Encyclopedia
The
Confederate States of America was the government formed by eleven southern states of the
USA between 1861 and 1865. These eleven states declared their secession from the United States. The United States of America held that secession was illegal, and refused to recognize the Confederacy.
The
American Civil War broke out when Confederate batteries fired on the United States Army's
Fort Sumter in
Charleston, South Carolina, in April 1861. No European powers officially recognized the CSA but British commercial interests sold it warships and operated blockade runners to help supply it. French and other European ports also gave safe haven to the ships of the Confederate Navy. All but two major battles took place in Confederate territory, as the CSA military was slowly overwhelmed by the much larger Union forces and choked by a naval blockade. When
Robert E. Lee and the other Confederate generals surrendered their armies in the spring of 1865, the CSA collapsed and slaves were freed. A difficult decade-long process of
Reconstruction gave civil rights and the vote to the freedmen, and readmitted the states to Congress.
History
Secession process Dec 1860-May 1861
Seven states seceded by March 1861:
...
,
After Lincoln called for troops four more states seceded:
Pro-Secession Factions in two states formed Confederate governments and seceded, though these states were also claimed by Union governments:
Following
Abraham Lincoln's election as President of the United States in 1860 on a platform that opposed the extension of slavery, seven slave southern states chose to secede from the United States and declared that the Confederate States of America was formed on February 4, 1861.
Jefferson Davis was selected as its first
President on February 9 and inaugurated on February 18.
In what later came to be known as the Cornerstone Speech C.S. Vice President
Alexander Stephens, declared that the “cornerstone” of the new government "rest[ed] upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery—subordination to the superior race—is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth." By contrast, Confederate President Jefferson Davis made no explicit reference to slavery at all in his inaugural address. However, in addition to the legal ordinances of secession adopted by each of the seceding states, the Deep South states of South Carolina, Mississippi, Georgia, and Texas all issued declarations of causes, each of which identified the threat to slavery and slaveholders’ rights as a major cause of secession.
Texas joined the Confederate States of America on March 2 and then replaced its governor,
Sam Houston, when he refused to take an oath of allegiance to the Confederate States of America. These seven states seceded
1 from the
United States and took control of military/naval installations, ports, and custom houses within their boundaries, triggering the
American Civil War.
A month after the Confederate States of America was formed, on March 4, 1861, Abraham Lincoln was sworn in as
President of the United States. In his inaugural address, he argued that the
Constitution had made the United States a
more perfect union than under the earlier
Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union-- and likewise that "the Union is much older than the Constitution," being, he claimed, 1) formed by the Articles of Association in 1774, 2) made a nation via the
Declaration of Independence in 1776, and 3) "declared to be perpetual" under the
Articles of Confederation in 1778 . As such, he claimed that the Constitution was a binding contract supremely bestowing national authority to the Union over the states, and that therefore "no state by its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union," calling the secession "legally void". The legal issue of whether or not the Constitution was a binding contract which authorized federal force against any state, has-- surprisingly, for such a controversial issue and incident-- rarely been addressed by government, law professionals, media or academics, leading by many to the conclusion from that it was a "suppressed concept" in American politics during the
Reconstruction era and afterwards; and thus to this day, it remains a hotly debated concept. Lincoln stated that he had no intent to invade Southern states-- except that which was "necessary" to maintain possession of federal property and collection of various federal taxes, duties and imposts. His speech closed with a plea for acceptance of the bonds of union.
On April 12, Confederate troops, following orders from the Secretary of War, fired upon the federal troops occupying
Fort Sumter in
Charleston, South Carolina, forcing their surrender. Following the
Battle of Fort Sumter, Lincoln called for all remaining states in the Union to send troops to recapture Sumter and other forts, defend the capital , and preserve the Union. Most Northerners believed that a quick victory for the Union would crush the rebellion, and so Lincoln only called for volunteers for 90 days of duty. Lincoln's call for troops resulted in four more states voting to secede.
Virginia,
Arkansas,
Tennessee, and
North Carolina joined the Confederacy for a total of 11. Once Virginia joined the Confederate States, the Confederate capital was moved from
Montgomery, Alabama to
Richmond, Virginia.
Kentucky was a border state during the American Civil War and, for a time, had two state governments, one supporting the Confederacy and one supporting the Union. The original government of
Kentucky remained in the Union after a short-lived attempt at neutrality, but a rival faction from that state was accepted as a member of the Confederate States of America. A more complex situation surrounds the Missouri Secession, but, in any event, Missouri was also considered a member of the Confederate States of America. With Kentucky and Missouri, the number of Confederate states is thus sometimes considered to be 13.
The five tribal governments of the
Indian Territory—which became
Oklahoma in 1907—also mainly supported the Confederacy, provided troops and one General officer.
