look at how his successors have had their own difficulties and dealing with the consequences of that decision. all of, that in subtle ways, it's factored into our assessment of bush and you can apply that to issue after issue, president after president. >> this survey of all the presidents, all the former presidents, available at our website at c-span dot org slash president survey 2021. i want to thank our panel from texas, doug brinkley, professor at rice university. from michigan, historian and author, richard norton smith. via zoom, historian and author, amity shlaes. and from here in washington, d.c., professor edna greene medford at howard university. thank you all so much for your time this morning.

-- including cox. >> homework can be hard, but squatting in a diner for internet work is even harder. that's why we're providing lower income students access to affordable internet. so homework can just be homework. cox connect to compete. >> cox, along with these television, companies support c-span 2 as a public service. present this m >> i am honored to present this morning's speaker is. they are both exceptional people. our first speaker will be professor gary w. gallagher, who is the john l no, it's not the way it's pronounced? and a u --

professor americas in the history of the civil war and director of the center for civil war history at the university of virginia. he's the author, co-author, and editor of numerous civil war era works. he has served as president of the society of civil war historians and received the tom watson brown book prize from the society in 2012 for his that union war. prior to that honor, is the confederate war was a finalist for the 1998 lincoln prize. copies of his books including this one, causes one, lost and forgotten, how hollywood and popular art shape what we know about the civil war. this one is, there i got this one because i hadn't read it yet. but there are several others that are available in the symposium bookstore. please help me to welcome

professor gallagher, who is topic this morning is going to be how should americans understood and gettysburg in 2021. professor gallagher. [applause] >> thank you very much, good morning, everybody. seems like we were just here. not all that long ago. i know some of you are disappointed that don't law wasn't here with me this morning. she and i were supposed to do a joint thing on gettysburg this morning, but she's president of the society of civil war historians and they changed the date of the winner for their big book prize, so joan is on her weight right now to durham, north carolina. to preside over the handing out of that award tonight. so, i am going to talk this

morning about gettysburg for 30 or 35 minutes. and then, maybe, we'll have time for some give and take afterward. i have enjoyed a nearly lifelong engagement with gettysburg. i was fascinated with the civil war as a, boy as i said last night. i never lost my interest and have had the really good fortune to make my living doing something i love and would probably have been doing anyway. teaching and writing about our great national crisis. what my explanations, whether as a young man or an academic scholar, have often led me to believe gettysburg in the larger framework of the war. for years i held the notion that gettysburg was the turning point of the civil war. but now, as will become evident as i go along this morning, i have changed my mind. yet, i realize that, for most people, the thought of discussing the conflicts great turning points without reference to gettysburg would be similar to having a film noir film festival and leaving

out double indemnity. or assessing potential or signs that the apocalypse is upon us without talking about the evil influence of twitter. i'm going to divide my comments into three parts this morning. the first explores white gettysburg looms so large in popular culture. the second, suggesting that the battle should not be held up as the great turning point of the war. and the third, explaining why i believe visits to gettysburg remain not only rewarding but important for americans interested in our history as a nation. but i will start with gettysburg in memory as the great moment of truth. all of you, i suspect, know the popular narrative of how the fearsome bloodletting here in adams county, pennsylvania, during the first three days of july, 1863 changed the trajectory of the civil war. before the army of northern virginia and army of the potomac collided here at gettysburg, goes that

narrative. victory still seemed possible for the confederacy. but after leads retreat, it was only a matter of time before the united states armies would vanquish their opponents and restore that republic. you get a sense that everybody in the confederacy got at their calendar, circled april 9th, 1865 and started crossing pays off, can't take how many were left. that formulation sounds compelling, it sounds so reasonable because we know things about gettysburg that make it seem sound and reasonable. there are things about gettysburg that set it apart from all other battles during the civil war. it is the biggest and bloodiest battle of our biggest and bloodiest war. it marked the deepest penetration into united states territory of any major confederate army. at no other principal rebel field army ever came into the united states again. the little army, the valley wandered northward in the summer of 64. but no major confederate army crossed into u.s. territory again. abraham lincoln also set

gettysburg apart from all other civil war engagements when he chose it as the place to deliver his eloquent benediction over the union dead, almost exactly 158 years ago. all these things help to explain why gettysburg has been far more steadied than any other military event in the united states history. bibliography published, gosh, 20 years ago now listed more than 6000 titles that deal with the battle of gettysburg. that number has grown steadily since, then that's 20 years ago. the centennial brought another round of a box, they continue to come out. i look at the most recent issue of civil war, times which all of you received in your packet. there's several new books on gettysburg that are featured in there. i readily admit, and you probably all also know as well, that very few places in american history resonate more evocatively than gettysburg. home to about 2400 people in

