Opinion of Robert E. Lee

[Illuminati Blood Drinker]

Willingly fighting for a country founded upon the ownership and exploitation of millions of human beings = Automatic HP

[MurrayBannerman]

Willingly fighting for a country founded upon the ownership and exploitation of millions of human beings = Automatic HP

That's both.

[Sol]

FF voters should be banned. The Confederacy was pure evil, plain and simple. And "fighting for your homeland" doesn't make you an FF. What else did, say, the Khmer Rouge think they were doing?

[The Dowager Mod]

FF voters should be banned. The Confederacy was pure evil, plain and simple. And "fighting for your homeland" doesn't make you an FF. What else did, say, the Khmer Rouge think they were doing?

Yes, ban me for having an opinion different than yours, how open minded of you.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Yeah, I'm sure the Wehrmacht were full of "nice guys" who just wanted to protect the country, but I'm hardly going to vote FF for them...

Also Lee, to his discredit, still found time to complain about the Radical Republicans after the war. What cheek! If he had stayed the hell out of politics, I could sort of understand the "he's just defending his homeland!" cries; but he found time to support the cause of all kinds of Southern reactionaries during the most critical stages of Reconstruction.

[H. Ross Peron]

The best of a rotten bunch.

Longstreet, judging by his postwar career, was far better.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

Yeah, I'm sure the Wehrmacht were full of "nice guys" who just wanted to protect the country, but I'm hardly going to vote FF for them...

Also Lee, to his discredit, still found time to complain about the Radical Republicans after the war. What cheek! If he had stayed the hell out of politics, I could sort of understand the "he's just defending his homeland!" cries; but he found time to support the cause of all kinds of Southern reactionaries during the most critical stages of Reconstruction.

The Radical Republicans (and indeed many moderate Republicans) did not consider Reconstruction to be in any meaningful sense "after the war," but a continuation of it.  Lee had his voting rights taken away and his state was not readmitted to the Union for five more years after he signed the peace treaty so of course he was going to be critical.

[MurrayBannerman]

FF voters should be banned. The Confederacy was pure evil, plain and simple. And "fighting for your homeland" doesn't make you an FF. What else did, say, the Khmer Rouge think they were doing?

Fighting for your home and being an upstanding man in every sense of the word does.

[anvi]

I didn't call Lee a traitor, TNF did.  And while Lee surely did see himself as fighting to defend his "country" (Virginia), he couldn't have been unaware of the implications that he was thereby defending Virginia's succession and that he was defending their right to maintain slavery.  Lee was far too brilliant not to have been cognizant of this.  That having been said, there were loads of union generals and soldiers that were massive HPs as well, there is no doubt about that.

I can't blame anyone for taking up the fight to defend their homeland even if they disagree with the politics of what led to the fight.  When you are looking at the threat of an army coming in and overrunning your town or city and region, abstractions go out the window.

Ok.  But slavery and secession were not abstractions.  Or maybe they were for many people then--including lots of northerners who wanted to preserve the Union only and didn't care about the freedom of the slaves.  The fact that slavery was thought to be an abstraction by so many whites then, and the fact that racial injustice is an abstraction to so many now--maybe that is the real problem, rather than Lee's choice as such. 

One thing I can say for Lee is that he didn't condone the torching or marauding of whole cities and the "punishment" of civilian populations in the wake of his army's advances as many northern generals did. 

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Leave your home or your a traitor!

Sound logic

He was a traitor for backing the attempt by the Slave Power to destroy the union.

The moment Virginia seceded, it became his home country. It makes no sense to call him a traitor.

According to this logic, Andrew Johnson was a traitor by remaining faithful to the Union while Tennessee seceded.

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His stance was typical for many "enlightened" Southerners, who opposed to slavery on moral grounds, but still enjoyed perks of being slaveholders.

[TNF]

No Confederate officer should have had their voting rights restored at any point.

[RR1997]

Obvious HP is obvious.