Citizens at Mesilla and Tucson in the southern part of New Mexico Territory formed a secession convention and voted to join the Confederacy on March 16, 1861 and appointed Lewis Owings as the new territorial Governor. In July, Mesilla appealed to Confederate troops in El Paso, Texas under Lt. Col. John Baylor for help in removing the Union army under Maj. Isaac Lynde that was stationed nearby. The Confederates under Baylor defeated Lynde at the Battle of Mesilla on July 27th. After the battle Baylor established a territorial government for the Confederate
Arizona Territory and named himself Governor. In 1862 a New Mexico Campaign was launched under General
Sibley to take the northern half of New Mexico. Confederates briefly occupied the territorial capital of
Santa Fe but, defeated at Glorietta Pass in March, the Confederates retreated and never returned.
The northernmost slave states were contested territory but the Union won control by 1862. In 1861, martial law was declared in
Maryland to block attempts at secession.
Delaware, also a slave state, never considered secession, nor did the capital of the U.S.,
Washington, D.C.. In 1861, during the war, a unionist legislature in
Wheeling, Virginia seceded from Virginia, claiming 48 counties, and joined the
United States in 1863 as the state of
West Virginia, with a constitution that gradually abolished slavery.
Attempts to secede from the Confederate States of America by some counties eastern Tennessee were held in check by Confederate declarations of martial law.
The surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia by General
Lee at
Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865 is generally taken as the end of the Confederate States. President Davis was captured at Irwinville, Georgia on May 10 and the remaining Confederate armies surrendered by June 1865. The last Confederate flag was hauled down, on
CSS Shenandoah on November 6, 1865.
Government and politics
Constitution
The
Confederate States Constitution provides much insight into the motivations for secession from the Union. While much of it was a word-for-word duplicate of the
United States Constitution, it reflected a stronger philosophy of states' rights, curtailing the power of the central authority, and also contained explicit protection of the institution of
slavery, though international slave trading was prohibited. The Confederate government was prohibited from instituting protective tariffs. The Confederate government was also prohibited from using revenues collected in one state for funding internal improvements in another state. The Confederates asked God's blessing
At the drafting of the Constitution of the Confederate States of America, a few radical proposals such as allowing only slave states to join and the reinstatement of the Atlantic slave trade were turned down. The Constitution did not specifically include a provision allowing states to secede, although the Preamble spoke of each state "acting in its sovereign and independent character".
The President of the Confederate States of America was to be elected to a six-year term and could not be reelected. The only president was
Jefferson Davis; the Confederate States of America was defeated by the federal government before he completed his term. One unique power granted to the Confederate president was the ability to subject a bill to a line item veto, a power held by some state governors. The
Confederate Congress could overturn either the general or the line item vetoes with the same two thirds majorities that are required in the
US Congress.
Printed currency in the forms of bills and stamps was authorized and put into circulation, although by the individual states in the Confederacy's name. The government considered issuing Confederate coinage. Plans, dies and 4 "proofs" were created, but a lack of bullion prevented any public coinage.
Although the preamble refers to "each State acting in its sovereign and independent character", it also refers to the formation of a "permanent federal government". Also, although slavery was protected in the constitution, it also prohibited the importation of new slaves from outside the Confederate States of America .
Civil liberties
The Confederacy actively used the military to arrest people suspected of loyalty to the United States. They arrested at about the same rate as the U.S.A. did. Neely found 2,700 names of men arrested and estimated the full list was much longer. Neely concludes, "The Confederate citizen was not any freer than the Union citizen--and perhaps no less likely to be arrested by military authorities. In fact, the Confederate citizen may have been in some ways less free than his Northern counterpart. For example, freedom to travel within the Confederate states was severely limited by a domestic passport system." [Neely 11, 16]
Capital
The capital of the Confederate States of America was
Montgomery, Alabama from February 4 1861 until May 29 1861.
Richmond, Virginia was named the new capital on May 6 1861. Shortly before the end of the war, the Confederate government evacuated Richmond, planning to relocate further south. Little came of these plans before Lee's surrender at
Appomattox Court House.
Danville, Virginia served as the last capital of the Confederate States of America, from April 3 to April 10 1865.
International diplomacy
Once the war with the United States began the best hope for the survival of the Confederacy was military intervention by Britain and France. The U.S. realized that too, and made it clear that recognition of the Confederacy meant war with the United States--and the cutoff of food shipments into Britain. The Confederates who had believed that "cotton is king" -- that is, Britain had to support the Confederacy to obtain cotton, were proven wrong. Britain in fact had ample stores of cotton in 1861 and depended much more on grain from the U.S.
During its existence, the Confederate government sent repeated delegations to Europe; historians do not give them high marks for diplomatic skills.
James M. Mason was sent to
London as Confederate minister to
Queen Victoria, and
John Slidell to
Paris as minister to
Napoleon III. Both were able to obtain meaningless private meetings with high British and French officials, but they failed entirely to secure official recognition for the Confederacy. Britain and the United States were briefly at loggerheads during the Trent Affair in late 1861. Mason and Slidell had been illegally seized from a British ship by an American warship. Queen Victoria's husband,
Prince Albert helped calm the situation and Lincoln released Mason and Slidell, so the episode was no help to the Confederacy.
