Throughout my reading of Rally on the High Ground, I could not help but think back to a question provoked by Trouillot in the first week: who is responsible for the telling of history? While Silencing the Past offers an inclusive answer that incorporates much more than the specialized historian, there is no doubt that the professionals do have at least somewhat of a unique duty to justly interpret the past for the less-informed masses (as we have seen, however, the definition of “justly” can be manipulated by each individual to fit their own agenda). Regardless, while the National Park Service may not claim superiority over the general public, it does have a responsibility to present the past in an authentic context.
This seems to be what the five historians, from Blight to Foner, are attempting to do with their speeches, each as fluent and articulate as the next. Instead of streamlining into my praises, I’m hesitant to extol the reading while my qualms with David Blight linger beneath the surface. Even without the introduction, one can easily conclude that the first speech is Blight’s. I simply could not read over his claims of sectional reconciliation without thinking of what Neff and Brundage would say (or rather already have said) that contradicts it. As always, he is correct in that the race problem seemed to fade from the foreground of the national consciousness, yet his classic slip into the adorable blue-grey reunions of “harmonious forgetfullness” cannot be considered without Neff and Brundage’s formidable counterarguments in mind. I am also skeptical of any teleological argument such as Blight’s response in the Q&A that had Lincoln not been assassinated, not much would have changed in the long run. Such a question is obviously counterfactual and proposed just for the challenge, but it seems impudently daring to make such a claim.
Having now vented my initial reaction to Blight, I did enjoy his reference to John Townbridge, the early battlefield tourist, who called for the need to bridge the gap between the graves on the battlefields and their meaning. This was obviously resemblant of Neff, who so heavily emphasized the role of the burial of soldiers in the process of interpreting the war. Interesting enough, the Neff and Blight ultimately disagree on the issue of sectional reconciliation.
Linenthal also drew parallels with Brundage and Neff with the issue of the policing of space. While Neff focused on cemeteries and Brundage on greater civic events, Linenthal spoke in this vein, affirming that national parks are civic venues for ideological persuasion. Such a claim suggests the idea that civil war battlefields are still very much battlefields in the sense that different groups are competing to stake a claim on the space with their interpretation of its history.
Foner seems to conclude on this theme of competing ideologies, except he adds the idea of constant changeability. With all groups vying to put forth their definition of “liberty” and “citizenship,” Foner hails the Civil War as a crucial moment in the ongoing saga of freedom, in which the definition is always changing.
All in all, the most intriguing aspect of the speeches was this idea of motivation for fighting. Why were soldiers, both Confederate and Union, white and black, slave-holding and non-slaveholding, fighting in this war? I like McPherson’s argument that soldiers very much were conscious of the ideological cause of the uniform they wore, and that cause being the institution of slavery. While group cohesion most certainly played a role, it was ideological conviction that sustained that camaraderie motivation. What is so interesting about McPherson’s point is that if soldiers truly were aware and motivated by ideology, Blight’s ultimate sectional reunion seems unlikely. As if time could wash away the blood stained convictions of the blue and the grey. A fascinating thought seeing that both men are speaking on behalf of the National Parks.
Ending on a light but momentous note, Horton’s bit of humor in his Q&A session was both funny and convincing. Addressing all those skeptics seeking to hide slavery from the foreground the Civil War, Horton says:
If you remove the South’s perceived need to protect slavery from this equation you don’t have a Civil War at this point. I cannot imagine people saying well, I think I’ll just get up and take up arms against my country because of some vague economic abstraction like the tariff.
It seems that sometimes the simplest answer is most appropriate for the most controversial questions. Commenting on ideology, motivation and the greater cause of the war, Horton issued a powerful statement, and one that he feels the National Parks have a duty to protect.