16 - Loyalty and Dissent: The Home Front in the American Civil War

Summary

In the turbulent and challenging year of 1863, when morale was low and disillusionment high in the North, an anonymous pamphlet writer expressed for many Americans, both in and out of uniform, a deeply rooted concern about the meaning of the paramount social, political, and military conflict facing the nation.

Loyalty. What is it? To whom or what due? These are questions vital to the American people, and if properly understood, may yet exercise a wholesome influence on the momentous issue of the day.

This pamphlet writer realized that the meaning of loyalty was central to the conflict, and this held true for both the North and South. In every modern war, the inclusion of the civilian population is essential for the war effort, and loyalty becomes the psychological touchstone on which to base national cohesiveness and the ability to motivate civilians to become soldiers, to leave their families, homes, friends, and communities, and to risk the ultimate sacrifice-death-for a cause, a nation, or both combined. Without the home front, loyal and committed to a cause, politicians in a democratic state hesitate to support a war, and ultimately the battle front collapses. The question of loyalty is intimately connected to patriotism, nationalism, and ideology. Disloyalty-or dissent-endangers the national consensus on the home front and is detrimental to the war effort.