The Two Faces of Thaddeus Stevens (war, England, general, Washington)

[2nd trick op]

Sixty years have passed since I was a fourth-grader. In the primary schools, history is a subject that's submitted to a wide range of interpretation, so at that level, we used a text called My Pennsylvania, a wide-ranging book which dwelt upon subjects from the Quaker founders, to Washington at Valley Forge, to "famous Pensylvanians". Thaddeus Stevens got an entire chapter -- in no small part because he was a major figure in the advocacy for free public education in the Commonwealth, the first state to do so outside of New England. And that was the only part of Stevens' life which was covered.

But despite the fact that there was a lot more to the man, Stevens got no further attention in the history curriculum offered during my Junior and Senor High School studies, So it was not until an undergraduate course while in college that I learned of Stevens' role in the abolitionist movement, which probably figured in the end of his first term in Congress (1849-1853, as a Whig), and his stridency as a Reconstructionist Republican when returned to Congress after 1858.

Stevens was one of a number of former Whigs who gravitated to the emerging Republican Party in the last years of the 1850's, Upon his return to the House of Representatives, he was quickly caught up in the festering polarization as his abolitionist beliefs intensified, and when Civil War broke out, was an early supporter of a high tariff, paper money and other features common to the emerging American industrial state.

At the war's end, with Abraham Lincoln gone and the South rendered powerless, Stevens became the single most prominent member of the radical Reconstruction movement. He was an unapologetic proponent of the land reform ("forty acres and a mule to each (male, of course) emancipated slave"), and as relations further deteriorated, spearheaded the unsuccessful effort to impeach Andrew Johnson in the winter of 1867-68. By this time, Stevens' health was failing, and he died (in Washington rather than his Lancaster home the following August.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thaddeus_Stevens

If there's a point to all this, I believe that it's that the passions of a time of intense partisanship might mellow with the passing of the years, but the "revisionist" view sometimes hides under a unique veneer of its own making.

[Grandstander]

Stevens gets points for his abolitionist stance and generally progressive policies. He loses a few for for his sometimes impractical idealism and his making things harder for President Lincoln who had a much better grasp of what was and wasn't possible in terms of keeping the north united in the war effort.

Stevens also loses a few points for his pre-war membership in the American Nativist Party (the Know-Nothings) which was the opposite of progressive when it came to immigration laws. Stevens' benevolent feelings for black slaves apparently did not extend to Irish and German Catholics.

[Quietude]

Originally Posted by 2nd trick op

If there's a point to all this, I believe that it's that the passions of a time of intense partisanship might mellow with the passing of the years, but the "revisionist" view sometimes hides under a unique veneer of its own making.

Revisionism is not necessarily a four-letter word; in competent hands, it's how the field works. When done with an agenda, it's often little more than propaganda. Take a look at the evolving view of John Brown, for example. Or the letters which only recently came to light showing Einstein had (and apparently abandoned) a daughter early in his life.

That a Civil War-era figure is interpreted differently over time - that an abolitionist could be deeply racist, that a Confederate war hero could loathe slavery - is as much a reflection of the reader's era as the figure's.

For example, I doubt PA kids learn much about Stevens these days; after all, he's just another old white guy. In that chapter's place is likely a long fabulated story about an ex-slave who invented a better butter churn, because diversity. But Stevens will be remembered long for his place and contributions, regardless of the tides of each era's viewpoint.