Talk:American Civil War

Status

What is the status of this article? I am new to Citizendium and very interested in the Civil War. Bill Falter 22:24, 10 September 2007 (CDT)

good question. it's imported from Wikipedia (where I worked a lot on it) and I plan a complete rewrite, one of these days.Richard Jensen 22:56, 10 September 2007 (CDT)

Cleanups

Just some cleaning up, mainly reducing the density of referencing, eliminating dead images and delinkingGareth Leng 16:53, 3 February 2008 (CST)

you have a sharp eye for what needs fixing! Richard Jensen 17:02, 3 February 2008 (CST)

Civil war gallery

Is it alright to include the public domain pictures taken by Mathew Brady? Minhaj Ahmed Khan Lodi 12:16, 14 March 2008 (CDT)

I think this article is in dire need of some images to spruce it up. --Todd Coles 18:57, 18 March 2008 (CDT)

YES indeed it needs them pleas pitch in. there arepublic domain images that can be used freely here all Brady images are in the public domain and cannot be copyrighted. Indeed, all images pre 1923 are public domain, Richard Jensen 19:32, 18 March 2008 (CDT)

Also, here is the Library of Congress Civil War page. http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/cwphtml/ --Todd Coles 19:40, 18 March 2008 (CDT)

I was actually wondering if the images of dead soldiers goes with citizendium's family-friendly policy. I didn't find them gruesome at all. Minhaj Ahmed Khan Lodi 00:29, 20 March 2008 (CDT)

Intro

I'm not sure if this was written by someone here, or still leftover from WP, but I feel like the intro is too long winded. I think it needs to be trimmed up, but wanted to get opinions first. --Todd Coles 19:46, 18 March 2008 (CDT)

I wrote the lede, originally for Wikipedia. The goal is to concisely summarize the entire civil war--since many people will only read this summary. It's long because the story is very long and complicated. Richard Jensen 20:40, 18 March 2008 (CDT)

As it stands, the introduction is redundant: "The Union), led by Abraham Lincoln and General Ulysses S. Grant defeated the breakaway Confederacy, led by Jefferson Davis and General Robert E. Lee and ended slavery. Following the war, the southern states were readmitted into the Union during a turbulent period from 1865-77 known as Reconstruction....The war was between the United States (the "Union") and eleven Southern states that declared that they had a right to secession and formed the Confederate States of America, led by President Jefferson Davis." [emphasis mine]

Even if the article is distinguishing between the Confederate army and the Confederate States as a formal establishment, the second instance of the clause "led by President Jefferson Davis" is superfluous, at least for the introduction's purpose -- and if you think that's a poor assessment, then I would at least change the wording to eliminate redundancy.

Also, the grammar in the second sentence just doesn't appear right: "The Union), led by Abraham Lincoln and General Ulysses S. Grant defeated the breakaway Confederacy, led by Jefferson Davis and General Robert E. Lee and ended slavery." Parenthetic expressions -- particularly those as long as "led by Abraham Lincoln and General Ulysses S. Grant" -- should be enclosed in commas. Nick Bagnall 00:56, 20 March 2008 (CDT)

good points, and I tried to fix the lede accordingly. Richard Jensen 02:05, 20 March 2008 (CDT)

Great stuff. There was a second parenthetic clause ("led by Jefferson Davis and General Robert E. Lee") immediately following the first, so I tossed in another comma. Consequently, "and ended slavery" awkwardly falls on the end of the sentence, but I'm sure you or others can reword it better than I can (if you think it's necessary). --Nick Bagnall 02:59, 20 March 2008 (CDT)

Second Paragraph

I have issues with the second paragraph. As this first section is an overview of the war, the second paragraph seems to be summarizing the causes of the war. It should say something about the crises leading to secession, especially the political crisis. I rewrote it. --Russell D. Jones 14:48, 23 March 2008 (CDT)

Reconstruction started in 1863?

In the first paragraph: "Following the war, the southern states were readmitted into the Union during a turbulent period from 1863-77 known as Reconstruction." This is confusing since the war ended in '65. Are Lincoln's reconstruction efforts during the war worth mentioning here? I'd be inclined to just change it to 65. Warren Schudy 10:11, 20 March 2008 (CDT)

In this article, probably yes; it will be less confusing to naive readers (and we maybe have to reword slightly in order to not say anything which is inaccurate - something like "the bulk of Reconstruction 1865-mumble").

In the Reconstruction article, I would definitely cover Lincoln's pre-65 efforts, because one can see in them how his vision of what Reconstruction should have been differ from what actually happened. (Obviously, because of the timing of his death, we have no actual post-War Lincoln reconstruction to look at.) But let's see what others think... J. Noel Chiappa 10:51, 20 March 2008 (CDT)

historians now emphasize that Reconstruction began during the war and was well underway by 1865. The war ended in different states at different times, and Reconstruction began as soon as the union armies took over. Richard Jensen 19:31, 20 March 2008 (CDT)

Organization

This article takes forever to get to the Civil War. Perhaps it should be forked into an article called "The Causes of the US Civil War"?--Russell D. Jones 14:59, 23 March 2008 (CDT)