JACKSON, Tenn. — Oct. 23, 2019 — While conventional history may diminish the legacy of Ulysses S. Grant, Civil War historian Joan Waugh said Grant deserves historical reevaluation and a greater appreciation for his work toward civil rights and reconciliation after the U.S. Civil War.
Waugh, professor of history at UCLA, spoke on the topic of 鈥淯lysses S. Grant: Soldier-Statesman鈥� during the 23rd annual Carls-Schwerdfeger History Lecture series Oct. 21 in the G.M. Savage Memorial Chapel. Waugh has written or edited six books that deal with the Civil War and its aftermath and has won numerous book and teaching awards.
鈥淚n the current 鈥榤emory wars,鈥� it seems particularly relevant that we revisit, revise and recast Ulysses S. Grant as the general who saved the Union and the steadfast, essential president who both championed civil rights and made sure that the United States stayed together,鈥� Waugh said.
Waugh said the current generation of historians has a renewed appreciation of the Union general and two-term president and is striving to replace the powerful stereotype of Grant as a butcher-commander and failed chief executive.
鈥淚 became interested in him because I wondered how a person in the 19th century who was so famous and really so widely admired 鈥� not only in the United States of America but throughout the world 鈥� could be so, if not forgotten, absolutely diminished from the reputation that he used to have,鈥� Waugh said.
Waugh detailed the diminishing of Grant鈥檚 reputation namely by ex-Confederates who wrote books and newspaper articles and gave speeches on their version of history, 鈥淭he Lost Cause.鈥� This negative view of Grant, along with the opinions of other outspoken critics, was perpetuated through textbooks for the next several decades.
鈥淐onventional accounts of Grant鈥檚 presidency and his generalship no longer square with the evidence uncovered by current research,鈥� Waugh said.
Waugh and other historians now see Grant as civil rights hero who denounced racism and bigotry and an ardent nationalist and reconciliationist who kept the Union together during the difficult Reconstruction period.
Going forward, Waugh said, historians and writers might consider all the new ways of looking at Grant 鈥� treating the two parts of his career as a general and a president as integrated: a soldier-statesman.
鈥淗is legacy is as a nationalist, as a proud president of a nation-state that survived this bitter Civil War,鈥� Waugh said. 鈥淭hroughout his presidency, Grant remained steadfast in the belief that the Union was worthy of being preserved. Like Lincoln, his fight was over the future of the Union, only this time, the issues were not secession and slavery, but what kind of nation, admittedly imperfect, would emerge at the dawn of the 20th century.鈥