Page:Harris Dickson--The unpopular history of the United States.djvu/157

The Confederacy First Sees the Light as ever shouldered a musket. The same faint-hearted individuals who fled from the first battle of Bull Run, afterwards became the sturdiest troops who were finally victorious at Appomattox.

In passing let us note a singular and significant state of affairs. The South stood largely upon the doctrine of States Rights, which the North repudiated. Yet during the second period of the war, the Union fought as a co-partnership of States, while the Confederacy fought as a nation. The Union appealed to the States, adhered to voluntary enlistments, and left the Governors with power to appoint commissioned officers. The Confederacy appealed directly to the people. President Davis appointed the officers, they abandoned voluntary enlistment, and first adopted the republican principle that every citizen owes his country military service.

To illustrate the extravagant use of men under this haphazard volunteer system, and as a fact interesting in itself, it may be mentioned that in 1861 the total force of the [139]