The Beginning of the Mexican Revolution

Hello dear readers and welcome once again. Today we’ll go on an adventure through history once again, and travel exactly 105 years into the past, to November 18^th 1910 to see the beginning of the Mexican Revolution. So with that out of the way, strap in and get ready for another exciting adventure into Mexican history!

Let’s start off by talking about Mexican political history. After the Mexican War for Independence (more info on that here) Mexico became an empire though the Emperor, Agustin de Iturbide, was quickly deposed and the empire was replaced with a republic. Because of this, there was much conflict over how the new government should be run. For decades, the president would be forcibly removed from office, only to be replaced with a new one. This trend of an unstable government would continue until the mid-1850s when then President, Benito Juarez and other liberals took power. While in office, Juarez wanted to weaken the power of the Catholic Church and the military. The Conservatives were against this and a civil war, known as the War of the Reform, was fought for about 4 years until 1861. This war weakened the Mexican government but ultimately the liberals won and Juarez asked foreign investors, specifically France, Britain, and Spain to wait until stability was returned to Mexico before repaying the debts owed to the Europeans. Those three European powers did not accept this and decided to take over the port of Veracruz in an attempt to force Mexico to pay the debts. France, under Napoleon III, wanted to colonize and take over Mexico and decided to move inland into Mexico. Once Britain and Spain saw this, they withdrew their support. This French invasion would be known as the French Intervention, and would last from 1861 until 1867 when Juarez and the Mexican forces managed to defeat the French and executed Maximilian, the Austrian that was put on the Mexican throne to rule Mexico in France’s place.

The execution of Maximilian

Once the French Intervention ended, both the Conservative forces and the Liberal forces managed to put aside their differences and work together to make Mexico great once again. This would lead to Juarez remaining in power and being re-elected in 1867 and 1871 until he died in 1872 from a heart attack. In 1872 after Juarez’s death, there were two other presidents until in 1876 when Porfirio Diaz rose to power and became president. Diaz’s regime as president is an era known as the Porfirato, named after him. During the Porfiriato there was a large increase in technology and growth for the country, especially creating large European-like cities and infrastructure. All of this was built on the backs of the poor and caused many social issues and problems between Diaz’s elite cronies and the poor and working classes. Another aspect of the Porfiriato era was that many foreign investors, often investors from the United States, would take precedence in legal problems, particularly in strikes. There were also some times that US soldiers would take control and put down rebellions or strikes. This would lead to more problems that Diaz would attempt to quench using the force of the Army and along with his rural police force, known as the Rurales. Diaz would use force to violently put down these revolts and strikes quickly and efficiently, though if there were many revolts to occur at the same time, Diaz would be powerless to stop them all. This is why the Mexican Revolution managed to start, because it started off as multiple different revolts and rebellions taking place at the same time.

Porfirio Diaz, the dictator of Mexico for three and a half decades

Let’s talk about the man that made the call for revolution, and would later become a martyr for the Revolution and become a symbol for the end of tyrannous rule, Francisco Ignacio Madero. Madero had been educated in France and the United States and later would go to University of California Berkeley. This would influence him and made him want to reform Mexico politically with little change for social conditions. In 1908 when Diaz said in an interview that he would not run for re-election in 1910, Madero took advantage of the moment to announce that he would run for president and he wrote a book titled La Sucesion Presidencial en 1910 (The Presidential Succession in 1910) in which he talks about how the country has problems, how Diaz having control over the political system caused various problems. This book became a national best seller and after Madero decided to run for presidency, he used the platform of “No reeleccion y sufragio effective” meaning “No re-election and effective suffrage” which essentially means that there should be secret ballots and that all men, regardless of class and social status, should be allowed to vote and that the president should only serve one term to prevent anyone from gaining too much power and not giving it up as necessary.

