When discussing the broad issues of the war -- slavery and abolition, states' rights and union -- some people leap to the conclusion that the Southern soldier fought to preserve slavery or to uphold some ambiguous political principle, and that the Northern soldier fought to free the slaves, and so on. Perhaps there were some among the early eager volunteers who fought for those very reasons, but the overwhelming majority of soldiers on both sides waited to enlist AFTER the initial euphoria of 1861, from 1862 to 1865, and did so under the conscription laws that both sides enacted. The reasons they served varied, but I think it's fair to say that, like American conscript armies from World War 1 to Vietnam, most fought because it was their duty, plain and simple.

It is, therefore, important to segregate the soldiers from the causes of the war, when trying to discuss the Civil War. The war would not have occurred how and when it did were it not for the issue of slavery. But it would be completely wrong to infer from that, that the typical soldier fought either to preserve or abolish slavery. Many Southerners seem to be unable to make this distinction, and have spent a lot of time and energy attempting to minimize the role of slavery as a cause of the war, because they think that to acknowledge the role of slavery somehow denegrates the honor of the Confederate soldier. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

On the other side of the coin, it has become fashionable within the past couple of decades for those with a certain political and social agenda to link the Confederate soldier and the flag under which he fought, irrevocably to slavery. It's disheartening to witness it, but I've learned through experience that social agendas have a certain life-span, and this one, too, shall pass. There will be another flavor-of-the-month cause to occupy their attention when this one has become passe' -- which they all do in time.

In the interim, then, those of us who are interested in the Civil War as a momentous historical episode should continue to study all aspects of the war, with class and without passion.

And to you, and all my fellow Vietnam vets, whose service was misunderstood and unappreciated -- welcome home G.I., Bravo Zulu.