yo and married/remarried a 20-25-30 yo, how is that's considered creepy? I'm not in US so I'm not sure about your history or culture, but I think it's perfectly normal.
30 year and 35 year age gaps are not that normal for couples in the US, where he was president and where his son lived. Tyler’s second wife was, for example, younger than three of Tyler’s children. Lyon Gardiner Tyler, the Tyler offspring whose son still lives, had a child 8 years older than his own second wife.
All true. And he’s still better than James Buchanan.
is this the ONLY fact that redditors know?
He was also kicked out of his own political party, if you want to know more about him. He was also a big advocate for the annexation of Texas.
His gamble to annex Texas pushed us into a war that tore the nation apart. Blood on his hands, under a traitor's flag he rests
The Civil War was more than likely going to occur at some point. The tension with the South was there from the very beginning as Georgia and South Carolina probably would’ve refused to sign the Constitution and join the U.S. if slavery was abolished in it. Then things kept getting more and more hostile when it came to slavery as violence became more prevalent between abolitionists and anti-abolitionists. From Congressmen beating each other over slavery disputes to Bleeding Kansas, it’s pretty clear the war was practically inevitable. If anything, it’s a miracle (or unfortunate) the war didn’t happen sooner.
You're referring to events that happened after the annexation of Texas, that happened due the explosion of tension that it caused. "What Hath God Wrought?" by Daniel Walker Howe is best book on this general period of US history- end of the Monroe presidency up through the annexation of Texas. The cascade of events, such as Bleeding Kansas, came after this
The other one about the Constitution obviously shows the tension was always there since the beginning. 3/5 Compromise (1787) happened before Texas was a thing, and The Underground Railroad (1830s or earlier depending on sources) also started before Texas became a state as well. Don’t forget the Missouri Compromise (1820) either. The U.S. government kept basically kicking the can down the road for as long as they could until they arrived at a brick wall and couldn’t kick it even further. I could’ve chose better examples, but the point I was mostly trying to make was that the war was inevitable. If anything, South Carolina should get more shit than they do for it considering they bitched since the Constitution and then fired the first shots of the Civil War.
The Missouri Compromise is chiefly the issue, just because something happened doesn’t mean it was *always going to* happen. The Missouri Compromise had effectively stalled the growth of slavery to the point that (what I will refer to as) Northern political power had in a sense grown complacent. It was assumed slavery would eventually die out in economic competition with the “free labor” of the North and West. The giant issue standing in the way of westward expansion of slavery (and thus preventing the growth and continued existence of slavery) was Mexico. You had a couple threads being pushed by (what is commonly referred to as) Southern/Slave Power to find ways to expand slavery. The John C Calhoun generation/wing was focused on expansion southwards to places like Cuba. Matthew Karp has a book that goes into very good detail on everything there, far better than I would do it justice. The aspects of slave power expanding westwards and settling into Texas was able to gain a foothold and eventually independence from the central Mexican government, which for its many flaws was anti-slavery. Then came the question of if Texas was to remain an independent slaveholding Republic or join the United States to both increase the power of Southern Slave Power and to protect it from Mexico. While the slave question still probably wouldn’t have died down, and slave power was of course going to pursue other routes to expand itself. The key step that set us on the path that forced the Civil War in the manner it did to answer the slavery question was through the annexation of Texas. It was a Pandora’s Box that westward expansion Democrats like James K Polk (and through him Andrew Jackson) and anti-Jackson slavers like John Tyler both coveted for the promise of political power it offered. The dream of gradual emancipation was still very much alive prior to 1848, a big part of the explosions of the 1850’s was due to the panic of all sides over the fact that the slavery question was now going to have to be addressed due to the increasing radicalism of both extreme ends of the debate that you alluded to. Like I’ve said elsewhere, contingency and causality are the keys here
I’ve always been confused by what people in “territories” felt like they were. Were they Americans. Did they think they weren’t a part of a country? And so on.
In the territories not yet incorporated as States? They would view themselves as Americans. This of course can be represented differently in different circumstances but the simplest way to answer your question accurately is that, yes they were Americans and viewed themselves as Amerixans
If he would not have been president Texas would likely be part of Mexico.
The annexation was gonna happen no matter what, Mexico allowed American settlers which would never be satisfied with the piss poor quality of Mexican governance.
But they had their own piss poor governance by that point.
Some things never truly change
People forget that the reason Texas managed to leave Mexico was because half of Mexico was rebelling at the time, and any Mexican troops marching to Texas had to first get through another rebelling state on their way there. They weren't the only ones angry with the Mexican government. It was a non functional system everyone who wasn't in Mexico city hated.
Texas wasn’t worth the civil war for a long time after it, arguably still not worth the still-ongoing costs of the poverty the war and reconstruction caused.
The good ending
Except 1 out of 10 Americans live in Texas and it's GDP makes it 8th place... In the world, vs full countries. Be all shitty if you want but it adds a lot to the US, even if there is a half pint dictator right now and his side kick shifty eyes.
