How the Civil War Lives on Today

The Revolutionary War may have answered the question of whether America would become an independent nation, but the Civil War answered the question of what kind of nation it would be.

Political Change

1. The American government became more centralized.
2. New constitutional amendments increased American power.
3. Northerners held more political power than Southerners.
4. The Civil War resolved two fundamental, festering problems left unresolved by the American Revolution and the Constitution.

1. The first was the question whether this new republic born in a world of kings, emperors, tyrants, and oligarchs could survive.
2. The second was slavery

Military Change

1. Logistics dependent on modern transportation are more important than Napoleonic-style maneuvers.
2. Entrenchment becomes best means to counter long-range firearms.
3. The importance of ironclads
4. The importance of a nation’s size and productive capacity is better appreciated.
5. Controlling the seas is understood to be more important than fortifying the coast.

Technological Change

1. Ambulances and hospitals
2. Repeating Rifle
3. Miscellaneous military tech: hot air balloons, soldier ID tags, land mines.
4. Ironclads
5. Telegraphs
6. Canning

Social Change

1. It ended slavery. Millions of slaves were freed. – states rights vs. slavery?
2. The United States went to war in 1861 to preserve the Union; it emerged from the war in 1865 having created a nation
3. Massive loss of life.
4. America became more focused on industrialism instead of an agrarian path .If the Confederacy would have won, America could have been more agrarian and less industrially focused, like Russia
5. Rhetoric of America as a land of opportunity emerges here.
   

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