july, 1860, three the southern pennsylvania community witness fighting that raged for three days and the nearby woods and fields and along gently sloping ridges and on modest hills, whose green summits rose above the surrounding countryside. we can still look at all those places. the names of those fields and woods and ridges and hills have come down to us in memory, charged with violent images of more than 150,000 men struggling for supremacy in a seismic war. the wheat field, the peach orchard, little round top, seminary ridge, copes hill, devils dan. where else in the united states have so many mundane pieces of terrain been invested with so much meaning by so many americans? i hope you won't mind if i inject a little bit of my own relationship with gettysburg at my comments here. i experience my help, i think, underscore why so many people identify the battle as the

war's key turning point. as born in los angeles, grew up in southern colorado, st. louis valley. two places fire from the great battlefield of the civil war. gloria towards the nearest battlefield of any kind to me and it, alas, was not much of a battlefield. during the civil war's centennial years in 1961 to 1965, i read accounts that left me overwhelmed with images of the scale of carnage at gettysburg. the san lewis valley is really big, as our great school teachers used to tell us. it's bigger than connecticut. which means, frank, i hate to say, it's way bigger than rhode island. even a county i grew up in was bigger than rhode island, but that's another topic. it had a population of about 50,000 people. gettysburg had made casualties of more people than lived in my valley. i thought as a boy, that really struck me. i would have known that nearly

as many men were killed or maimed or became casualties at gettysburg in three days as were killed in the decade-long war in southeast asia. if there had been a vietnam memorial when i was a boy. black and white images of the battlefield, taken shortly after the armies marched away from gettysburg, also impressed me deeply. i poured over them. some of these photographs depicted the landscape, you all know them, the rocky slope of little round top, the gun pits that scarred the earth in front of the brick gate house at evergreen cemetery on cemetery hill. the woods on mcpherson's ridge in which part of the famous iron brigade waged its last great fight. the remarkable study of three captured confederates, in poses that combined nonchalance and defiance as they face the camera near the chambers bird python seminary ridge. it's applied what was and remains for me the best portrayal of rebel veterans in the field. want to know what a rebel

veteran looked like in the civil war? look at that shot of the three men, taken a couple days after the battle. studies of the battles human an equine wreckage impressed me most of all. time and again, i contemplated the rows of confederate bodies laid out for burial on the rose farm. the corpses, strewn among the rocks and trees along plum run at the foot of round top. the slaughtered battery horses near the trestle farmhouse. and most memorably, the study of a dead confederate soldier in devils then, seemingly asleep with his musket propped up against one of the boulders. i didn't know at the time, the books hadn't come out yet, that alexander gardner staged that shot. he dragged the corpse from up farther on the hill and placed it just right. had no idea that it happened, that picture really captured my attention. a first visited here as a 14 year old in june of 1965. my mother, grandmother nitro from colorado to gettysburg and back in 12 days.

before interstate highways were everywhere. crossing virginia then was a real adventure in the middle of 65. but my visit to gettysburg increased my sense of its unique importance. among civil war vents. i insisted on being photographed in the peach orchard, at the spot in devils dan where garner had taken that picture. i photograph the ground over which the pickles petito assault had been swept, from both union perspective and the confederate perspective. i climbed at the southwestern slope of little round top and i lingered at a number of the famous monuments at the field. including those directed by the states of virginia and pennsylvania. i was impressed by their scale but innocent of the commemorative circumstances within which they went up. gettysburg looms as large today for many of those interested in the civil war as it did for me in that summer of 1865. among americans who know anything about the war, the

clash between elise army and george gordon meade's army in the potomac typically represents a moment of profound reckoning. tourist visit gettysburg in huge numbers each year, more by far than go to any other military site in the continental united states. coverage of the wars assess guy quintessential in 2015 revealed the battles seemingly an shakeable whole uncommon understanding of the war. i'll mention just a few examples of this phenomenon. the washington post issued a civil war special edition which hit the news stands on -- it described gettysburg as a massive mash-up, a conflict that sits at the heart of american history. not only the sort of focal point of the war, it's that great tipping point for all of american history. usa today offered a 47-page special edition in july, 2013, titled gettysburg, turning

point in the civil war. the principal argument in that issue described the battle as, quote, the epic battle that would decide the fate of the nation. national geographic gave readers a special issue in may of 2012 on the civil war that included a folded map of the eastern theater, titled 1863, turning point of the civil war. i know you're picking up on a light motif here in this coverage. the texas covering the map said, quote, the union used it to gain the upper hand only in july 1863 with its victory at gettysburg. the largest battle ever fought in north america. time magazine published 122 page 150th anniversary tribute, titled gettysburg, a day-by-day account of the greatest battle of the civil war. very straightforward. even bbc climbed on board, with a 98-page booklet titled, the american civil war story that pronounced gettysburg, quote, a disastrous mistake by the south

that marked the beginning of the end for the confederacy. okay, that's enough of that. gettysburg dominant place in popular culture is a great deal to novels, films and television. those mediums reach far more people than all of that historians put together and cubed, whatever number you want to come up with. john with the wind has influence more people's thoughts about the civil war than anything, as i said last night, historians have done. gone with the wind has done more to influence popular perceptions of the civil war than any other single factor. and talk about the 1939 film, not the 1936 novel. all of us at a georgia and finished featuring sherman's campaign in 1860, for the film, three years after the novel appeared, treats gettysburg gets a great turning point. ashley wilkes addresses the issue in home on furlough. families are me on christmas in 1863. we should need all our prayers, now the end is coming, he tells scarlett with his usual hand dog look. the end? she asks.