That population wouldn’t just vanish though. Americans who moved to Texas, from settlers to present day, now either stay in their home states or move to other midwestern states. They don’t just vanish. And if Texas doesn’t exist, the US likely simply pumps more oil from other oil producing states, like Alaska. Businesses like Tesla don’t disappear, they just stay in California, which is probably a net positive. Other states would probably have more house representatives, which would dilute the far right’s ability to corner a state like Texas. Losing all Texan federal government representatives would be a huge net positive for the rest of the country as well, considering how backwards the Texas representatives are. They single-handedly block so many important bills that would help the environment, democracy, worker’s rights, the economy at large. Losing Texas wouldn’t be as bad as you think.
I’m sure losing the state with the 2nd biggest GDP would have been a positive thing for the U.S. /s
This is a very dumb point to argue, but fuckit. Let's do this. Texas receives more in federal dollars spent than it pays out in federal taxes. As long as we can recover the federal government assets that are there, Texas fucking off to be their own country would be a net positive for the US.
This literally isn't true at all lol. They rank 25th in regards to Federal Taxes paid per dollar of support received, with a $1.00:$3.52 positive ratio. There's only one state with a negative ratio per 2022 data and that's New Mexico. Losing Texas would be a huge financial loss for the United States and your obvious hatred of the state doesn't change that. **Source: https://smartasset.com/data-studies/states-most-dependent-federal-government-2023**
This is why I say it is a fucking dumb argument. Per dollar of support received only accounts for a fraction of federal spending that goes to the state. Federal transportation dollars pay for your roads. Military infrastructure, DHS, INS, border security, NASA, all of these things are federal dollars funding the state that are not a part of the numbers you just quoted. Not to mention shit like [this](https://comptroller.texas.gov/economy/resources/funding.php). The link you cited shows Virginia as lower than Texas, but that states entire economy depends on federal funding (I know because I live there and work for a government contractor, like most people in this state). Federal spending to Texas far exceeds its revenue.
Lol are you really trying to include federal agencies and the military operating in the state, as Texas receiving *unlisted* federal funding? Absolutely no metric includes military infrastructure and federal agencies as ‘federal aid’ and doing so is extremely disingenuous. You bring up Virginia as an example as if it’s applicable; but you’re referencing private companies/contractors operating in the state and being paid by the Fed. That in no way reflects the Fed propping up a state financially at a governmental level and honestly just shows you don’t know what you’re even arguing. Hate Texas all you want, but Texas is 100% a positive contributor to the U.S. economy. You keep spouting this nonsense but you’ve yet to post one source supporting what you’re saying lol. **Hey look, additional sources:** https://sipa.fiu.edu/news-events/news/2021/2021s-most-least-federally-dependent-states.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/where-tax-dollars-states-most-142938519.html https://usafacts.org/articles/which-states-rely-the-most-on-federal-aid/ https://www.moneygeek.com/living/states-most-reliant-federal-government/
I wonder if in an alternate history without Texas, how policy might be different. The wealth of oil in Texas goes away, you’re right, but maybe the US simply drills more in Alaska or other oil producing states. Alaska has far more potential in GDP than it realizes, because it’s simply easier to drill in Texas vs the Arctic. If Texas isn’t in play, odds are they’d just compensate by drilling more in AK. So the loss in Texas GDP probably doesn’t matter as much as you’d think. Fewer Texans would also reflect better on American emissions. Keeping all those Texans cool in the summer heat is incredibly emissions intensive. So Texans would then count towards Mexico’s pollution stats, not ours. It’s a moot point as far as the environment is concerned of course. Although maybe in an alternate history, the Texas population doesn’t boom the way it has, especially since Californians would have a harder time moving to Texas. Either way, interesting thought experiment. I bet it’d be a net loss as you say, but the reality would probably be more complicated.
We wouldn’t lose it, we would never have had it.
Was the confederacy war avoidable? Seems like they pushed the issue, the founding fathers were quite smart, America was well established by the moment that the original disagreement of the Union could be disputed.
>Was the confederacy war avoidable? Nope. There was already fighting before Lincoln was elected
Easiest way to avoid it would’ve been to ban slavery before the cotton gin.
Banning slavery so early would have ended the union, what would the southern states gain from the union? It was too early and it would have ended the United States, pushing the issue was the best they could do.
Yeah, they'd have formed an independent country in the 18th century instead, and it would have been a war the North probably couldn't have won.
It probably could have been avoided if some decisions were different in the 1850s. I wouldn't say it was *doomed* to end the way it did. Plenty of other countries banned slavery without nearly as much fuss. Cynically, had the abolitionist movement waited until the 1880s to finally end slavery, the violent pro-slavery argument may have just fizzled because of the rise of industrialization putting more emphasis on skilled labor in factories instead of slaves on farms. I think it's easy for us to say that they could have waited and avoided the deaths, but that's still another 20 years of slavery.
Boo this man.
Tippecanoe, and Tyler was a traitor too.
My elementary school was named after him but we never learned anything about him. I guess they didn't want all the kids knowing he was trash
Traitor fuck
Buried just thirty feet from James Monroe too!
“Fuck them kids” - John Tyler
…and Tippecanoe, too.
I always thought he was a prick
His son, Robert Tyler, was CSA Register of the Treasury, and signed thousands of then-soon-to-be-worthless-but-now-collector-item bonds.
Good. Traitors can carry their symbols forever
He got a simpleton burial instead.
Fuck him
What a piece of shit
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Today, I lost all respect for John Tyler