The Civil War at 150

Despite its natural overlap with American constitutionalism and a thoroughly classical liberal antislavery tradition, the Civil War can be a treacherous, and even hostile, subject matter for classical liberal historians to navigate. Even a century and a half later the subject remains an emotional one, tied to complex moral and economic questions, iconic historical figures, regional and national identities, and race. The war itself has a legacy among historians of attracting veritable partisans to one of the two belligerents, yet neither side offers a particularly welcoming home for classical liberal purists. While it largely emerged from a tradition of decentralized federalism, secession itself being a logical extension of Jeffersonian states rights, any libertarian inclination of enthusiasm for the Confederacy is inescapably tempered by its expressly pro-slavery designs and the moral abhorrence of the plantation system. The Union makes an equally problematic, if less frequently admitted, cause for libertarians to champion - not for want of its ultimate anti-slavery results but in its highly problematic means of attainment and, perhaps more importantly, its lasting centralizing effects upon the federal government. In the subsequent 150 years, proponents of the income tax, militarized societies and preemptive warfare, military tribunals, protectionism, fluid constitutional constructions, and any number of other similar policies have enlisted the Union as a "virtuous" precedent for their causes. The paradoxical implications of the Civil War as both a liberating and centralizing event have troubled classical liberal thinkers since the cannon fire ceased in 1865...more