Why should or shouldn’t confederate soldier’s graves be marked with an American flag?

29 comments

1. They were pardoned[in 1868](https://www.politico.com/story/2018/12/25/this-day-in-politics-dec-25-1868-1074077)

2. They were never not Americans is one argument I suppose. There’s no official agency keeping watch on graves to legislate and enforce what persons can place on them.

3. President Andrew Johnson granted amnesty to all confederate soldiers (with some exclusions like Lee and other leadership) on Christmas Day 1868.

   Whether right or wrong, healing the divide was the best course to moving forward.

4. It’s a reminder they lost.

   Seriously, though, they were Americans at one point. I’m descended from Civil War soldiers on both sides, and would find it much more disturbing if Conferate soldiers’ graves had the Confederate battle flag on them. No need to perpetuate “lost cause” b.s.

5. I agree – like they fought against the US to defend one of our nation’s most vile crimes.

   Freedom of speech and that jazz, but I almost feel like the Confederate soldiers having American flags on their graves would piss them off too, seeing as they were not Americans, that was their choice, and they specifically were willing to die and kill over that fact.

6. Those graves should be marked with American flags. They have been pardoned and were technically always Americans.

7. They deserve to be in unmarked graves. Or with just an inscription saying “This person died fighting for the preservation and expansion of slavery”.

8. Forgiveness.

9. Those filthy, traitorous scum do not deserve to be buried under the Union colors. They don’t deserve any honor or memory at all. I would dig them all up and bury them in one mass grave with a single monument marking it as the last resting place of worthless garbage that betrayed their country.

10. Flags on graves are for American veterans, so they should be marked with American flags if they also served in any war other than the Civil War (e.g. the Mexican-American War), which many of them did.

11. Honestly, it’s pretty easy to talk tough and condemn people speaking from this current era of unprecedented information, freedom, due process, and privilege.

    Say you’re a poor farm kid who signed up with your state militia before the war and got conscripted/transferred to the Confederacy under penalty of imprisonment or death without trial. Your sole source of information on what’s happening and what the war is about are your local paper and your officers.

12. The civil war was a terrible time where brother fought brother. I think marking their graves with an American flag underlines that fact. They were traitors, but we shouldn’t other-ize them too hard lest we forget the lesson that brothers can turn on one another.

13. As I understand it, Confederate soldiers were administered loyalty oaths at the time of the surrender. (“Swallowing the dog”, it was called.)

    So, I’d say they were American citizens when they died, just not US Army veterans.

14. If they’d won, there’d be Confederate flags marking their graves. But they lost. Heh.

15. It’s simple. They where Americans. The US never recognized them as a separate nation but rather states in rebellion. So even though they where fighting against the union and where traitors to the union, they where still Americans.

    They where also pardoned in 1868, so by being pardoned, their crimes are no longer held against them.

    This was also the whole point of reconstruction. Reconstruction failed because we refused to work to reintegrate them into the US in a positive way, and then abandoned all attempts to heal the wounds of the war. To continue that arrogant and self centered view by treating these people differently than any other American at this point continues to fuel the separation and in some cases pushes people deeper into the lost cause ideology.

    Edit: case and point, see the willfully ignorant and hateful comments at the bottom of this thread.

16. These are veterans that answered the call, and more than likely were not slave owners or knew much about the politics of the time. They deserve respect. Obviously. Most soldiers are pawns of their government trying to do the right thing.

17. Because they are traitors.

    Edit: yes they are. You know they are. I don’t care that limp dick Johnson pardoned them. They were traitors and they lost.

18. Interesting. Here in my area alot of them are marked with the old CSA national flag or the battle flag

19. I feel that as a matter of free speech it should be left up to the descendants as to what flag they want or don’t want on the grave.

20. The way I think of it is that a lot of them were just doing their jobs and trying to get by and fought either because they were forced to or because they needed the money. The real traitors were the ones in power and they weren’t on the ground fighting. Most were small family farmers and tradesmen who were just trying to protect their land and way of life. Slaves, servants, and laborers were all forced to support the army by digging tranches, cooking, etc. They need to be honored.

21. There were a lot of people who were forced into fighting in the war weather they agreed with confederacy leaving the union or slavery many were conscripted for service. Additionally many slaves accompanied confederate soldiers on the front lines and were hurried on battlefield with them. Not everyone could afford to move away or had friends in high places that could secure a way to not serve when the war started. So a lot of people who didn’t want to be there or didn’t believe in the cause ended up serving.

22. Confederate soldiers are literally US military members by act of Congress passed after the war. They did this to try to reassert their view that the Confederacy was an illegitimate government and remained part of the United States the whole time as well as to help heal the divide in our country.

    I don’t know why after over 150 years we’re tearing back open that divide which was almost non-existent even 20 years ago.

23. The confederates never stopped being Americans, regardless of what flag they waved about.

24. They fought against the US, they should no more have an American flag than German graves at Verdun or British graves at Concord.

25. It’s because they were pardoned for their actions and they were repatriated back into the United States.

    In 1868, President Andrew Johnson declared “unconditionally, and without reservation, … a full pardon and amnesty for the offence of treason against the United States, or of adhering to their enemies during the late civil war, with restoration of all rights, privileges, and immunities under the Constitution and the laws …”

    So, calling them traitors may be correct…but it’s also not correct because many went on as American citizens to build up this nation and this was done at a very trying time between Reconstruction and the turn of the century.

    I just don’t think blanket dismissals of CSA soldiers helps. We rarely look at what they did after the Civil War.

26. *Shrug* I don’t think it matters whether it makes sense.

    Graves aren’t for or about dead people. They’re for the living. If it makes someone feel better to go put american flags on those graves and it doesn’t cause undue distress to anyone else then I have no problem with it. Could be a fuck you, could be a memorial, doesn’t really matter.

27. I don’t think they’d have wanted that, but they’re dead, and their descendants are alive, so maybe they wanted it, and that’s fine with me. Grave decorations are for the living.

28. The premise of your question is flawed. Secession from the Union isn’t exactly treason, it’s important to note that Jefferson Davis (President of the CSA) was never tried or convicted of treason.

    Also important to note that the USA was very very different back then. The federal government had a much smaller roll in this country and individual States rights had more of an impact than what we see today.

29. I don’t support it. They shouldn’t be honored with the American flag. They were a disgrace to the country and deserved to die.