Secession

Well, I want to have a good rant and rave here, but I feel too tired to begin, because I have been here so many times before.

Yesterday I was sitting on a sun-soaked manor house lawn in Hampshire, drinking tea, and listening to a guy from New Jersey agree with a buddy of mine who hails from Texas that the secessionists in the Civil War had the better argument. It was a surreal moment, to be sure. They listened with scorn to my protestations to the contrary which were, I confess, feeble.

Why? Well, for one thing, I struggled with a student of mine all last term who had been reading neo-Confederate, ah, nonsense, and I am tired from constant battle against people for whom evidence is a speedbump rather than a signpost. Moreover, speaking as a historian of Colonial America/American Revolution/Post-fetal American Republic, I realize now that everyone in that period could really care less about the question, and if they did, they were revolted by the idea. The more letters I read from officers in the American Revolution, the more I realize that saying "Secession" to them was like saying "Democratic Republic" to Osama bin Laden.

Anyway, I am weary of all this. Take it away, Dr. Curmudgeon.