the end of the war, he intones. and the end of the world, scarlett. more hang dog expressions. the gettysburg that persuaded ashley that the confederacy can't win. so they underscored by an earlier scene that shows people in atlanta eagerly reading casualty list from the battle. expose a tory text instructs viewers who may struggle to grasp the portent of the scene, quote, hushed and graham. turned painful eyes to the faraway little town of gettysburg, and a page of history waited for three days while two nations came to death grips on the farmlands of pennsylvania. well news about gettysburg and reckonings of its dead and wounded certainly would not have reached atlanta so quickly, but the device works very well in reminding audiences about gettysburg's role in for closing chances for confederate independents. i have to mention william faulkner, some of you can just close your eyes and think about something else now. but i have to quote from his

1948 novel, intruder in the dusk. one passages quoted endlessly from this book. for every southern boy, and he meant every white southern boy, 14 years old, not once but whenever he wants it, faulkner at the time just before the confederates launched the picket pedigree assault. there is that incident when it's not yet 2:00 on that july afternoon in 1863. the brigades are in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods in the furled flags already lucent to break out and pick it himself with his long, oiled ringlets. his hat in one hand, probably, his sword in the other. looking up the hill and waiting for longstreet to give the word. it's all in the balance, hasn't happened yet, hasn't even begun yet. that moment doesn't need even a 14 year old boy, continued faulkner as he set up the battle as a decisive moment of the war. to think this time, maybe this

time, with all this to lose and all this to gain, pennsylvania, maryland, the world, the golden dome of washington itself the crowd with desperate an unbelievable victory, the desperate gamble that cast made two years ago. well, killer angels, mike chavez 1964 pulitzer prize-winning novel, translate to film by director bra maximal as gettysburg. it is also been immensely influential. in both novel and film, colonel joshua lawrence chamberlain of the 20th main infantry states that the outcome of the war hangs in the balance as armies prepare to come to grips here at gettysburg. i think, if we lose this fight, observes the determined chamberlain, we lose the war. the hard to overestimate the impact of this book and film. for example, ty can talk more about this than i -- military academy red killer

angel's, that's how they got their view of gettysburg at the academy for a good long while. documentary filmmaker ken burns also expressed profound respect for killer angels, something obvious and how he handled gettysburg in his overwhelmingly successful 1990 pbs erie's, the civil war. he devoted 45 minutes to gettysburg, far more than any other battle or campaign. vicksburg, in contrast, it's 11 minutes from ken verdicts. stones river or murphy years borough, of all the major battles in the war, witness the most casualties in the war, it got less than a minute from ken burns. gettysburg it's 45. burns reach more than 40 million viewers the first time around, as we've all read many times, and it remains influential because it is replayed endlessly during pbs fundraising. you can hear it and see, it it's always there. and apparently still popular, or they wouldn't be using, it at least that's my suspicion.

and joshua lawrence chamberlain's ascendancy in the popular imagination over the past 30 years also speaks to the impact of char and burns. when i came here in 1965, there wasn't even a path to the 20th main monuments. there is no signage that pointed to the 20th main monument. the book that the park service put out for the battle of gettysburg didn't even mention the 20th main, didn't mention joshua chamberlain. the hero of little round top was governor kendall warren. as we might suspect, who has a statue on little round top? oh, governor warren does. and so the strong vincent, and strong vincent has a ancillary marker as well. fascinating example of how memory deviates from what actually happened. joshua lawrence chamberlain's ascendancy, and i admire chamberlain. my god, an academic who could function in the real world, just think about that for a minute. joshua lawrence chamberlain, joshua lawrence chamberlain has benefited from michael sarah

and ken burns and the other ways in which americans learn about their history, that have nothing to do with books that historians write. stephen spielberg's 2012 epic, lincoln, uses the gettysburg address to remind viewers about the battles powerful wartime impact. it opens, as you all know, opens with a scene of common soldiers, one, black to white, who recite the gettysburg address to lincoln as he watches troops depart for the wilmington campaign in the last winter of the war. the scene is comically preposterous! the speech received almost no attention in 1863, as all of you know. and the notion that it had entered the national consciousness to the point where random soldiers could quote passages speaks volumes about our perceptions of gettysburg as a definitive turning point. i'll bet lincoln couldn't have quoted the gettysburg address to himself in january of 1865.