Francisco I. Madero, the Martyr of the Revolution

Madero ran for president and took advantage of the trains and other vehicles to help promote his presidential campaign. Overall, Madero was similar to Diaz, politically speaking, in the sense that he wanted to modernize Mexico as well and that Madero believed that the only real thing necessary to fix Mexico was by having new people involved in the political process. In June 1910 Madero would be arrested by Diaz’s orders due to trumped up charges of Madero having disturbed the peace. During this time that Madero was jailed, Diaz managed to win re-election, to no one’s surprise. Madero then used the connections that his father had to manage to get out of jail on a bail. Soon after he got out on bail, Madero escaped to the United States. Soon after this, Madero issued his famous Plan de San Luis Potosi, named after the city where he was jailed. The Plan de San Luis Potosi, which can be read here in Spanish, has Madero explain that the biggest problem to Mexico is Diaz and that the best way to fix this problem was for the people to take up arms and remove Diaz by force. If you recall, I earlier mentioned how Diaz was able to use harsh methods of violence and force to stop any and all revolts but that if multiple revolts were to break out simultaneously, he’d be helpless to stop all of the revolts. This is precisely what Madero wanted to happen, and it did. At the end of the Plan de San Luis Potosi, Madero calls for everyone to revolt against Diaz on a specific day, November 20^th, 1910 at 6 pm. The tl;dr version of the Plan de San Luis Potosi is this: 11/20/10 let’s kick Diaz out of power guys.

I’m sure some of you may be wondering if the Mexican Revolution happened the way Madero wanted, or if it ended up succeeding. The answer is yes and no. Initially Madero had promised various kinds of reforms but nothing ever entirely specific, preferring to give vague ideas and statements. One of the things he was vague about was land reform, stating that it would be something that would happen. Because of this, many campesinos decided to side with Madero and planned to arm themselves in preparation of this. You’d think that this would end up working greatly for Madero, but in actuality it wouldn’t. Two days before Madero’s plan was to be used, there was an issue. On November 18^th, 1910 while gathering supplies for the revolution, the Serdan family was ambushed by Diaz’s men. This ambush resulted in a violent attack and as a result the Mexican Revolution began two days prior to when Madero wanted. After this, the Mexican Revolution began and many battles would occur between the Diaz regime and the various revolutionary factions. In this initial part of the Mexican Revolution many of the revolutionaries were siding either with Madero or with local agrarian leaders, such as Emiliano Zapata in Morelos and Jose Doroteo Arango Arambula, better known as Francisco “Pancho” Villa, in the North. Villa and Zapata both admired Madero, though in different ways. While Villa firmly believed in Madero, and in fact (spoiler alert: Madero gets killed), openly wept at Madero’s funeral, Zapata was less of a believer in Madero and would later break away from Madero after (spoiler alert again: Madero becomes president) Madero became president.

Emiliano Zapata (right) and Pancho Villa (left) in Mexico City in 1914

As the spoiler alert above mentioned, Madero would become president, though only after the Treaty of Ciudad Juarez of May 1911, where Diaz and his vice president would step down from power and Francisco Leon de la Barra would become interim president until official elections could be held. An interesting saying often attributed to Diaz after the Treaty of Ciudad Juarez says that “Madero has a tiger by the tail, let’s see if he can control it.” After this, Madero officially declared the Mexican Revolution would end and that all insurgents would lay down their arms since the main objective, removing Diaz from power, was completed. This didn’t work since as soon as you let people take up arms it becomes difficult for the people to put their arms away, especially since many were trying to avenge family or improve their conditions against hacendados, or large land owners. After ordering the insurgents to put away their arms, Zapata refused saying that the goal of the revolution hadn’t been completed yet, which he believed to be more agrarian and land reforms to improve conditions for the poor campesinos. The greatest problem that Madero and the revolution faced as time went by was that for many people the Mexican Revolution held many different meanings. For Zapata and other agrarian leaders, there was a large focus on helping and reforming the working conditions for campesinos as well as distributing land for those that needed land, whereas for various political leaders, such as Madero, wanted to fix the political system by adding new blood, so to speak, and allowing a new generation to be involved in the political system. It was this problem that caused the Mexican Revolution to have completely different meanings for different people and prevent Madero from easily taking power after the Treaty of Ciudad Juarez.

