So What?
Why Does This Matter?
While the various anti-war efforts across the nation during the Civil War may not seem like much compared to the many bloody battles that occurred, they were still tremendously important to the outcome and impacted the war greatly.
If there had only been efforts against the war in the North, it would have given the Confederacy a great advantage. The energy in the Union would have been spread thin between trying to manage the war effort as well as the restless and unhappy people back home, and the war would have probably been over a lot sooner. The same would have been true if the entirety of the Union supported the war effort while the South was divided. However, since both parties had issues to deal with within their own countries, it just drew the war out. Both parties were trying to fight each other and win the war while also trying to win over various dissenters.
The dissenters also targeted the leaders of their countries. Both Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis suffered floods of abuse from their own people, which made it increasingly hard for them to keep their countries whole.
It might seem like all the opposition did was complicate things, but it also brought to light various new issues both during and after the war. For example, the Richmond Bread Riots showed the Confederate government that it needed to care for both its military and its civilians. The conscientious objectors in both the North and the South made both sides realize that there needed to be arrangements made for those who were religiously against fighting in a war.
The Civil War was so horrible that it is unfathomable that there would be no opposition to the war. Although people may not agree with the reasons that people back then were against the war for, studying this helps us to understand the beliefs of the different people at the time and to gain a more complete overall perspective of the Civil War.
If there had only been efforts against the war in the North, it would have given the Confederacy a great advantage. The energy in the Union would have been spread thin between trying to manage the war effort as well as the restless and unhappy people back home, and the war would have probably been over a lot sooner. The same would have been true if the entirety of the Union supported the war effort while the South was divided. However, since both parties had issues to deal with within their own countries, it just drew the war out. Both parties were trying to fight each other and win the war while also trying to win over various dissenters.
The dissenters also targeted the leaders of their countries. Both Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis suffered floods of abuse from their own people, which made it increasingly hard for them to keep their countries whole.
It might seem like all the opposition did was complicate things, but it also brought to light various new issues both during and after the war. For example, the Richmond Bread Riots showed the Confederate government that it needed to care for both its military and its civilians. The conscientious objectors in both the North and the South made both sides realize that there needed to be arrangements made for those who were religiously against fighting in a war.
The Civil War was so horrible that it is unfathomable that there would be no opposition to the war. Although people may not agree with the reasons that people back then were against the war for, studying this helps us to understand the beliefs of the different people at the time and to gain a more complete overall perspective of the Civil War.