Atlas Posters During the American Civil War

[Mr. Jew]

Serious response:

I don't like it but based on demographic background (and well hell probably most of my family's history) I'd likely be a Copperhead Democrat during the CW.  Saying I'd probably hold the same progressive values today is fruitless because I most likely wouldn't even be in the same social situation I am today and thus be inclined to have the views that I do have.

[This account no longer in use.]

True. I'd probably be in Europe, realistically.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

>thread about Altas Posters during the American Civil War
>90% of dudes posting in it claim they would totes be Union supporters
>extra round of self-congratulatory backpatting


LOL

I actually did consider that I might be a Northern Democrat due to my family being historically working-class 'white ethnic' immigrants from the European periphery, but geography (I'm from Western Mass) and the fact that the only side of my mother's family that would be demographically at all likely to have been here at that time is Jewish--not an overwhelmingly pro-Union demographic overall (see Judah P. Benjamin), but not notably less pro-Union than the surrounding populations in the North--meant that I could honestly say I would have thrown my lot in with Honest Abe. My father's family are Baltimore Irish with all that that would have entailed, but I wasn't close to them until relatively late childhood.

If we're going with answers that don't presuppose that any part of our our families is already in America, I would have been either sorting through conflicted feelings about the Risorgimento, groaning under Tsarist oppression, or plotting for the Fenian Rising.

[FEMA Camp Administrator]

Going off of Nathan's post, this is an interesting opportunity to bring up my incredibly limited knowledge of my geneaology! To quickly discount them, my mom's side of the family came to the country probably around the turn of the century, so disregard them. My dad's side of the family--or at least those who bear my father's last name and a few others--are an interesting case study. From what I remember from a family reunion a year ago, there's evidence of my family being in the country since about 1872, I wanna say. To my knowledge, always Catholic, they were nevertheless Mid-Western, with me hearing about locations in, as I recall, places like Ohio and Indiana. My grandmother (different family than my grandfather's obviously), for her credit, came from Cairo, IL. Dirt poor little place where the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers meet, the classic breeding ground for a Depression-era (if not earlier--Southern IL, after all) Democrat. Nevertheless, my grandfather, who, as far as I'm aware, hailed form an Irish-French(-possibly English) white trash, Mid-Western background, was a Republican, possibly life-long. He'd twice served his country (World War II, Korea) and was alienated from his more outspoken children by his support for the Vietnam War and the fact that my eldest uncle was a draft dodger, and my late second-eldest uncle was homosexual. That said, I don't know if my paternal grandfather's side of the family had Republicans before the Vietnam Era. His sisters (my great aunts) are, I believe, more liberal than he was, though also devoutly religious--I think all of them became nuns. My paternal grandmother's family seems to have been a bit more liberal in general, however. This is anecdotal; during last summer's family reunion, one of my late grandmother's brothers was present at the house the family rented and seemed to refer to a past that was a little bit wild. So what does that leave us with? Dirt poor white trash Catholics bumming around north of the Ohio River Valley. (I recall one particularly sordid story that sort of makes the case of "white trash back in the day") Despite my grandfather's status as a Republican, they may have been the very demographic that made up Mid-Western Copperheads; at the same time, no guarantees, and there are always outliers. I'm reminded on one hand of the type of folks that had voted for McKinley (he attracted a diverse crowd, based on what I know of the congressional districts he stood in), and as well of the story of Dick Nixon's father, who as a sort of Black Irish, devoutly religious--though Protestant--fellow wanderer, once met McKinley at a parade during the 1896 campaign and, because of that, was a proud Republican (despite voting for Wilson--Hannah Nixon voted for Bryan and Frank chided her for it).

The options are thus:
-As a poor, Catholic Mid-Westerner, I support the Copperheads for a resolution to hostilities and to make sure I don't get drafted.
-As a poor, Catholic Mid-Westerner, I'm attracted to Lincoln's "Free Soil", populist, Homestead Act-type campaign and stand with the President against those un-Christian heathens to the South.

Who knows?

Thanks for the opportunity (only slightly buzzed right now).