Now, for Madero the Treaty of Ciudad Juarez was the end of the Revolution, Diaz was out of power and the political system could, theoretically, be improved and fixed. Because of this, Madero asked all the revolutionary fighters to put down their arms, but the campesinos were not going to put down their arms until they got the things they wanted and the reforms they wanted. Due to this, the Mexican Revolution continued for almost another decade and there would be very little political and social change during this era. Madero made a few mistakes after he managed to take power as president, one of which was keeping most of Diaz’s cabinet/assistants. One of the people that Madero allowed to remain in power was Victoriano Huerta. Huerta was a high ranking member of the military under Diaz’s regime. Huerta was initially used by Madero to put down any anti-Madero revolts, not necessarily because the revolutionaries were against Madero, but because they were revolts that disrupted Mexican life and would prevent the changes that Madero wanted. During this time, there were very few, if any, battles that took place in Mexico City but that all changed in 1913. Now, by 1913 popular support for Madero had been in decline mainly because he did not implement, nor did he plan to implement, any type of social and agricultural reform until the political process had been changed and reformed. You can easily see why the population did not fully support Madero at this point and it wasn’t just the general population that disliked Madero either. Many elites disliked Madero, even though most kept their jobs after he took over. One person that greatly disliked Madero by 1913 was General Manuel Mondragon. Mondragon was a top general in the Porfirio era and disliked Madero, wanting to take him out of power as soon as possible. In a (failed) coup, he and other conspirators planned to break Felix Diaz out of prison and take Madero out of power. This initial coup failed, though Diaz was able to break out of jail. For those wondering, yes, Felix and Porfirio were related the elder Diaz was Felix’s uncle.

 

The similarities are uncanny, just look at their hats, moustaches, shiny medals and military uniform.

Felix on the left and Porfirio on the right

Now back to the fighting. After this failed coup, Huerta began conspiring against Madero thanks to intervention from the United States ambassador, Henry Lane Wilson, (who really put the “ass” in “ambassador”) who convinced Huerta that Madero was unfit to be the true ruler of Mexico. Huerta then hatched a plan to remove Madero from power. Madero ordered Huerta to go out and put down an anti-Madero rebellion in Mexico City led by, who else but Diaz and Mondragon. Huerta initially fought against the anti-Maderista rebels, but later on sided with them to take Madero out of power. This coup against Madero is known as the Decena Tragica, the Ten Tragic Days, where Madero and his vice president, Pino Suarez, were essentially held hostage by Huerta from February 9 to the 19^th hence the name, the Ten Tragic Days. During this time, Madero and Suarez were held hostage by Huerta and this caused problems. On February 19^th Madero and Suarez were killed, though the circumstances surrounding this event are relatively unknown. While it is certain that Huerta either killed or ordered the death of Madero and Suarez, not much other than that is known. According to Huerta, both Suarez and Madero were trying to flee with assistance from pro-Maderista rebels, and of course no one believed him.

Victoriano Huerta, the "Usurper"

So where do we go from here? Well, honestly this is the highest point of the Mexican Revolution, with many different factions unite to depose Huerta, who would take power after Madero’s death. Huerta became known as “The Usurper” because he stole power and took it for him after Madero died. Because of this and because of the fact that Huerta was a crony of Diaz for some years, the general population didn’t like him and tried to get him out of power. As I mentioned above, Villa was a great supporter of Madero and because of that, Villa would want to avenge Madero. Zapata, now that Madero was dead, was able to focus more on fighting the government and attempt to create more agrarian reforms. Two other important players show up now as well, Venustiano Carranza and Alvaro Obregon. Collectively these men would help form the Constitutionalist Army, though Zapata, as expected, would not actually be a part of the Constitutionalist Army but would still assist them as needed. Carranza was more of a politician than a general which was why Obregon was assisting him as the general of his faction. Carranza, Obregon, and Villa were generals in the North while Zapata was primarily in the South, centered mainly in his home state of Morelos.