we i would in fact but a good bit of money on that. he'd get the gist, but they get it exactly in the movie, exactly. it's like a perishable film about lincoln also debuted in 2012, abraham lincoln vampire hunter. it carried gettysburg's supremacy to apogee by treating the battle as not only the largest of the war but also the last. a bloodletting that brought union victory and killed slavery at one grand, silver bullet laden crescendo. vampires and rebel soldiers fall and equal profusion as the republican emerges, thanks to gettysburg, from its greatest moment of trial. two final pieces of evidence that test gettysburg cultural importance. i work with groups of middle and high school teachers every, summer they come from all over the country. i've worked with 2000 of them over the years. from them, i've learned that many state history test for high school students includes pacific questions, what with the turning point of the civil

war? it has one answer, gettysburg. so, they say, what should we do about this? i, say you can use this to tell students that the world is complicated. tell them to write down gettysburg, because they need to get the right answer, but then tell them it's not really the right answer and just, you know, think about that. many of you doubtless remember the u.s. postage stamps issued to commemorate the sesquicentennial of the war. the one for gettysburg, issued a 2013, as part of a sheet that is like a stamp devoted to pittsburgh, includes a stamp that notes gettysburg has been named the high water mark of the rebellion. okay, that's enough of that. what about gettysburg in the wartime context? it supremacy in the popular imagination prompts an obvious question. it's accurate to view gettysburg as a great turning point of the civil war? i suspect i've already tip my hand here, but i'm going to plow forward. my research and reading over the past 30 years persuades me that the answer to that question must be no.

it did not mark a watershed, determining the outcome of the war. moreover, people at the, time in the midst of massive war efforts on the part of the united states in the confederacy, did not consider it a watershed. in trying to understand gettysburg's importance at the time, we must remember not to read into the battle -- you should never, do that trying to understand, gettysburg never. don't ever start at the end of the story than try to read, back figuring out how did we get to the end. which seems inevitable because of the and we know happened. 12 appomattox and, jerome don't do, that resist that. by july, 1860, three third already been many bloody clashes on the conflict and nobody knew whether another, one even more horrific than gettysburg, lay ahead. similarly, no wonder whether the army of northern virginia would mount another invasion of the united states. neither could they know that abraham lincoln would go to gettysburg and deliver what would eventually become the most famous political speech in our history.

not at the time, but in time. the vast outpouring of writings on the battle to be written, as did the battlefields development as a major attraction for people interested in american history. i think affairs has been of gettysburg impact in the summer and early autumn of 1863 was up both sides of a bloody but not ultimately decisive battle, that represented largely good news for the united states and bad news for the confederacy. not nearly important at the time as vicksburg. vicksburg far and shadowed gettysburg, in terms of its impact both the united states and the confederacy. admittedly, many people in the loyal states rejoiced upon first hearing about leaves retreat. of course they did! it seemed, as the noted new york diarist george temple turned strong observed on july six, 63. that, quote, the rebels are headed out of the north, our best army is routed and the charm of robert ilyse invincibility broken. just as important, in strong

opinion, quote, the army of the potomac as a left-hander general that can handle it. and it has stood nobly up to his terrible work, in spite of its long, disheartening list of hard-fought failures. and in spite of the mcclellan influence on its officers. ty, i think strong would have agreed that we should rename mcclellan's installation now, put it on the list. yet, strong still spoke about how meade allow the army to escape intact over the potomac river. newspapers brag far too loudly about our having broken the backbone of the rebellion, he wrote on august 8th, 1863. the vertebrae of southern trees can still come here, as we may yet learn to our terrible cost. especially if lee reinforces himself with the debris of rebellion from that southwest. we got away! that's the bottom line in the end, for george template and strong. as it was for abraham lincoln.

on july 14th, in a written written but never sent to meade, although he knew he thought -- the president, affirmed i am very, very grateful for you for the magnificent success you gave the cause of the country at gettysburg. the aftermath of the battle, however, left lincoln depressed, his word, not mine. at the seeming lack of aggressiveness on the part of meade and his fellow union commanders. mcclelland created a culture of command of the army of the potomac, and of course it was still there when meade took over. i did not believe you appreciate the magnitude of the misfortune involved and leaves escape, state and lincoln in a passage emphasizing his opinion that gettysburg cycle no turning point. he was in your grasp and seizing upon him would, in connection with our late successes, vicksburg and elsewhere, have ended the war. as it is, concluded a bitterly disappointed lincoln, the war will be prolonged indefinitely.

your golden opportunity is gone, and i am distressed immeasurably because of. it many other northerners came to share the sense of lost opportunity. it soon became all too clear that the conflict would drag on, with no end in sight and no certainty as to the outcome. confederate testimony from 1863, as opposed to postwar writings by ex rebels that elevated gettysburg to a position of special importance, suggests a pervasive view that the battle had not delivered a catastrophic blow to southern hopes for independence. many in the confederacy lamented the high casualties and some criticize leads generalship, but most concluded that leaves foray into pennsylvania and his subsequent retreat represented only a temporary setback, with few long term consequences for either the army in northern virginia, or the confederacy. confederates typically drew a sharp distinction between gettysburg, with his high casualties but striking southern success on july 1st

