Did The Civil War Conform to the "Just War" Doctrine?

TFSmith121

Banned
Yes

The Medieval and Early Modern "just war" doctrine essentially states both the legitimate justifications and its ideal conduct. As explained in this PDF:http://www.vernalproject.org/papers/understanding/JustWarCriteria.pdf
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Do you think the civil war qualifies for most,or many of these?

Yes. Not that it was the criteria of the time, but of course; defending the will of the people in a democratic nation state and delivering 3 million people and their descendants from bondage are the definitions of just cause.

Best,
 
Yes. Not that it was the criteria of the time, but of course; defending the will of the people in a democratic nation state and delivering 3 million people and their descendants from bondage are the definitions of just cause.

Best,

5 million

4 million Slaves and 1 million White Southern Unionists who wanted no part of the Confederacy. While the WSUs had a far better lot in life than the Slaves, they were also liable to be slaughtered if they attempted to defend themselves. The CSA, not being an actual democratic institution, was hardly going to tolerate a Southern version of the Northern Copperheads.:rolleyes:
 
The Medieval and Early Modern "just war" doctrine essentially states both the legitimate justifications and its ideal conduct. As explained in this PDF:http://www.vernalproject.org/papers/understanding/JustWarCriteria.pdf
.
Do you think the civil war qualifies for most,or many of these?

Only the Declaration of War cannot be applied, as that would be giving the Rebels what they wanted, formal recognition as a nation state. Same reason why the British never issued a formal DoW against the USA. They were "suppressing a rebellion", not "waging a war".
 
Pretty sure this belongs in Chat.

But IMO the answer is absolutely yes. Any movement whose primary purpose is to preserve and perpetuate the institution of slavery deserves nothing less than utter and complete annihilation.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Fair point

5 million

4 million Slaves and 1 million White Southern Unionists who wanted no part of the Confederacy. While the WSUs had a far better lot in life than the Slaves, they were also liable to be slaughtered if they attempted to defend themselves. The CSA, not being an actual democratic institution, was hardly going to tolerate a Southern version of the Northern Copperheads.:rolleyes:

Fair point, I generally use 3 million as shorthand for the enslaved population; I think the 1860 census pop was under 3.5, so I round down.

The WSU population I include in the "will of the people" group.

Best,
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Well, an AH element to it would be if Archbishop Hughes

Pretty sure this belongs in Chat.

But IMO the answer is absolutely yes. Any movement whose primary purpose is to preserve and perpetuate the institution of slavery deserves nothing less than utter and complete annihilation.

Goes to Rome as well as Paris on his 1861 mission and persuades the Pope to issue an encyclical against slavery and supporting the war...

Best,
 
The United States' casus belli wasn't to abolish slavery. It was to maintain the integrity of the union- eventually abolishing slavery was used as a part of their strategy to undermine the Confederacy (which no doubt, was fighting to preserve slavery), but to say the war was fought to end slavery isn't accurate. Sure, it was fought over slavery, but that's something else altogether. Since the Civil War was a defensive war for the Union (Confederacy fired first) it is a just war- as for the Confederacy, it was an unjust war- it was unwinnable and fought for morally reprehensible reasons.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
I'd suggest that abolishing slavery certainly became a

The United States' casus belli wasn't to abolish slavery. It was to maintain the integrity of the union- eventually abolishing slavery was used as a part of their strategy to undermine the Confederacy (which no doubt, was fighting to preserve slavery), but to say the war was fought to end slavery isn't accurate. Sure, it was fought over slavery, but that's something else altogether. Since the Civil War was a defensive war for the Union (Confederacy fired first) it is a just war- as for the Confederacy, it was an unjust war- it was unwinnable and fought for morally reprehensible reasons.

I'd suggest that abolishing slavery certainly became a war aim for the US over the course of the war, and thus (by 1862 or 1863, depending on how one interprets the iterations of the Emancipation Proclamation) it certainly was what the war was being fought over, along with the preservation of the Union.

In any case, given that the rebels initiated hostilities, the conflict was a just war from 1861 on-ward. It simply became even more of a moral crusade (quite literally) by the middle years of the conflict, and was undeniably about destroying slavery by the end.

Best,
 
Yes, for similar reasons mentioned above. The Confederacy had no moral high ground of which to speak of.

Save for those Slavocrats who saw their "peculiar institution" as a noble one, and worth fighting for. The diary of Mary Chestnut has some nice chestnuts about the supreme hypocrisy of "Southern morality".
 

Deimos

Banned
The just war idea was developed by theologians to be an ideal that mirrored all that was wrong with warfare around them. Therefore it is quite hard to conform to the standard presented by the theory and I highly doubt a single conflict could meet all the requirements.

Since the Confederacy is a lost cause when it comes to justice, I will concentrate on the Union.

I think it does not meet "the right intention" as abolishment of slavery was not an original goal and even the emancipation proclamation was only aimed at southern slave states. The goal of the Union was to "preserve itself" (A House divided against itself ...), i.e. a political one aimed at maintaining the greatest amount of power possible.
Furthermore the conduct was not up to the standards, the Union general Sherman for example did cause inordinate amounts of damage to private property that clearly violate non-combatant immunity.


I am no utilitarist and I do not like weighing human suffering on a scale to gauge who is more wicked. If I was however, the only conflicts that come to mind where the original injustice was so great that it outweighs nearly everything else were the slave uprising of the second and third servile war of Rome (and even then, only to a certain point).
 
The question of the civil war, is a just war depends on whether there was a peaceful alternative to war.
Could trade sanctions and economic presure forced the CSA to rejoin the union or could some other non violent solution be found.
 
The question of the civil war, is a just war depends on whether there was a peaceful alternative to war.
Could trade sanctions and economic presure forced the CSA to rejoin the union or could some other non violent solution be found.

no and double no for ending slavery the most unambiguous just part of the case
 
As an interesting aside I recommend to the readers the "Lieber Code" of ~1863, put together by the legal scholar Francis Lieber at the request of Union authorities to codify laws of war. Do note there were two parts to just war theory, jus ad bellum (a just war) and jus in bello (justice in war - following legitimate laws of war).

Both the Red Cross and the Geneva Conventions were not in operation in the USA during the Civil War. The first convention leading to codification of relief for the wounded and such was held in 1863 in Europe - the Red Cross was adopted as the "neutral" symbol in honor of Henri Dunant the Swiss who started the movement for the relief of war wounded in the wake of the Battle of Solferino.

FWIW IMHO the winners always decide that their war was "just", history in the long run may or may not agree with them. This is not to say the CSA was "right" or "just", merely to say that the overall justice of a war is perhaps best judged by history. Having said that jus in bello, how a war is fought, whether "rules" are observed, can be determined relatively objectively. Of course this assumes that both sides agree that there are rules - for examples compare "rules" in nazis vs western allies as opposed to nazis vs USSR, or the war in the Pacific especially from the Japanese perspective.

Just my 2 pence
 
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