Venustiano Carranza, future president of Mexico

Throughout this time, the Constitutional Army fought united against Huerta until 1914 when, after numerous defeats at the hands of the Constitutionalist Army, Huerta decided to step down from power and fled to Germany until he decided to go to the United States to return to Mexico, but this was thwarted by US officials that arrested him and he died in 1916. On October 1914, after forcing Huerta into exile, the Constitutionalist Army united once again, this time to speak about the future of the nation, joining to form the Convention of Aguascalientes, which was described by Carranza as the “Great Convention of Commanding Military Chiefs and State Governors.” Ultimately this Convention would be the breaking point for the Constitutionalist Army since each of the leaders held a different opinion as to what where the Revolution was headed and what the government should be like in the future. One major problem with the Convention was that there was no real consensus as to what types of reforms and changes there should be. There was little talk of what should be done for the poor working class and as a result both Villa and Zapata split from the Constitutional Army. After this, both Villa and Zapata had a deal where neither would attack the other. The picture showing Villa and Zapata was taken in December 1914 and would be the last time that either Villa or Zapata would be in Mexico City after they took it in a joint effort. After this in 1919 Zapata was killed in an ambush by Carranza. It wouldn’t be until 1920 that the Mexican Revolution ended when Villa made a deal with the government, where Villa would go into retirement in exchange for an hacienda of over 20000 acres.

This is where I’ll end this history of the Mexican Revolution. I generalized and glossed over some points, primarily the events in between the various presidential eras and with the battles. Many more things happened, such as Villa making a film for the US about his battles and exploits against Huerta or Zapata’s various campaigns in Morelos, but those may show up on another day. I'd like to point out; however, that Madero's dream of a fixed political system happened with the Constitution of 1917, which had several clauses to prevent another regime like Diaz's, and the Revolution made clear that the working class would never be ignored again. I’ll end and remind all of my readers that they must work together for a brighter future and that only by working together, united in spite of our differences, can true peace be accomplished. Never forget how every person has their own story and their own lives each as different and complex as the next. 

Women and the Mexican Revolution

Hello all, and welcome once again. Today we will delve into the history of the Mexican Revolution and the participation of people in it. We’ll be talking about women’s roles in the Revolution, so strap in and enjoy the ride.

The Mexican Revolution started in November 18^th, 1910 when Francisco I. Madero, the political opponent of the current president, Porfirio Diaz, called for the Plan de San Luis Potosi while in exile in the United States. Under the Plan de San Luis Potosi, the oppressed agrarian people would rise up and rebel against Diaz’s regime, which exploited the lower classes in favor of the richer aristocratic classes. This plan worked and after some time, Diaz was exiled from Mexico and Madero became president. One would think that this would end the Revolution, but this was just the beginning. Madero had promised vague agricultural reforms, and the people were demanding they be heard. Madero refused to give the working class the social reforms they wanted. Because of this several of his supporters, including Emiliano Zapata and Pascual Orozco, left him to try and support the poor working class. As a result, Victoriano Huerta, a general, caused a coup d’état in 1913 where Madero, as President of Mexico, and the vice president were essentially held hostage by Huerta and his men, then executed.

This is where the Revolution becomes more chaotic. Different people fight for different reasons, and different geographical locations help determine the reasons for fighting. In the north of Mexico, a leader of the forces there known as Francisco “Pancho” Villa fights for land and reform, to fix Mexico and have all people have equal access to land and education, for the hacienda system to end. In central Mexico, primarily the state of Morelia, Emiliano Zapata was the leader in that area and he fought for land, with one of his major motto's was “Tierra y Libertad” meaning “Land and Liberty” where agricultural and land reforms were his main focuses, as I mentioned above. For the various political leaders, they either wanted political power or, if they wanted reforms, political reform to allow more people to vote.