and vicksburg, and unequivocal disaster that cost the confederacy and entire army and control of the last little piece of the mississippi river that they still controlled in mid 1863. robert e. lee recognize gettysburg as a defeat, and in the short term he pouted that some newspapers criticized him. he even very theatrically tendered his resignation to jefferson davis, who did what lee wanted. he lavished praise on lee and said he could not accept the resignation. i feel better, said lee, and they went forward. on for the reflection, lee pronounce the logistical part of the campaign, which is crucial in a whole formulation of the campaign, a success of some importance. as for the longer term impact, he argued that the heavy loss of gettysburg did not exceed, quote, what it would have been from the series of battles i would have been compelled to fight had i remained in virginia. adding, we did with them at gettysburg, it will be seen for the next six months that army,

the army of the potomac, will be as quiet as a sucking of. in fact, it would be ten months before the next big battle of the eastern theater at the wilderness, saunders field, on may 5th, 1864. the next real collision on the eastern theater. this is the longest period between major battles in the eastern theater after 1862. two other witnesses conveyed the tenor of innumerable confederate accounts. one is from eastern north carolina, my favorite woman diarist, catherine different edmonton. she -- and news then highlighted confederate news on the first. confederate newspapers were full of council the victory on july 1st, which very soon were overwhelmed by news of vicksburg and of leaves retreat. she is very happy to get that early information, but her mood was much chastened, of course, that lee had left pennsylvania.

but by july 25th, aware of grumbling in the united states over meads slow movement after july 4th, and that's been penned a largely optimistic comment about gettysburg. general lee and his army were said to be in good condition in pennsylvania. crossing the potomac in pursuit, she put pursued in quotation marks and underlined it. the north, much exasperated against him for, quote, allowing lee to escape. she also put that in quotes and underlined. it but josé gorgeous is an important witness here. he is also quoted endlessly to share what a shattering piece of news gettysburg's. he is the confederate chief of ordinance. he wrote in his diary that events have succeeded each other with -- one month, ago we are nearly at the point of success. lee within pennsylvania, threatening harrisburg and even pennsylvania. vicksburg seem to laugh all

grants efforts to scorn in the northern newspapers, and reports of his raising this each. 30 days later, however, lee had retreated from pennsylvania, vicksburg and port hudson had fallen and irreplaceable man and material had been lost. yesterday, we wrote the pinnacle of success. today, absolute ruined seems to be our portion, stated and apparently shaken josiah gorgas. the confederacy taunters to its destruction. that is pretty compelling. and if you don't read anything after that in josiah gorgas its diary, you can have a sense that he thought gettysburg was a complete disaster. we need a little deeper into the diary however, in august in early september, and you find much greater optimism than those oft quoted passages of late july. all seemed quiet on lee's front, reported josiah gorgas, and his army seems to be nearly in its original, good condition. by september, six josiah gorgas alluded to the armies excellent condition and even speculated that lee was considering taking

the offensive and perhaps marching back into pennsylvania. his diary and his dealing with gettysburg underscores how misleading it can be to pull one quotation out of a document and ignore the rest of it, when you lose the sense of context. whatever the precise breakdown of union and confederate opinion in 1863, one thing is undeniable. as the armies of grant and lee engaged in the bloody overland campaign of may and june, 1864 and then settled into the siege of petersburg, virtually no one in the united states or the confederacy would have insisted that gettysburg had been a great watershed. it, biden, amounted to scarcely more than a distant memory, as northern civilian morale dropped to its lowest point of the war in july in august of 19 of 64, and confederates maintained hopes that the democratic triumph in the north autumn elections would boost chances for southern independents. ndi've led more than 125 tours f

gettysburg over the years, with groups of students and adults and marine and u.s. army officers, others. i always deal with the battle and its memory. one of my framing themes has been that gettysburg was not a turning point. of course, lee's army was damaged, 25,000 casualties, perhaps more. a third of all his generals became casualties, 17 out of 52. the army of the potomac was also badly damaged, more than 20,000 casualties would be reorganized, drastically, before the next major campaign. as you, know seven core were reduced to just three. when could to decide that meade was not an officer who could win the war. meade was competent in some, ways he could do some,'s meat was not the man who is going to win the war. there is a short term downturn and confederate morale, and a longer term downturn in north carolina. because north carolinians had suffered disproportionately at gettysburg, and that really encourage the anti-war movement in north carolina after

gettysburg. but lee's reputation emerged unscathed. i find this remarkable and really hard to explain. much later in the war, confederate still described him as unbeaten on the battlefield. over and over, you read that. and in the united states, he remained a great bugaboo. that fact is underscored by grants taking the field against lee in the overland campaign of 1864. northern public opinion demanded that their guy go against the confederate guy who had been the doubling the union effort for more than two years at that point. but the strategic situation in the eastern theater after gettysburg simply returned to the rapid dan river line, where it had been before ally went north in june of 1863 and what remains for almost another year. all right, so, how should we treat gettysburg now? well, you might not agree with me that gettysburg was less momentous in 1863 than is often

