Re: The Civil War

More on this post. (BTW, Tony, I don’t give a rat’s glutius about whether a term “turns people off” or doesn’t “promote discourse”. If I cared about that, I wouldn’t be a libertarian.)

Some readers offered some interesting suggestions. Johan Ridenfeldt reminds me, Walter Block (who is fleeing Ivan as I type) called it “the First War of Southern Secession“.

Another favorite (from Burger King Markus) is:

1776 Revolution: the War To Switch Mercantilist Masters (NSK: this could also be used to describe the Civil War)

1860-something: the War Of Yankee Bloodlust. Daddy likes!Burger King also wrote:

Once I realized that the American “Civil War” hadn’t been a civil war, I started calling it the War of Secession. It’s short and people know what I’m talking about, even if they’re puzzled at first that I don’t use the standard name. What I don’t like about any of DiLorenzo’s preferred names is that they immediately take a stand on the “Civil War” — one with which I now agree — and that keeps any dialog or debate partners from using them. War of Secession seems neutral, while it also disarms the associations with “Civil War”. [NSK NOTE: I don’t care about “keeping dialog open” etc. I like to use the best term, period. If it turns off some people then it saves me the trouble of wasting time talking to PC, humorless idiots.]

Similarly, when Robert LeFevre convinced me (through Mises.org/Media) that the “American Revolution” wasn’t a revolution, I started calling it the War of Independence, as it had once been known. Again, people know what I’m referring to without getting their defenses up.

Now the War of Independence was also a war of secession, and the War of
Secession was of course a war for independence, but I have yet to encounter any confusion from my use of those terms. And in fact, I like that descriptive cross-over because it helps eventually make the point that the two wars had strong parallels, with mercantilists on the anti-secession side both times and for similar reasons.

An anonymous chap writes,

The key is to use a name that tells the truth without sounding too contrived.

For accuracy, how about something like The Yankee Invasion of America?

But my favorite, which I picked up from a Southern friend, is The Late Unpleasantness. It concedes nothing and it’s catchy. It doesn’t make the listener defensive.

Again, I don’t see the benefit of not making someone defensive. Screw that touchy feely stuff. Now John whose last name is allegedly Bolstad writes:

I enjoyed your blog posting on names for the “Civil War”. I can think of a good reason for not using “The War of Northern Agression”: it doesn’t uniquely identify the war! About 20 years ago I went to Mexico City, and toured the history museum. They referred to the Mexican-American war as the “War of Northern Agression”.

Some character purportedly going by the monicker of Tony Pivetta wrote:

How about “Lincoln’s Cruel, Wicked and Unnecessary War”? It would be a fitting tribute to U.S. Representative Clement L. Vallandigham of Ohio, whose use of such terminology in a speech before the Congress got him deported. Too cumbersome you say? OK, let’s just go with “Lincoln’s War.”

Gil “The Gilster” Guillory writes,

OK, what’s needed here is a proper name that is not so darn long. I think part of the reason that folks use “Civil War” is because of the short form. How about:

The Slavery-Tariff War (I agree with Jeff Hummell that the South seceeded because of slavery, but the north attacked because of the tariff.)

The Union-Confederate War
The USA-CSA War
The War Over Union
Lincoln’s War

Mark Fulwiler, an alleged attorney, writes,

How about the Uncivil War?

One reputedly known as Sam Irvin said,

Loved your discussion of the various labels applied to “that” war fought in the 1860’s. However, it occurs to me that even the term “War to Prevent Southern Independence” is lacking inasmuch as once something has been done, it’s too late to prevent it from happening. Allow me to suggest “War to Reverse Southern Independence” or even “War to Subjugate the South.”

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3:02 pm on September 15, 2004