Keeping in mind that the Revolution took place 1910-1920 and because of this time period, women were traditionally not meant to be involved in the Revolution, but at the same time, because of the fighting it was difficult to keep women home when what was considered home moved along with the battles. What I mean by this is that many women, especially lower class and working class women, were camp followers and would do the traditional woman roles, such as cooking, cleaning, and caring for children. Oh yeah, and the most important thing a woman (at the time) could do; have sex. This doesn’t mean that women were completely useless because they weren’t. Traditionally these women were called adelitas, named after a popular corrido, a traditional folk song that tells a story, that talks about a soldier’s girl named Adelita, who performed the tasks I just listed. More recently they became called soldaderas. Now, I know what some of you that don’t know the history behind these women may think “Oh the women are called soldaderas because they’re female soldiers.” And to those of you that are thinking this I say, “Good thinking, but wrong.” Soldaderas were called that because often times, when their husbands or other male relatives died or were busy fighting, the women would pick up the man’s salary called a soldada. This is why women became known as soldaderas.

A stereotypical picture of an Adelita or soldadera

Now I’m sure some of you are thinking, “Wait, so women didn’t fight in the Revolution?” Of course women did fight as soldiers, though once again, it depended on the social class and geographical location. Villa definitely had some women fight, and so did some other revolutionaries, though women still remained the minority in the fighting. Some factions fighting preferred not to use women at all, because they were "weak" or would be too much of a distraction to the men. Women still played a very crucial role, as I previously stated, and as a result of having previously been in dangerous situations during the Revolution. Being in those situations helped push women into wanting equal rights as men, considering that there were women fighting alongside with men in this Revolution to change and reform society. This led to helping create the feminist and woman’s rights movements in Mexico, which in 1953 women earned the right to vote. An important thing to note is that not all women fought, but many did; however within the soldaderas there was infighting and many other conflicts. There have been stories told of how some soldaderas would “accidentally” kill other soldaderas, along with innocent bystanders. This doesn’t lessen the role that the women played; however, as some soldaderas killed their companions, others fought valiantly for their cause. There were also many cases of women not fighting, but being spies or smugglers for the Revolutionaries, bringing them food, supplies, weapons, and other necessities for the fights.

A potentially staged photograph of soldaderas 

One important thing to note is that because this revolution took place in the 1910's, we have actual photographs of the fights, the participants, and others. While normally having photographs is a good thing, in this case not so much because it is difficult to tell what may have been staged for propaganda and what was an authentic action. For example below is an example of a potentially staged photograph. If these women were in fact aiming at an enemy, so many women wouldn't be needed, the women sitting below on the ground wouldn't be in a proper position to aim or fire properly, and some women only appear to be holding their rifles. This doesn't diminish from the true acts of heroism that many women did by fighting, smuggling goods, or spying but rather these potentially staged photographs add to the myth that all soldaderas were female soldiers and that they all fought, when in reality many did, but many more were still simple housewives in a time of war.
                       

This is where I’ll end this blog post, but don’t worry my dear readers, I’ll tackle the Mexican Revolution once more. Until then dear readers, remember that any dreams or goals you have will never be beyond your reach if you try hard enough. Never give up because someone says that you aren’t worth it. Always remember that with determination and perseverance you can succeed. And above all, remember that everyone on this world has a different life than yours, and that different opinions and perspectives are what makes everyone unique. Acknowledge your differences and respect them just as you want your differences to be respected.

Lincoln's Assassination and the Civil War

Hello all, and welcome once again. Today we will discuss something that is very important, nay essential, to American history and how it shaped later events. To begin let me ask you a question, my dear readers: “What was one of the bloodiest wars in American history?” Easily, the American Civil War. The Civil War shaped much of what American society is today, and if events changed even in the slightest, perhaps we would be living in a completely different world today. In honor of its 150^th anniversary, today we will tackle a very important turning point in American history, the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. Buckle in your seats ladies and gentlemen, because it’s gonna be a long ride.

Now normally at this point, I would begin to talk about the historical background leading up to the Civil War, which would lead to Lincoln’s assassination 150 years ago on April 14^th 1865; however, this time I feel that a different approach is necessary simply because of the large amount of history and the major events occurring in the war, so I will do my best to summarize about a good 87 years of history or so.

