Shelby Foote on American Exceptionalism

November 18, 2009

in Civil War Culture, Civil War Historians, Memory

foo0-001The following commentary by Shelby Foote comes at the tail end of Ken Burns’s The Civil War

“We think that we are a wholly superior people – if we’d been anything like as superior as we think we are, we would not have fought that war.  But since we did fight it, we have to make it the greatest war of all times.  And our generals were the greatest generals of all time.  It’s very American to do that.”

  • Deltaboy
    I agree with Foote on this one.
  • Lewis Black clarifies this point (language NSFW): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mCDZMWVWuc
  • Thanks for the link. That was hilarious.
  • Rob Wick
    Kevin,
    Looking at his quote, am I wrong in thinking that saying "if we'd been anything like as superior as we think we are, we would not have fought that war" as saying that it wasn't necessary to fight it even to end the scourge of slavery?

    As to the claim that it was a PC swipe at American exceptionalism, for God sake the man praised Nathan Bedford Forrest on the program. Foote was not PC. How senseless.

    Best
    Rob
  • I thought it would be obvious that my tongue was firmly planted in my cheek when I made that comment. I momentarily forgot that there are people out there, some of them writing "history" blogs, that say such things in all seriousness.

    ;^)
  • Rob Wick
    Marc,
    Allow me to apologize for failing to realize your comment was not meant to be taken seriously. After I wrote my comment, I started to wonder if that wasn't the case. Hopefully no harm, no foul!

    Best
    Rob
  • No apology necessary.

    Marc
  • markrcheathem
    Good point. In light of his other statements in the series, maybe I gave Foote too much credit by focusing on the latter part of his statement.
  • Another PC swipe at American Exceptionalism.
  • Jarret Ruminski
    I have no problem with patriotism and the acknowledgment of the United States' many strengths, but I do have a problem when patriotism is deluded into a jingoistic America fetish that oversimplifies United States history and mythologizes events like the Civil War. Sanitizing American history with myth opens the door to an American exceptionalism that is downright hostile to the necessary criticism that serious scholarship demands. For example, casting the Civil War in an overtly romantic light minimizes the serious racial issues that caused the conflict and only fuels the often simplistic popular conceptions of the war's meaning and continuing legacy. The serious and complicated issues of racial division that caused the war and continues to drive American political and cultural issues today are too important and too glaring to invoke claims of "exceptionalism."
  • markrcheathem
    That comment is one of the few Foote comments in the series with which I agree. American exceptionalism is a major theme of Civil War memory.
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