If the Confederacy fails, it should be written on his tombstone: He died because of a theory. Jefferson Davis
Of all the leaders associated with the Civil War, few are as ignored as Jefferson Davis. The president of the ill-fated Confederate States of America, Davis is largely dismissed into the “Lost Cause” pantheon, passed over in favor of military leaders like Robert E. Lee, Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson, and JEB Stuart.
Davis’s relegation to the shadows of Civil War history is not surprising, however; Davis was little understood and often a mystery to his contemporaries, an intellectual who lacked the popular appeal of Abraham Lincoln or the gentle grace of Robert E. Lee, who has since become the figurehead of the Confederacy. for many.
Neither current events nor history show that the majority rules, or ever did rule.Jefferson Davis
That Jefferson Davis was ever elected to the presidency of the Confederacy is a wonder. Davis had the credentials, certainly; a West Point graduate who had served in the US Army, and the Mexican-American War, and in the US House of Representatives and Senate representing his home state of Mississippi, and then acting as Pierce’s Secretary of War, Davis appeared to be an excellent presidential candidate, at least on paper.
Those who knew Davis, however, often found him to have a fickle, reserved, and often ornery personality. Davis resigned from the Army at one point to marry the daughter of Colonel Zachary Taylor against Taylor’s wishes. Following the death of his first wife, Davis retired to the Mississippi plantation, where he lived for eight years as a virtual recluse, studying history and government, seeing few people besides his brother Joseph. He never filled a full term for any office to which he was elected or appointed. At the conclusion of the Mexican-American War, he rejected President Polk’s offer of a federal commission as a brigadier general, arguing that the Constitution gives states the power to supplement military officers, not the federal government. .
“My devotion to the Union of our fathers had been declared so often and so publicly; on the floor of the Senate I had so defiantly challenged any doubt as to my fidelity to him; my services, civilian and military, had now been extended throughout for so long, for a period and they were so well known that I was pretty sure no whisper of envy or ill will could lead the people of Mississippi to believe that I had dishonored their trust by using the power vested in me to destroy the government for which I was accredited. Then, as afterwards, I regarded the separation of the States as a great evil, though not the greatest.” Jefferson Davis
Although a supporter of slavery, Davis initially opposed Mississippi’s secession from the Union, a stance he took publicly in both the North and South; However, believing that the states had the right to leave the Union, Davis thought that seceding would be disastrous for the South, which would be unable to compete with the US military on the military front when the inevitable war that would follow began. to secession.
But in the end, Davis was unable to antagonize his home state of Mississippi, and when Mississippi made the decision to secede, Davis reluctantly capitulated. He immediately became the military leader of Mississippi, and shortly thereafter was elected president of the Nascent Confederacy by the First Confederate Congress.
The presidency was never a position that Davis wanted to fill. His interest was in the military. He initially served only as provisional president, but the growing antagonism between the federal and Confederate governments gave little time for a true election to the position, and Davis found himself elected to a six-year term, which like his other terms politicians. , he would never comply.
“We feel that our cause is just and holy; we solemnly protest before humanity that we wish peace at any sacrifice that is not that of our honor and independence. We do not ask for conquest, nor aggrandizement, nor concession of any kind of the states with which lately We were Confederates; all we ask is that you leave us alone; that those who never had power over us do not now attempt our subjugation by arms.” Jefferson Davis
Davis’s first action as president was to try to prevent the inevitable war, a war he knew the South could not win. He sent a peace convention to Washington, but Lincoln refused to listen to them. He proposed buying US military installations in the South and paying off the South’s half of the national debt. None of the proposals was accepted. The impending war begins when Davis orders the attack on Fort Sumter.
Most of Davis’s time as president was spent dealing with the war that consumed the Confederacy. There was no time to truly build the country he had been chosen to lead. The war depleted the meager resources of the South and the blockades of the North strangled the Confederacy, leaving Davis unable to supply his army or his citizens.
After the conclusion of the war and the dissolution of the Confederate States of America, Davis was one of the few Confederate officers to be accused of treason and imprisoned. He was released after two years, the charges against him dropped.
Davis spent the postwar years at his home in Mississippi, writing, refusing to repudiate his role in the Confederacy. He never took allegiance to the United States and was therefore never reinstated as a citizen. He never changed his views in favor of slavery, and remained embittered by the fatally flawed government he had led, even until his death.
“Our situation illustrates the American idea that governments are based on the consent of the governed, and that the people have the right to modify or abolish them as long as they destroy the purposes for which they were established.” Jefferson Davis