In 1776 the 13 British colonies, in what would soon be known as the United States of America, officially broke ties with Britain and declared themselves to be a new, independent nation due to the various grievances that Britain refused to hear. This event would later be repeated by the Southern states of the United States, who would secede from the nation in 1861, claiming that because the Northern government was preventing the Southern states from exercising their states rights’ they would secede if Abraham Lincoln, the Republican candidate for the 1861 election, was elected. The two events are vastly different though, simply because of the causes for why the colonies and Southern states decided to secede and leave the “Mother country.” While the colonies decided to leave and rebel because they were being taxed without proper representation in British parliament, the Southern states decided to secede from the Union because they felt that the Union was not respecting the states’ rights, a code word meaning the Southern states were scared that the Republican party, an anti-slavery party, was going to abolish slavery completely. Yup, that’s right the Civil War was definitely fought over slavery, though that’s oversimplifying matters a bit. Now the Republican Party was anti-slavery, but that didn’t mean that they were totally against slavery, but rather just wanted slavery to stay in the South and not let it move out west. This would be the biggest problem the country would face until the Civil War started.

Let’s fast forward a bit, and jump to the more important events that caused the Civil War. The first would be the Mexican-American war in 1846. This war was caused by the United States in an attempt to beat Mexico in a war and gain land, something that the United States had been attempting to do by offering to buy land from Mexico. Mexico repeatedly refused to sell the land to the United States. The president of the time, James K. Polk, ran on a campaign that he would annex Texas into the United States, which before this time Texas was its own independent country that wanted annexation into the US. Unsurprisingly, because of his campaign, Polk won the election of 1845 and proceeded to annex Texas. The border of Texas was a main conflict between the US and Mexico because of what the border was. The US claimed the Rio Grande as the border, while Mexico claimed the Nueces River as the border, which was about 150 miles north of the Grande. Polk ordered troops to move down to the Nueces River, since he knew that the Mexican government would attack the American troops, since they would view this as an invasion or some other kind of aggressive show of power on the part of the US. There was a brief skirmish, where the US troops were killed, and Polk asked Congress to declare war on Mexico because Mexico “spilled American blood on American soil” and that Mexico needed to pay the price. Long story short, Mexico lost and had to give up most of what is now the American Southwest as a result in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. In 1846, a few months before the Mexican-American War broke out, a Congressman by the name as David Wilmot introduced a proviso, the Wilmot Proviso (gee I wonder who named it). This Proviso stated that if the US won any land from the war it would be closed to slavery, which of course, sat badly with the South because they wanted slavery everywhere possible. Of course the Proviso failed to gather enough support and it was essentially ignored.

Let’s focus now on the politics of the North and South in regards to slavery. The North and South were different in pretty much every regard, with wage labor thriving in the North and, of course, slavery in the South. This led to the South wanting to expand slavery to the West at any costs, while the North wanted to prevent the expansion of slavery. It was this division in politics that ended up ending one of the most influential political parties of the time, the Whig party. The Whigs were a political party established in the 19^th century to oppose President Andrew Jackson and the Democratic Party. The Whigs were prominent in both the North and the South, and had no real national stance other than to prevent Democrats from winning office. Once the Democrats didn’t have as much power as before, tensions within the Whig party began to form in the form of, yup you guessed it, slavery. Slavery would tear the Whigs apart and further divided the nation. There were Whigs on both sides of the slavery debate and it was this divide that would eventually end this party. The focus on anti-slavery would eventually lead to the formation of new parties, some would end quickly, while one formed would become the reason for the Civil War, and became a major political party, becoming one of the two major parties in today’s politics: the Republican Party.