assumed it was. but that raises another question. does it merit the attention lavished on it by today's civil war rioters, readers and battlefield visitors? i think that it does. because more than 150 years after the fact, it offers much to instruct us about our history. no place better serves the purpose of explaining the deepest meanings of the civil war. no one has captured those meetings better than abraham lincoln, in the brief text of his gettysburg address. lincoln possessed a genius for getting at the heart of an issue. and if he is possible words, as you know. and his speech here at gettysburg illustrates his guest for explaining in simple yet eloquent language the import of profound events. the war tested, he said, whether a nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal can long endure. here, he spoke to the widely

held belief in the united states that the country was a beacon in a world where small d democracy had yet to take from root. it was not only the work of the founders that was on the table during the civil war, according to this view, as the fate of small d democracy in the western world. it is going in the wrong direction in europe, since the failed revelations of the late 1840s. only a confederate victory could be the death but a small d democracy, believe many who fought for the union. if the confederacy one, thought lincoln, and untold thousands of other northerners, reared on the rhetoric of daniel webster, the noble american experiment and its citizenry would've failed. lincoln added in his address that it would have been democracy free of slavery. soldiers like gettysburg had given the last indication that the nation under god should have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. he would have emphasized the

propositions, there which people go after court to gettysburg to, of the people by the people. for the what? of the what? it's the people, darn it. have you read the preamble to the constitution? that's what lincoln is pulling into his treatment, here it is all about the people. the people and self governance. i believe we have heard or read these words so many times that they don't really register. but if we think about them carefully, we have vividly before us the essence of what was at stake in that war. modern-day americans have ample reason to visit gettysburg. these journeys yield rich dividends to most pleasant and rewarding exercises on many levels. what around the field and figure out how the action unfolded. no text no map can really convey what happens on a battlefield. if you really want to understand a battlefield, you have to go to the battlefield and look at the ground. the little nuances of terrain that you look at and say, oh, now i understand.

oh i guess dan sickle, yes, he was on lower ground. probably should've told me to what he was doing. but the idea that the peach orchard is important is not a silly idea on dan sickles part. few places offer so many opportunities to really understand the terrain. or as many opportunities to explore questions of leadership. and questions of leadership that could be applied in nantes military as well as military situations. what does it mean to be a good subordinate? this collective leadership period individual leadership? there's just a plethora of ways to come at questions of leadership at gettysburg. hundreds of monuments here provide insights into how americans have chosen to remember the battle into the war. here, we see the memory of the war in stone and bronze, unlike any other place related to the american civil war. or any other event in our history. most of these monuments, if you look at them closely, ignore emancipation as an issue at the

time the armies collided at gettysburg. and they remind us that first to, last for most of the loyal white citizenry, this was a war for union. northern regimental state -- excuse, me state monuments which fill the field typically celebrate the gallantry of u.s. soldiers and the glory of the preserve union. southern state monuments, most of which went up in either the 1920s and 30s or 60s and 70s, like a lost cause interpretive pageant by former confederates in the late 19th century. the former carolina monument, executed by goods and borden, dedicated to 1929, mentioned, quote, the eternal glory of the north carolina soldiers who, on this battlefield, the heroism and surpassed. sacrificing all in support of their cause. while the south carolina, monument dedicated in 1963, with george wallace in attendance, as we mentioned last night, proclaims of south carolina inside gettysburg, quote, abiding faith of the sacredness of states rights provided their creed here.

many monuments confirmed the power of the era of reconciliation. when americans, north and south, sought to find common ground in casting the war as an ethical event that prepared the united states to become a world power. the strain of memory, which took most dramatic form in the eternal light peace memorial dedicated on oakville by franklin d. roosevelt on the 75th anniversary of the battle, in july of 1938. it remove the divisive issues of slavery and emancipation from the national narratives of the battle and of the war. if you want absolutely crystal clear examples of reconciliation is rhetoric, that airbrush slavery and emancipation out of the war, read what woodrow wilson said here in 1913. and what fdr said here in 1938. joshua chamberlain, colonel of the 20th main infantry, we all know, and now probably the most famous union officer at the battle, return to gettysburg in

october of 1889 to dedicate the monument to soldiers from maine who had fought during 1863. his remarks captured what that ground, and that the national park service now protects and interprets, meant to the generation that waged the war. he, of course, deployed vintage rhetoric and doing, it often today toward the color purple. no chemistry of frost overlaying the mold of the season's recurring life and death can ever separate from the soul of these consecrated fields that lifeblood so deeply comingled and incorporated here. in great, deeds something abides. in great fields, something stays. forms change and, past bodies disappear but spirits linger to consecrate ground for the vision place of souls. looking to the, future chamberlain predicted, that quote, reverent men and women from afar and generations that no it's not and we know not of heart drawn to see where and by

