  Perhaps it was necessary for brother to fight brother to determine the course in history our nation would take. Tragedy often walks with greatness; it required a terrible war before America could continue with confidence down the road of progress. The Civil War was the watershed—both a beginning and an end—in our history, and many legacies of that war keep it ever-present in our thoughts. The Civil War lives in battle names now so much a part of our heritage: Bull Run, Shiloh, Antietam, Fredericksburg, Stone’s River, Chancellorsville, Vicksburg, Gettysburg, Chickamauga, Atlanta, the Wilderness, and the Crater. These grounds, drenched in human blood, are as sacred as our most revered cemeteries. —It lives in the crosses that mark the final resting places for thousands of American patriots. Most of these soldiers died in the flower of youth. We shall never know what contributions their numbers might have made to politics, literature, the sciences, the arts—to American life in general. In this respect was the conflict of the 1860’s a great calamity. Acclaimed by many as the best likeness of “Stonewall” Jackson, this equestrian statue is on the grounds of the Manassas National Military Park. —It lives in the many statues and monuments erected across our land. These stone images stand as silent sentries of our past. They are reminders of the cost of what today belongs to all Americans. —It lives in the Congressional Medal of Honor, given birth by that war, and in Memorial Day, which sprang from the heartache caused by that war. —It lives in the American Red Cross, whose origins date from Clara Barton and her tender nursing of wounded Federal soldiers. —It lives in the songs given popularity by men of blue and gray: “Dixie,” “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” “The Bonnie Blue Flag,” “The Battle Cry of Freedom,” “Lorena,” “The Yellow Rose of Texas,” “Maryland, My Maryland,” “When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again,” “Tenting Tonight on the Old Camp Ground,” “Home, Sweet Home,” and many others. This 1862 Army Model was the first Congressional Medal of Honor ever struck. The present Medal is quite different from its predecessor. —It lives in the extinction of slavery, which Robert E. Lee once termed a heavy impediment to the whole Southern people. —It lives in the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments to the U. S. Constitution, which promise equality without racial limitations. —It lives most of all in the unity of the American people. Until 1860 it was customary to say “the United States are”. After 1865 it was more correct to say “the United States is”. Today we acknowledge this change by a phrase in the Pledge of Allegiance: “... one nation, under God, indivisible....” The Civil War did preserve the old Union with all of its virtues and all of its defects. But at the same time, as Lincoln and others hoped, the war gave birth to something better: a new Union, stronger and more enduring. The idea of secession ended forever with the Southern Confederacy; the oneness of modern America became reality with Appomattox and Durham Station. Therefore, one cannot and should not forget the tragedy, courage, and lessons of the Civil War. If we would overlook the 1860’s that endowed us with unity, we must also ignore the 1770’s that brought us freedom. For unity and freedom are the bedrocks on which America rests—just as they are our hopes for the years yet to come. |
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