Confederate Flag Research Paper

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The Confederate Flag to them is supposedly a way to honor ancestors who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country. “That is not hate, nor is it racism”. But unfortunately, the history of the Civil War has always been about white supremacy. Though it is argued that the Confederate Flag is innocently representative of heritage, its creation and legacy are entwined in racial discrimination that flag supporters fail to acknowledge. The reason the Confederate Flag is a racist symbol has a lot to do with its context and history. It should be widely known the CSA formed when the movement for abolition threatened white supremacy. There is no hidden or underlying cause to the Civil War like economic or social differences, or even states’ rights.…show more content…
The often overlooked Cornerstone Speech, given by the Confederate Vice President weeks before starting the Civil War similarly states, “Our new Government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas… its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition” (Stephens). Despite stating the CSA’s objective, it is still argued what the nation was really about. For instance, Shelby Foote, in a transcript from a PBS News Hour debate, stated, “The flag is a symbol my great grandfather fought under and in defense of. I am for flying it anywhere anybody wants to fly it. I do know perfectly well what pain it causes my black friends, but I think that pain is not necessary if they would read the confederate constitution and knew what the confederacy really stood for” (Foote). Article I Section 9(4) and Article IV Section 2(1) of the Constitution…show more content…
This is an entirely weak argument, however, due to a lack of solid evidence and regulations present during the Civil War. A minority of people will assert that “thousands” of blacks took up arms for the Confederacy, but most historians reject this idea. It’s estimated that if any blacks had fought for the CSA, it would have been “a miniscule percentage—completely insignificant for anyone trying to make the argument that blacks saw the conflict as a war of Yankee aggression” (Britten). This minority was also either likely to have been forced to fight, as many of them were slaves and had no choice but to accompany their masters, or to fight for the same reasons they had fought in any previous wars, "to position themselves. They had to prove they were patriots in the hope the future would be better ... they hoped to be

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