whom great things were separated done for them with, they'll come to the field to ponder and dream. i believe something does still abide a gettysburg. the tories i've landed some of the characters of the past, talk about what happened why it happened and what it meant for the nation then and what it means for us now. people on these tours usually make a connection to the past at gettysburg that cannot be duplicated in a classroom. in, fact the ground at gettysburg is perhaps the best classroom i have discovered. i rejuvenated every time i gather people on mcpherson's ridge to begin our discussion of the battles opening scenes. i readily admit, as during my first visit in 1965, i feel energized as i walk up the round top where chamberlain's men from maine held off william sea oats's infantry. or when i re-tracey advance of pickets brigade against the

stonewall, or hancock's second corps troops awaited them. lawyers please for questions about the war's larger meetings arise as we walk along less famous parts of the field. those are some of the best, walks from banners field, down across rocks creek and up copes hill. or trump burns ridge tibet's fire that along the railroad. cut as you walk, along you can see why the army's game, here with the soldiers that was at stake. you get far beyond the details of the immediate place. and passed this battle in a much broader framework. i know that many people have an exaggerated sense of gettysburg importance during the war. and i'll just say one last time, it was not the legendary turning point it became. in the writing of lost cause advocate and many of their union counterparts. the last cause focused on gettysburg because i have two reasons why the confederates lost. reason, one we never could've won because the yankees had too much of everything. reason to, longstreet undid lee

at gettysburg. if number one is the real, reason number two is irrelevant. but nonetheless, they had reason number one and reason number two. so, they focused immense energy on gettysburg. dancing on the heads of pins about leadership here. but that is a relevant to what i see as gettysburg's real value to modern americans. i wish every student in every american history corps had a chance to visit gettysburg. to read lincoln's address while standing in the national cemetery amid the graves of national soldiers. who, in lincoln's words, consecrated the ground at gettysburg far above our power to detract or add. lincoln saw that the world would never forget what happened at gettysburg, and i hope he was right. thank you. [applause] >> thank you so,

much professor gallagher. if you have questions, please make your way to the mics on either side of the room. >> you give me the signed one -- >> it seems that the explanation of abolition is, in part, a fantasy. i mean it's partly a cause but can also be exaggerated. similarly, it we are to believe that preservation of the union was a satisfactory explanation for four years of chaos and death and unspeakable suffering. so, where, now, how do we understand the cost?

and why it was born, both by lincoln and by the nation? >> we'll, if we had an hour and a half i could really do justice to that. first of, all you're talking about both causation and motivation there. those are two different things. related but different. in terms of causation, if you take slavery out of the question, nothing makes sense. it is inconceivable to me that there would have been a civil war were not for issues relating to slavery. it's absolutely, there there's no way to read the documents from the time honestly and reach any other conclusion. anybody who tells you differently and starts to quote something from after the war, say i don't hear something from after the war. i want you to read something to be written in the midst of events, going forward that says this isn't what's going on. it's all about slavery, stupid, to paraphrase other things we've heard lately. but that is not why most white men from the united states put

on blue uniforms. we put all blue uniforms to save the union. and the fact that we don't appreciate what union men in the mid 19th century did, it doesn't mean the union didn't loom unbelievably large in the mid 19th century. and the most powerful word in the political vocabulary of americans in the mid 19th century. and union conveyed to them, they had a tremendously exceptional us view of the united states as a singular place and the world that gave people, by people we need mean white men who could vote, very restricted by his standards. but within a mid 19th century context, breathtakingly broad franchising in the united states. it gives you a voice in your own governance and the opportunity to rise economically. you're not doomed to be what your father is. lincoln is a poster boy for this. almost no education he becomes. -- that's what they fought for him but for the american revolution and if we --

people aren't happy without the presidential election, then small d democracy is failed. our government has failed and the annotated is a beacon to the rest of the world that small d democracy has failed because we can't have a presidential election without people deciding to wreck the republic. through the course of the war, most loyal white northerners came to support emancipation but off of the reasons we would want. not as a great moral crusade, but because they considered it essential to beating the confederacy. because it would punish slaveholders that they believed brought on the war in the first place and it would remove the only internal issue that anyone can imagine undoing the union going forward. again, let shows the power of slavery and how people feud it. only issues relating to slavery could undo the nation from within. you get rid of slavery, that potential threat to the union going forward. for me, this is a sea change we were talking about attitudes for race last night.

