Sincerely,
Tom Dugan
Playwright “Robert E. Lee – Shades of Gray

I don't think it is a matter of Grant underestimating the longevity of the Lost Cause. His mistake was not realizing how quickly former Confederates would begin to deny that slavery had been the root cause of the war, and how easy it would be for them to obfuscate the truth. BTW- Great article by Dwight Picaithley, former Chief Historian of the National Park Service on this subject in that mangled magazine.

At best, Lee belonged to the older slavery as a necessary evil school rather than the Calhounite slavery as a positive good school but the older school contended that God would end slavery when He saw fit (which generally appeared to be seen as a time long after the speaker and his progency were long gone). As for unpreparedness for freedom, who was answerable for that? During the antebellum period, the Southern pro-slavery forces refused to even discuss the possibility of slavery ever ending. They managed to suspend the First Amendment's petition clause for over a decade with the Gag Rule against even receiving anti-slavery petitions, even regarding DC which was federal property. It's not like the northern states had anything against gradual abolition. That's how many of them ended slavery within their own borders.

My heavens: such a collection of myths, going beyond the normal Lost Cause! The Mayflower was not used as a slaver – she was engaged in the wine trade and, as far as anyone knows, never made another voyage to the Americas as a blackbirder or anything else.

I liked the criticism of abolitionists and Radical Republicans. Hmm. “Lee” failed to mention the Southern secessionists as having any responsibility for the Wah..

And I did not know that REL suggested to Davis to emancipate at start of war – somehow I doubt that Davis knew that either!

Bob

I would not have the anniversaries of our victories celebrated, nor
those of our defeats made fast days and spent in humiliation and prayer;
but I would like to see truthful history written. Such history will do
full credit to the courage, endurance and soldierly ability of the
American citizen, no matter what section of the country he hailed from,
or in what ranks he fought. The justice of the cause which in the end
prevailed, will, I doubt not, come to be acknowledged by every citizen
of the land, in time. For the present, and so long as there are living
witnesses of the great war of sections, there will be people who will
not be consoled for the loss of a cause which they believed to be holy.
As time passes, people, even of the South, will begin to wonder how it
was possible that their ancestors ever fought for or justified
institutions which acknowledged the right of property in man.”

Memoirs, Vol. I