Now that we’ve captured a rough idea of why the Civil War broke out (*cough* slavery *cough*) and what the response was from the North and South, let’s go ahead and talk about the Civil War itself. In the beginning of the War, the North seemed to be the clear winner of the war, with a larger population and train tracks; however, because of the lack of proper generals and control of troops the North was unable to properly fight the war and as a result, the North would fight a losing war for a majority of the war. The South had the advantage in the War because they didn’t need to win the war, only have the North surrender. In addition to this advantage that the South had, they had the better commanders and generals due to the fact that most of the major military schools were in the South and also in general, the South had more money due to the large amounts of cotton being exported, primarily to Britain. We’ll get into the importance of Britain in the Civil War soon enough, I promise, but for now let’s continue to focus on the North and South. In 1861 the southern states, beginning with South Carolina in 1860, in response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States of America. The problem that the South had was the fact that Lincoln was a Republican and had an anti-slavery stance. As mentioned above, Republicans wanted to halt the expansion of slavery, not abolish it as an institution. The Southerners; however, felt that Lincoln would attempt to abolish slavery due to the fact that he was a Republican, previously a Whig, and stood against the Mexican-American War when it began. In his first inaugural address, Lincoln said that “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.” This was clearly an attempt by Lincoln to prevent the remaining Southern states from seceding and try to reintegrate some of the seceded states, and also clearly show the rest of the nation that Lincoln was not an emancipator, nor would he try to free slaves if he could help it.

Now Lincoln didn’t like slavery, but he would not allow his personal ideas to influence what he would decide in the Civil War. In a letter in 1862, Lincoln wrote that he would do whatever it took to save the Union, that if freeing all the slaves would save the Union he would do it, if leaving slavery alone could save the Union he’d do it, and if freeing some slaves and keeping others enslaved would save the Union, he would do it. During the war many Northern generals were freeing slaves; however, Lincoln ordered the generals to stop freeing slaves, and return the slaves to their owners because Lincoln didn’t want the Southern slave owners to become angry at the North any more than they already were. Ultimately the question of slavery was not as important to Lincoln as ending the war quickly and saving the Union. Before the Emancipation Proclamation was issued, there was a Confiscation Act, which allowed Northern generals to confiscate property to be used in the war effort. Slaves would be “captured” by the Northern generals and, since the South viewed slaves as property, the slaves would be confiscated and “used” by the Northerners. Before the Proclamation, it was understood that the slaves would have to return to their owners after the war, because since the war was over any and all property confiscated by the North would have to be returned to their original owners. The Second Confiscation Act of 1862 essentially said that the slaves would not be returned to their owners. This is especially noticeable with the Emancipation Proclamation, which Lincoln used as a war measure and not as a moral tool to end slavery. The Emancipation Proclamation is interesting because of the fact that it was used to free slaves in the states in rebellion in the South. In order for the various acts and most importantly, the Emancipation Proclamation, to affect the South, they had to be considered not as a separate nation, but rather as states rebelling against the United States, which was how the North viewed the Confederate States of America. The middle states, states that were in between the North and South and didn’t have as much slavery, were exempt from these acts and the Proclamation because Lincoln and his government didn’t want to lose these important middle states.

Now before we talk about the Emancipation Proclamation, let’s talk about Britain like I promised. Britain had many factories and textile mills and had to import most of their cotton used in the factories from the Southern states of the US since they had the largest amount of cotton to export. Because of this, Britain wanted to help the South win the Civil War in order to keep their amount of cotton stable, or perhaps even increase due to the help Britain could provide. Britain had previously abolished slavery in 1833 and until the Emancipation Proclamation, the Civil War was not clearly about slavery. Once the Proclamation was passed, the war became clearly about slavery, with the South now fighting to preserve this institution while the North fought in order to end slavery. This change in the war caused Britain to be unable to support the South because it was fighting for slavery and Britain had already abolished slavery. Perhaps if the Proclamation hadn’t been passed, Britain would have openly supported the South and perhaps they would have won.

