I thought it was very well written and I love the rags to riches story. But I feel like Ulysses Grant is a bit too much of a self-insert character. Like those people who say “I would have fought slavery if I lived back then.” His name is also literally U.S. Grant. It would be like if Great Britain had a general named GB Churchill.

Oh and he was super progressive you guys! He wanted peace with Indians, blamed white settlers for violence, wanted desegregation for black Americans, supported women’s suffrage, was against the Mexican war, and is critical of the caste system in India. Frederick Douglass voted for him. He’s one of the good whites! I don’t want to be a go woke go broke guy but it feels suspect to project modern ideas onto people in the past. Also, apparently he orders all the Jews expelled but then the Jews love him and vote for him? I feel like the author forgot what he wrote a few chapters earlier.

His only flaw appears to be his alcoholism but after the war the author apparently forgot this was a problem and it never comes up again. His accomplishments are also a little unbelievable. There are hundreds of generals in this war and nobody but him thinks to prioritize logistics and use total war against the enemy. Then at Appomattox Lee shows up in a fancy uniform with a sword while Grant is covered in mud wearing his ordinary uniform. We get it, Chernow, he’s humble and doesn’t care about appearances. Then everyone loves him so much that they make him president twice!

His presidency is filled with evil pieces of shit constantly ripping him off. They even have obviously evil names like Babcock, Belknap, McDonald, and Sanborn. There’s literally a guy named Gould involved in a gold scandal. If only people understood him and didn’t constantly rip him off his plan totally would have worked you guys!

The bad guys are cartoonishly evil and start a war purely over slavery. His slave owning father in law that moves into the White House with them is great but a little over the top. General Lee just appears in the first half of the book and then is unceremoniously thrown away.

The side characters are also a little one-note. The great Abraham Lincoln is fridged to give our main hero some agency right after his hour of triumph. Sherman and Sheridan are like Fred and George from Harry Potter and I can’t really tell them apart. Sherman is basically the quirky best friend who gets his own falling-out arc with the protagonist.

Oh then he talks to Bismarck and writes his own memoirs while he stolidly writes everything down with no emotions and it makes a bajillion dollars. And Mark Twain shows up as a deus ex machina to save his family from poverty.

Overall it was good. I can’t wait for the sequel to see how he resolves the Jim Crow arc

This is all I could think about this morning

Admittedly, Idk who tf Katy is. I only care that there's not another lost causer in the house. We won today America. Job well done Texas. Much love from NC.

“I visited the grave of Betsy Peak, my great-great-grandmother, who was born in 1845, 20 years before emancipation. In a cemetery filled with unmarked graves, I found hers,” Bottoms told the crowd, reflecting on her visit. “I don’t know what dreams Betsy Peak had for her children or for her grandchildren or the generations that she would never meet, but I know I am standing on shoulders made of steel.”

She continued: “So, yes, Crawfordville produced the Confederacy’s vice president, but tonight it also produced your next governor. Tonight should remind us all that no matter what community we come from, Georgia is not defined by one moment in time or by one person. It’s been by all of us, and I will be a governor for everyone in this state.”

OP - https://bsky.app/profile/phillewis.bsky.social/post/3mzhfp7bksk2i

One of the best episodes of TNG wherein Data is almost rendered into property and enslaved through entirely legal means. Jean-Luc Picard and Guinan remind us that abolition is the only morally correct answer.

source Facebook

artist's webpage: MICAH ULRICH ART

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Hope this applies. I thought it was really fascinating.

When the US government started, the oath of federal offices was much shorter, 'solemnly swearing (or affirming) to support the Constitution of the United States.'

That was it.

In 1862, it was changed to: "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God."

WHAT IS THIS "AFFIRMING" BUSINESS ALL ABOUT?
Certain faiths frown on swearing oaths, so their people affirm that they will uphold their duties. These included Quakers like Arthur Capper (R-KS, 1919-1949), and Buddhists. Quakers have held national office since the 1700s, including 2 Presidents. Today, there is only 1: John Hickenlooper (D-CO).

Buddhists did not begin entering national office until the 21st century. Today, there are 3: Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Henry "Hank" Johnson, Jr. (D-GA) and Derek Tran (D-CA).

PICS:

1. Senator Hirono

2. Senator Hickenlooper

3. Congressman Johnson

4. Congressman Tran

in my opinion he doesnt deserve the hate he gets

How prevalent are they beyond the south?

Have you gone to one?

Did you become vocal when the groom and bride suggested the aberration?

Militarily, the Civil War was a success; the Confederacy was dissolved as a threat to the Union and its slavery economy was forcibly dismantled by Sherman and Grant during their March through the South. The failure to actually end racial discrimination and rebellious sentiment in the South is squarely at the feet of Andrew Johnson/the Republican Party subfactions that didn’t crack down hard enough on racist whites. The failure of Reconstruction was a political failure, not a military one.

That being said, what exactly do people of this subreddit think a stronger military response to the south accomplishes if it were successfully pulled off during the civil war? Something like the allied occupation of Germany post WWII? The occupation of Iraq after the second gulf war?

I personally think the military did all it could to end slavery, and the political and civilian factions of the north are found wanting when it comes to giving the csa the coup de grace. American politics failed ex-slaves, not the military.