Philosophy: A Just War? The US Conflict 1861-1865

[Truthstalker]

I am avoiding calling it either the Civil War or the War of Northern Aggression.

On the basis of Catholic theology concerning war and social justice, which side was more correct?

 

[RobNY]

I am avoiding calling it either the Civil War or the War of Northern Aggression.

On the basis of Catholic theology concerning war and social justice, which side was more correct?

Thomas Aquinas, ST II-II, Question 42, A.2, On the Contrary and I Answer that (taken from Thomas Aquinas On Law, Morality, and Politics).

Is Rebellion Always a Mortal Sin?

On the Contrary, the Apostle in 2 Cor. 12:20 prohibits rebellion along with other sins that are mortal. Therefore, rebellion is a mortal sin.

I answer that, as I have said, rebellion is contrary to the unity of citizens (i.e., the people) of a political community or kingdom. But Augustine says in The City of God that wise persons define the people as “a popular assemply legally constituted and bound by common interest, not any popular assembly.” And so the unity contrary to rebellion is evidently one of law and common interest. Therefore, rebellion is obviously contrary to both justice and the common good. And so rebellion is by its nature a mortal sin and more serious insofar as the common good, which rebellion subverts, surpasses private goods, which private disputes subvert.

And the leaders of rebellions indeed first and chiefly incur the sin of rebellion, and they sin most seriously. Second, supporters of rebellion who disturb the common good also incur the sin of rebellion. But we should not call those resisting the rebels and defending the common good seditious, just as we do not call those defending themselves brawlers, as I have said before.

I figured this would spark discussion.

As a note: Aquinas has a far different view of government than was current at the time. For Aquinas and for philosphers classically, the greatest good and the ultimate end were essential in finding what was the true state. The purpose of government, in no small part, was to help make citizens good. By the time we get to Locke and Hobbes with their social contract theories the ideas of greatest good and ultimate end aren’t really accepted, and the purpose of government, at least for Locke, shifts to being for protection of property. As a result there is separation of what is in the public sphere and what is in the private sphere-- and so government is no longer concerned chiefly with the good, which is the concern of citizens privately. The government of the United States is obviously influenced by Locke. Let the discussion begin.

-Rob

 

[Truthstalker]

There is also the whole question of a moral equivalency between 1776 and 1861…

 

[RobNY]

There is also the whole question of a moral equivalency between 1776 and 1861…

I was wondering when someone was going to bring that up, as I was posting. In any case, they are two distinct wars, and the legitimacy or lack thereof of one has no bearing on the other.

Note: I actually took no position in my first post.

-Rob

 

[mrteachersir]

I am going to posit that no, it was not. When the Southern attacked US troops at Ft. Sumter, they believed they were attacking a foreign army on their soil. This is absurd, because the fort was already US property and I’m guessing the Army didn’t pay VA taxes on it (so it wasn’t really a foreign incursion). In addition, there was no threat to a greater loss of CSA life by the presence of US troops at Fort Sumter, making military incursion unnecessary. On the other hand, Lincoln understood that to allow the Union to dissolve rather that to unite was foolish. So ardently did he believe he was saving something so dear to him, that he risked the lives of hundreds of thousands of young men. In no means would allowing the Southern States to secede have caused millions to die (which would have been necessary to justify such a bloody war).

Contrast that with the potential and supposed threat Iraqi WMD (in Al Qaeda hands) posed along with the deaths of 3000 innocents on 9/11 and we have a different story . In that case, merely standing by while Saddam (a vocal international terrorist supporter and anti-American) developed the WMD we thought he had and sold them to OBL would be more disasterous than the 3000 Americans killed in the war and the 50,000 Iraqis killed (though not by Americans). I won’t get into the rest of that anology here, but on that point, the potential loss of life by just letting Saddam continue his violations of the UN would outwiegh any estimated cost of lives by removing him.

If the war was over slavery, then its a different story, but it wasn’t.

In a similar vein, I believe the Revolutionary War to be immoral and unjust. While an ardent American patriot (who lives in the Northern States), I see the Revolutionary War as a child’s tantrum: we weren’t getting what we want, so we complained and took matters into our own hands. Does that mean that the Revolution was wrong, or that Washington and Jefferson and Adams were bad, bourgeois oppressors? No. Their ideas on independence and freedom and liberty were valuable. Does that mean the British were blameless? No. The Quartering Act and the Intollerable Acts and the Townshend Acts were gross usurpations of government authority, and the colonists were right to oppose them, not rebel. That said, it doesn’t make the war just.

 

[Verisimilitude]

Yes, I would say it was a just war with respect to (re-)forming the more perfect union.

Untill a particular time, Heaven will never be had on Earth so we are relagated to what we can come up with untill that time. The Souths version of that was contrary to the Norths (Davis vs Lincoln), and ultimately contray to the Founding Fathers view of this Union.

I tend to think the spirit of America is Just being founded on certain principles. When those ideals are at risk as they were in 1861, the action taken to protect that spirit is just.

 

[Ahimsa]

If the war was over slavery, then its a different story, but it wasn’t.

 

[clmowry]

In answering this question isn’t it necessary to analyze the decision based on the information available to the person making the decision to go to war at that time without appeals to the actual results of the war or later discoveries?

To over emphasize the point, I could argue that had the union not been maintained then we wouldn’t have had the strength to intervene in WWII and Hitler would have caused a greater evil, therefore the war was just.

Chuck

 

[DanteAlighieri]

In answering this question isn’t it necessary to analyze the decision based on the information available to the person making the decision to go to war at that time without appeals to the actual results of the war or later discoveries?

To over emphasize the point, I could argue that had the union not been maintained then we wouldn’t have had the strength to intervene in WWII and Hitler would have caused a greater evil, therefore the war was just.

Chuck

Wow, that is a stretch!

I agree with your point. We don’t have the privelege of deciding after the fact whether our actions are just; we must decide before taking them.

Peace,
Dante

 

[JimG]

In answering this question isn’t it necessary to analyze the decision based on the information available to the person making the decision to go to war at that time without appeals to the actual results of the war or later discoveries?

To over emphasize the point, I could argue that had the union not been maintained then we wouldn’t have had the strength to intervene in WWII and Hitler would have caused a greater evil, therefore the war was just.

Chuck

Looking at it from hindsight, that’s a good point. The confederate states could argue that the United States was, after all, a voluntary association of states. And that just as they had freely entered the union, they could freely leave.

But that would have created two nations, rather than one, with all the subsequent historical consequences that might have entailed.

 

[StCsDavid]

Civil War historian Shelby Foote wrote that when a Northern soldier asked a Southern soldier why he was fighting the Southerner answered, “Because you’re down here.” That reflected the mindset of most of the soldiers in the South. They felt invaded, and later felt and were defeated. Having grown up in the South I can tell you that sentiment has never really faded completely.

A just war? In my opinion, no. The only casualty at Ft. Sumter was an Army mule. The war was fought over economic reasons. Both sides were culpable, though I believe Lincoln probably had the more noble cause of uniting what had been a fragmented collection of states into a more cohesive union even if half of that union was forced back into the fold against its will. I’m not so sure the South would not have eventually rejoined the North anyway simply for the economic advantages. If that were the case, was all the bloodshed really necessary? I can only justify it in that it freed the slaves, but that was kind of an afterthought for Lincoln, a blessed one at that, but a secondary concern to him all the same.

Texas may never have joined either side as it could have likely stood on its own. I’ve always thought the leaders of Texas at that time saw an opportunity to be a very big fish in a small pond had the South prevailed.

Good question.