One recorded diplomatic event involved Ernst Raven a citizen of Texas who was appointed before the war as a consul of
Ernst II, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha in Texas. Confederate Secretary of State Judah Benjamin reported to the Confederate Congress that "Ernst Raven, esq.,...was appointed consul for the State of Texas by his highness the Duke of
Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and who applied to this government for an exequatur on the 30th of July 1861" Historian Eugene Berwanger claims that the appointment did not convey diplomatic recognition to the Confederacy, though his only cited source is Benjamin's report, which makes no mention of the recognition issue. The Confederacy never claimed any recognition by any country.
Throughout the early years of the war, both British foreign secretary
Lord Russell and Napoleon III, and, to a lesser extent, the British prime minister
Lord Palmerston, were interested in the idea of recognition of the Confederacy, or at least of offering a mediation. Other figures in both governments, and particularly a strong anti-slavery faction in Palmerston's ministry, were much less sympathetic to the idea. Recognition was considered following the
Second Battle of Manassas when the British government were preparing to mediate in the conflict, but the Union victory at the
Battle of Antietam and Lincoln's
Emancipation Proclamation, combined with internal opposition, caused the governments to back away.
In November 1863 Confederate diplomat A. Dudley Mann met
Pope Pius IX and received a letter addressed "to the Illustrious and Honorable Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America.” Mann, in his dispatch to Richmond, interpreted the letter as "a positive recognition of our Government" and some have viewed it as a de facto recognition of the C.S.A. Confederate Secretary of State
Judah P. Benjamin, however, interpreted it as "a mere inferential recognition, unconnected with political action or the regular establishment of diplomatic relations" and thus did not assign it the weight of formal recognition.
For the remainder of the war confederate diplomats continued meeting with Cardinal Antonelli, the Vatican Secretary of State. In 1864 Catholic Bishop
Patrick N. Lynch of Charleston travelled to the Vatican with an authorization from Jefferson Davis to represent the Confederacy before the Holy See.
Throughout the war, most European powers adopted a policy of neutrality, meeting informally with Confederate diplomats but withholding diplomatic recognition. In its place, they applied international law principles that recognized the Union and Confederate sides as belligerents. Canada allowed both Confederate and Union agents to work openly within its borders and some state governments in northern
Mexico negotiated regional agreements to cover trade on the Texas border.
Relations with U.S.A.
For the four years of its existence, the Confederate States of America asserted its independence and appointed dozens of diplomatic agents abroad. The United States government, by contrast, asserted that the southern states were provinces in rebellion and refused any formal recognition of their status. Thus the U.S. Secretary of State William Seward issued formal instructions to Charles Francis Adams, the new minister to Great Britain:
- You will indulge in no expressions of harshness or disrespect, or even impatience concerning the seceding States, their agents, or their people. But you will, on the contrary, all the while remember that those States are now, as they always heretofore have been, and, notwithstanding their temporary self-delusion, they must always continue to be, equal and honored members of this Federal Union, and that their citizens throughout all political misunderstandings and alienations, still are and always must be our kindred and countrymen."
However, if the British seem inclined to recognize the Confederacy, or even waver in that regard, they were to be sharply warned --with a strong hint of war:
- [if Britain is] tolerating the application of the so-called seceding States, or wavering about it, you will not leave them to suppose for a moment that they can grant that application and remain friends with the United States. You may even assure them promptly, in that case, that if they determine to recognize, they may at the same time prepare to enter into alliance with the enemies of this republic."
The Confederate Congress responded to the hostilities by formally declaring war on the United States in May 1861--calling it "The War between the Confederate States of America and the United States of America." The Union government never declared war but conducted its war efforts under a proclamation of
blockade and rebellion by President Lincoln. Mid-war negotiations between the two sides occurred without formal political recognition, though the laws of war governed military relationships.
Four years after the war, in 1869, the
United States Supreme Court ruled in Texas v. White that secession was unconstitutional and legally null. The court's opinion was authored by Chief Justice
Salmon P. Chase, the former
Treasury Secretary under Lincoln, and attacked by ex-Confederates. Jefferson Davis, former president of the Confederacy, and
Alexander Stephens, its former vice-president, both penned arguments in favor of secession's legality, most notably Davis'
The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government.
Confederate flags
The official flag of the Confederate States of America, and the one actually called the "Stars and Bars", has seven stars, for the seven states that initially formed the Confederacy. This flag was sometimes hard to distinguish from the
Union flag under battle conditions, so the Confederate battle flag, the "Southern Cross", became the one more commonly used in military operations. The Southern Cross has 13 stars, adding the four states that joined the Confederacy after Fort Sumter, and the two divided states of Kentucky and Missouri.
As a result of its depiction in 20th century popular media, the "Southern Cross" is a flag commonly associated with the Confederacy today. The actual "Southern Cross" is a square-shaped flag, but the more commonly seen rectangular flag is actually the flag of the First Tennessee Army, also known as the Naval Jack because it was first used by the Confederate Navy.
Political leaders of the Confederacy
Executive
Legislative
The
legislative branch 
