This post deals with two books on the “Lost Cause.”
Thomas J. DiLorenzo presents the case for the Lost Cause in The Real Lincoln: A New Look at Abraham
Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War, while Edward H. Bonekemper
argues against the Lost Cause in The Myth
of the Lost Cause: Why the South Fought the Civil War and Why the North Won.
What is the Lost Cause? The basic tenants are as follows: the War of Northern Aggression had nothing to do with slavery; the South did nothing to provoke war; the Constitution included a right to secede and the South should have been allowed to leave peacefully; antebellum life in the South was prosperous, dignified, and just; slavery was already dying; Robert E. Lee deserved deification, U. S. Grant deserved demonization, the North deserves condemnation for engaging in total war; the South had no chance of winning, and most important of all, Lincoln was a despot who started the war by invading South.
Basically, the Lost Cause is innocence victimized.
(These are research books for Maelstrom, a sequel to Tempest at Dawn.)
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