the baseline for mid 19th century americans was profound racism from our point of view. take that as a given. anyone who comes to you, breathless lee opining some mid century person had racist views. tell them that, how exciting, maybe next time you go to the beach will find sand next time. it is absolutely not surprising. it's something when you don't find that. take that as a baseline and then, i think, it's rather miraculous that we do get such a broad degree of support for emancipation in the course of the war. sort of miraculous that the 14th and 15th amendments happened. you only get them, of course, because the shows the transformative of event of great military clashes. nobody would have us for seeing what happened in 1861. it wasn't a war, it's not a war to end slavery in 1861. some people hope it will be, frederick douglass hopes it will be. charles sumner hopes it will be. charles sumner is kind of happy that the first world run was a

defeat because means the war would last longer and they believe many appalachians, the more the war we go on the more likely that emancipation would come to the four. if mclelland had captured richmond, come back to our friend jorge. if we clown had captured richmond in july of 1862 which any compton commander would have -- >> that would've been the end of the war and it would've been the end of the emancipation. it was on the table. everybody talks about antietam and administration, it is not the key battle with emancipation. the seven days is. the quantification act came a couple days after mcallen's defeat and charles sumner tied it directly to lincoln's -- mclelland's defeat. blinken now to his cabinet on the 22nd of july, 1862, that he was going to issue a proclamation of emancipation. that was the key battle. and he gives the moment he could do it, but the decision comes in the wake of macron's

failure when they decide we are not going to be up to win this war without upping the ante. does that mean? we will put the ante as high as that can be. the entire slave holding society of the confederacy is now on the table. you can't get higher states stakes than that. most people eventually, not all, many millions of democrats never got on board with it. they were willing to die to save the union and are not willing to die to free enslaved black people, they can attend. many democrats came around in the course of the war because they thought it was essential. as a longer international given, you look bored. >> as much as i love this place, as wartime as i've been here, i agree with your premise. that begs the question what, if anything, was the turning point? was it -- or was it, as jimmy mcpherson i

think said, the antietam. you don't seem to agree with that one. but -- >> i think there are lots of no turning points! summer military and some are not military. i think -- was a turning point because really politicized the war and brought the creation of the joint committee on the conduct of the war, which had a lot to do with how the united states waits the war later. vicksburg is certainly a turning point in some ways. atlanta and the shenandoah valley campaigns sheridan reelect abraham lincoln, but i don't think any battle however had more impact on the subsequent course of the war than the seven days, which i've already mentioned. they bring emancipation to the table on the united states side and they put in place, on the confederate side, lee. without lee in charge of that army -- i hate to say this. with eminent biographers of joseph johnston in the audience here, but joseph johnston was not going to do -- here is not going to prolong the war for two years. i have this image of mr. johnson waking up in the morning on his first not being, what a great day to retreat.

i could go that way, i could go that way. even george mcclelland could handle that, because johnston takes a big step back, mcmillan takes a baby step forward. in the end you got through richmond and mcallen can preside over a siege. i think that the ascendancy of really complicates the united states problem during the war. it is because war becomes the, by far, most important confederate. human's army function very much in the way that -- in his army during the revolution. where is the continental army? who cares. is if it exists it still winnable. let people in the confederacy came to see lee in the army later in the war, many people said that least remake dictator or king. his ascendancy, the bringing forward of emancipation on the union side, i think the 70s is

marked as a important moment in the war, when it takes a revolutionary turn but says all bets are off. lincoln initially didn't want it to descend into her remorseless never luminary struggle into life's 1962 -- willing to have it head that direction. that is because of mcallen's failure in the seven days, at least significantly. >> the wounding of johnston maybe the -- >> that is the worst shot of ever in the federal fire, unless and this is why history is so much fun, i had a student wasn't a class give me at the end of the semester a had copied a five dollar bill but imposed mclelland picture on it instead of lincoln. that is -- mclelland had ambitions, he could've easily been president. i promise you he would have not pushed for emancipation. we know that very well, but that's not what mcclelland is going to do.

it is extremely important. yes? >> this is it. this is the last question because i am giving answers that are too long. >> well maybe this is a simple -- maybe not. i was up on the battlefield the other day and we were standing in front of the minnesota monument in the guide was telling us about how to hunt 30 men went forward. >> which mana you meant? >> i think i minnesota. they were asked about 15 minutes about 250 some odd men went forward in 40 came back. it always brings up the question, what made the soldiers do what they were doing? from our modern perspective. why would they go forward and, are they more afraid to not go than to go? what is your take on what makes these guys -- >> a lot of factors are in place there, of course. including the loyalty to your

unit and training that has you do things a certain way so you can control man on a 19th century battlefield the way they drill, the way they're taught to fight on a battlefield and there is a penalty for not going forward, to. a pretty significant downside to that if you're caught not going forward and they decide to do something about it. i mean, clearly and i would defer to people who have actually commanded troops. i can't imagine -- troops, even citizens shoulders, these are not to regular soldiers. these are citizen soldiers, not the same as regulars. smart officers knew that. you can't treat them the way you treat regulars. there's a political dimension, in many instances, in what they are doing. there are many poor men there because it's something to do. the indian army of virginia there are still mainly volunteers, actual volunteers, by that stage of the war. conscription had just come into

place in the united states in the previous months. they were mainly volunteers and they do have a sense of being part of our republic in which a citizen ray of something to the republic that gives them benefits. on the battlefield there is more nitty-gritty stuff on the ground. it is woefully inaccurate answer -- i can address it in this match, but thank you! >> [inaudible] >> thank you for the presentation. we have a ten -- is a ten or five minutes? we have time in a break so please come back promptly at 5:30.