The Proclamation also served to motivate more people to serve in the military, since prior to this many soldiers deserted or refused to join the military when they were drafted, with this happening on both sides. Once the Proclamation passed pro-slavery people in the South fought to keep slavery while more anti-slavery people in the North fought to end this institution. This would also rise morale in the troops for both sides and, because of the Proclamation, more black soldiers would side with the North to end slavery and free those that were still trapped in the South. Blacks were, in a sense, the first emancipators in the Civil War because, once war broke out and there were less men to keep slaves in line, slaves would take advantage of this and either runaway to the North or take up arms and rebel on plantations knowing that there were few men to stop them. Because of the large number of troops, the rise in morale, and the North finally having a fully capable general to lead the troops into battle, General Ulysses S. Grant, the Northern army entered into a war of attrition to quickly end the Civil War. It was in these later battles of the Civil War that caused many of the casualties in the Civil War, though this doesn’t mean that earlier battles weren’t as bloody or had lower amounts of casualties. The only thing that the Proclamation did not spell out was what would happen to the freed slaves, because the Proclamation did not state that the freed slaves would become citizens.

I’m going to go ahead and wrap up the Civil War here, now that we know a bit more of its background and a brief history of Civil War and the Emancipation Proclamation, let’s go ahead and talk about what really matters and why I’m writing this: the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Before we get into the actual assassination, let’s go ahead and talk a bit about the assassin and the assassination plan that John Wilkes Booth and his conspirators had.

Booth was a white supremacist and a sympathizer of the Confederacy. Now to be clear, Booth was not a Confederate, he was born in Maryland. He believed that allowing blacks to live in the United States, where they worked hard, became Christians, and were lucky to live in a great country, though as slaves because blacks were inferior to whites. The Emancipation Proclamation and Lincoln’s last speech showed Lincoln’s true intentions when it came to slavery. In Lincoln’s last speech he said that black males should have the right to vote, something that further infuriated Booth. Originally Booth and several other conspirators attempted to kidnap Lincoln, but when that failed, he decided to kill Lincoln. Now it’s interesting to note that Booth and his fellow conspirators not only wanted to kill Lincoln, but also General Grant, Vice-president Andrew Johnson, and Secretary of State William Seward. This was done to try and decapitate the Northern government, to distract them long enough for the Confederacy to regain power and win the war, as long as there were still Confederates fighting after the surrender of General Robert E. Lee at the Appomattox Court House.  There were some issues with this decapitation plan mainly that the conspirators were unable to complete the plan because of various issues. The conspirator assigned to kill Johnson lost his nerve and didn’t try anything, Grant’s wife and Lincoln’s wife disliked each other so Grant was not in Ford’s Theatre, and Seward survived his assassination attempt. Ultimately, only Booth was able to assassinate Lincoln and as a result, Reconstruction varied from what Lincoln originally wanted. Lincoln’s assassination was one of the greatest turning points for history because of how Reconstruction would play out due to Andrew Johnson being much more lenient in how he wanted Reconstruction to play out. Lincoln’s assassination was planned, but it hinged on many details. For example if Lincoln decided not to attend the play, “Our American Cousin” at Ford’s Theatre that Good Friday 150 years ago, Booth would not have killed him. Or perhaps if Booth’s small handgun, which held only one bullet, missed or jammed, Lincoln would not have died. Perhaps if Lincoln had more security with him, since the Secret Service had not been established yet, he would not have been killed.

If seemingly small parts of the American Civil War had varied, perhaps we would be living in a completely different world. If Lincoln never issued the Emancipation Proclamation, perhaps Britain would have stepped in to aid the Confederacy and the Confederacy had won the Civil War, perhaps the United States and their allies would lose World War I, or perhaps there would be no World War II. Perhaps if Lincoln hadn’t been assassinated, he could have pushed for more progressive treatment toward African-Americans and as a result, perhaps race relations in the United States now would be better. This is pure speculation on my part, but it is interesting how different the world would be if any of these details in history had been changed.

This will end this post, and as usual my dear readers, remember that originality, independence, and living your life the way you want, are the most important things. Never let people stop you from achieving greatness, whether that means becoming the most successful person in the world, or simply being the best nurse, teacher, or secretary you can be. Never let anyone tell you that your dream is too small or too large for you because only you know what you are and what you want. Dream an endless dream, and fight the current that is keeping you from reaching the shore. Never let people keep you from doing what you love, and remember, even if no one believes in you and your dreams as long as you believe and keep fighting for what you want, nothing else will matter.