[Oldiesfreak1854]

Better than most Confederates, but an HP for supporting them.

[AggregateDemand]

He was an FF in the literal sense. Early in the war, the South could easily have maximized collateral damage in the North. But the Confederacy was not interested in destroying the North, only in secession, and Lee stayed true to the secession mission.

Unfortunately, the Confederacy was fighting for the right to control US agriculture, including forced labor policies, and that was why the Union had to raze the South, not just achieve another tepid political compromise.

[GaussLaw]

He was an FF in the literal sense. Early in the war, the South could easily have maximized collateral damage in the North. But the Confederacy was not interested in destroying the North, only in secession, and Lee stayed true to the secession mission.

Unfortunately, the Confederacy was fighting for the right to control US agriculture, including forced labor policies, and that was why the Union had to raze the South, not just achieve another tepid political compromise.

Please explain.  I never understand your wordy posts. 

Anyways, HP but not quite as HP as some other Confederates.

[moderatevoter]

Y'all might be surprised (or not?) at how much is named after him here.

[AggregateDemand]

Please explain.  I never understand your wordy posts. 

Anyways, HP but not quite as HP as some other Confederates.

It's well known that the Confederacy had nearly free passage to Washington DC and Baltimore in 1861 and 1862 after the Bull Run battles. Union battle performance was so poor around the capital that some members of Congress believed that Union commanders were conspiring with the South to end the war.

Lee never attacked because he was only interested in secession, not killing the Union.

[Indy Texas]

Leave your home or your a traitor!

Sound logic

He was a traitor for backing the attempt by the Slave Power to destroy the union.

The moment Virginia seceded, it became his home country. It makes no sense to call him a traitor.

And, for what it's worth, his stance on slavery is highly objectionable.

You're assuming that secession was legitimate, which it was not.

If you're going down that road, then everyone residing in Crimea should have immediately sworn allegiance to Putin after the annexation occurred. It is now their home country, after all.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

Leave your home or your a traitor!

Sound logic

He was a traitor for backing the attempt by the Slave Power to destroy the union.

The moment Virginia seceded, it became his home country. It makes no sense to call him a traitor.

And, for what it's worth, his stance on slavery is highly objectionable.

You're assuming that secession was legitimate, which it was not.

If you're going down that road, then everyone residing in Crimea should have immediately sworn allegiance to Putin after the annexation occurred. It is now their home country, after all.

Lee's allegiance to Virginia as his country didn't have anything to do with secession. Virginia was his home country from when he was young.  Secession only brought to the forefront the issue of divided loyalties between country and union. Country and political nationhood are identical to most contemporary Americans but for many in the past this was not so much the case.

[Deus Naturae]

You're assuming that secession was legitimate, which it was not.

Why not? Not trying to defend the Confederacy specifically but what is inherently illegitimate about the idea that a member of a larger political body can remove itself from that body and become a sovereign entity? Do you believe secession violates the US Constitution specifically or do you think that political bodies should never be separated?

[Indy Texas]

You're assuming that secession was legitimate, which it was not.

Why not? Not trying to defend the Confederacy specifically but what is inherently illegitimate about the idea that a member of a larger political body can remove itself from that body and become a sovereign entity? Do you believe secession violates the US Constitution specifically or do you think that political bodies should never be separated?

That was one of the questions that the Civil War answered - a state or group of states cannot unilaterally secede from the United States.

[Deus Naturae]

That was one of the questions that the Civil War answered - a state or group of states cannot unilaterally secede from the United States.

First of all, that contradicts what you said about Virginia's secession being illegitimate. How could that have been the case if the legitimacy of secession was only determined by the outcome of the war that Virginia's secession preceded.

If the Confederates had won the war, secession would be legitimate in your view? Since when is an idea/practice's value determined by whether or not it's supporters emerge victorious in war? I suppose you think imperial conquest is legitimate since so many nations have successfully invaded and conquered others, thus "answering the question" of whether or not a country can invade and conquer another.