43 pages • 1 hour read
Charles B. DewApostles of Disunion: Southern Secession Commissioners and the Causes of the Civil War
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2001A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Role of Slavery in the Push for Secession
Dew’s primary goal in Apostles of Disunion is to assert the undeniable causal relationship between slavery and the secession movement. In his Introduction, Dew articulates the questions that occurred to him during his first encounter with the racist rhetoric of the secessionists:
Could secession and racism be so intimately interconnected, I asked myself? […] did white supremacy also form a critical element in the secessionist cause, a cause my ancestors fought for and revered? The present volume […] attempts to answer these questions (2-3).
Though his book argues unequivocally that slavery was a central cause of secession, Dew acknowledges the tendency—in his younger self, as well as in others with Southern roots—to avoid associations between the institution of slavery and the formation of the Confederacy. He names instances of Confederate and Neo-Confederate revisionism that deemphasize slavery and offer states’ rights as the war’s true cause. Confederate Vice President Alexander H. Stephens made such an argument after the end of the war: Dew quotes him saying that while “the war ‘had its origin in opposing principles,’ […] The institution of slavery was but the question’” that brought these principles into violent conflict (16). Dew himself does not spill much ink considering the states’ rights counterargument in depth; he touches on it briefly in Chapter 1 and then moves to thorough analysis of the timeline and documented rhetoric of the secessionists’ speeches in Chapters 2-5.
Dew’s narration follows a repetitive pattern as he presents extensive quotations of secession commissioners that confirm his core argument. With the introduction of each new commissioner, Dew surveys their personal and professional biography, noting their connections to the states where they lived or were sent, their political accomplishments and any public offices they held. He notes which commissioners owned slaves (as many did). These biographical details show how these men were culturally and financially invested in the Southern status quo, as well as the institution of slavery which fueled its economy. Dew also takes pains to note any incidents of racist or pro-slavery rhetoric put forth by these men prior to their appointment as commissioners—as in the case of Andrew Calhoun, Leonidas Spratt, and others—which show a commitment to a slave society that appears more fundamental than incidental.
The heart of Dew’s book presents an inventory of the commissioners’ defenses of slavery and their prophecies about the social and structural decay that would ensue under a Republican president. Much of the commissioners’ pronouncements are so blatantly and extremely racist that they warrant little extended analysis, though Dew is careful to provide the historical, cultural, and circumstantial context surrounding each quotation. The commissioners speak with disgust about prospects of racial equality. They describe the abolitionist project as a radical, violent act against the South and defend slavery as a moral and necessary institution for the preservation of white Southern honor. They also frequently recognize the material threat to their livelihood posed by the loss of slave labor, as well as the potential riches the South would gain by maintaining and overseeing a robust Southern slave trade.
In many cases, they acknowledge a concern over the constitutional legitimacy of abolition, but this concern frequently relates back to a notion that the founding fathers conceived American government for white men only, at the exclusion of black Africans and members of other races. Often, commissioners state that the urgent need to protect slavery—not states’ rights—necessitates secession and the formation of the Confederacy. As Dew notes at the end of Chapter 1, the records of these speeches and writings are a “truly remarkable set of documents,” in which “the commissioners’ words convey an unmistakable impression of candor, of white Southerners talking to fellow Southerners with no need to hold back out of deference to outside sensibilities” (21). Over the course of the book, the repetition of these racist, pro-slavery terms, phrases, and sentiments viscerally reinforces Dew’s primary point that slavery was the “occasion,” or the question, and the core issue driving the secessionists toward their goal.
The Strategic Coordination of the Secessionist Movement
Alongside the commissioners’ words, Dew traces an engrossing narrative of the highly effective and well-organized movement toward secession. Southern government officials acted swiftly and strategically to respond to the election of Lincoln: through the meeting in Washington that resulted in the “Southern Manifesto,” the quick organization of state conventions and appointment of commissioners, and the symbolic choice of both radical and moderate commissioners to signal Southern political unity. The fast-paced description of the commissioners’ journeys across the South emphasizes the sense of coordinated movement in the manner of a military operation.
Dew’s broad survey in Chapters 2 and 3 of the numerous speeches that occurred in December and January—some on the same day—heightens this sense of an organized campaign, rather than a merely coincidental agreement between different states’ commissioners. Throughout the book, Dew notes striking parallels in rhetoric and logic deployed by different commissioners in different states. The sense of collaboration and cooperation among secessionists toward a shared goal is reinforced finally in Chapter 5, as commissioners from three different states meet and coordinate their presentations to try and sway Virginia to the secessionist cause.
While Dew sometimes ironically likens these men to “apostles” or holy men spreading a kind of “gospel,” his prose and narration more often highlight the manipulative, militaristic nature of the commissioners’ role. The earliest commissioners to appear before conventions “took the field first” and carried out a “vital mission” (18); Dew names early states where this first wave “unlimbered their rhetorical artillery” (25). Employing a hunting term, Dew describes one commissioner’s failure to gain support from a Unionist governor who “knew a secessionist stalking-horse when he saw one” (32). Describing Alabama’s commissioners to North Carolina Dew notes that each had “crossed political swords” with prominent Democrats in the state (34).
After South Carolina’s unanimous vote to secede, the state’s commissioners met and prepared to “sow the seeds of revolution across the Deep South” (39). Dew describes internal political tensions within state conventions in like manner, as in the Georgia Convention where “disunionist forces were in firm control” (47). As the narrative progresses in these first three chapters, Dew details the actual military tension mounting in Charleston harbor around Fort Sumter in early January. Dew’s characterization of the commissioners’ rhetoric as organized and aggressive emphasizes the fact that they acted in full awareness and anticipation of a war with the North.
The Dangers of Revisionist History
The modern relevance of Apostles of Disunion is evident in the ongoing confusion around Civil War narratives that has persisted into the present day. Though Dew does not analyze Lost Cause narratives in any depth, he notes multiple instances of shifted rhetoric following the end of the war that have led Southerners to romanticize their Confederate heritage. These strategic manipulations of the narrative by Confederate officials and commissioners, such as Preston, have enduring consequences, providing fodder for modern-day Confederate apologists and sympathizers. Dew’s initial blindness to the racism of the Confederacy is a prime example of this effect and shows how skewed narratives of Civil War history can endure and grow over generations. Chapter 1 charts numerous clashes between Southern state governments and civil rights advocates over the preservation and destruction of Confederate symbols. Many of these, which occurred prior to the book’s initial 2001 publication, led to protests, boycotts, and public expressions of hate and disgust, with little progress made and no end in sight.
In the Afterword, published in 2016, Dew makes a similar survey of the national dialogue and political climate, which seems to indicate things have not gotten better and possibly grown worse, with the rise of the Tea Party, widely publicized police killings of young black men, and the mass shooting of black parishioners at Emanuel AME Church in South Carolina by Dylann Roof. Concluding the Afterword with a look at the future, Dew sees no end in sight: “And so the argument over secession, the causes of the Civil War, and the honor, or dishonor, that should be accorded to the Confederate States of America continues” (102).
Apostles of Disunion advocates for a broad cultural reckoning with slavery’s role in secession and the Civil War. Its stated goal is to provide a resource for undertaking such a confrontation, as he believes the secession commissioners’ documents are uniquely revelatory. He invokes the example of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation commission as a possible model for addressing the legacy of slavery. Dew’s Introduction acknowledges that at the individual level, facing the racist foundations of Southern heritage will be painful, as was the case for him in writing his book. However, as Dew illustrates both in his opening and in his closing, if we do not directly and continually confront the legacies of white supremacy, the historical confusion, violence, and hate in our society will endure.
