Thursday, July 04, 2013

The Fourth of July

The Declaration of Independence, 1823 William Stone facsimile.
237 years ago today, the Continental Congress adopted and promulgated the Declaration of Independence at Independence Hall.  The Congress had voted for independence on July 2nd.
Vicksburg, Mississippi literally dug in during the seige.
Exactly 87 years later and 150 years ago today, the Union Army of the Tennessee under U.S. Grant followed up the Army of the Potomac's spectacular victory at Gettysburg with the capture of Vicksburg, Mississippi.  Now the Mississippi River belonged entirely to the Union, and the Confederacy was cut in half.  The Civil War was by no means over; there would still be terrible battles and thousands more men would die.  But the Confederacy would never recover from the blows of that fateful first week of July, 1863.

Long live the United States!

3 comments:

  1. Not everyone shares your enthusiasm for the United States. If the Confederacy had been allowed to secede peacefully like they wanted to do (and as they were Constitutionally allowed to do), we probably wouldn't be dealing with gay marriage and abortion like we are now. Extrapolating on my high school and college history, I would even say that chattel slavery itself would have been abolished relatively soon in the Confederacy, and perhaps a peaceful reunification with the Federal government would have been effected.

    Michael Val Hietter

    ReplyDelete
  2. Not everyone shares your enthusiasm for the United States. If the Confederacy had been allowed to secede peacefully like they wanted to do (and as they were Constitutionally allowed to do), we probably wouldn't be dealing with gay marriage and abortion like we are now. Extrapolating on my high school and college history, I would even say that chattel slavery itself would have been abolished relatively soon in the Confederacy, and perhaps a peaceful reunification with the Federal government would have been effected.

    Michael Val Hietter

    ReplyDelete