Editing Confederate States of America (section)

===Theories regarding downfall===

Historian [[Frank Lawrence Owsley]] argued that the Confederacy "died of states' rights".<ref name="Frank L. Owsley 1925">{{cite book |first=Frank L. |last=Owsley |title=State Rights in the Confederacy |location=Chicago |publisher=The University of Chicago Press |year=1925 }}</ref><ref>"Thomas1979" p. 155</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Owsley |title=Local Defense and the Overthrow of the Confederacy |journal=Mississippi Valley Historical Review |volume=11 |issue=4 |year=1925 |pages=492–525 |jstor=1895910 |doi=10.2307/1895910 }}</ref> The central government was denied requisitioned soldiers and money by governors and state legislatures because they feared that Richmond would encroach on the rights of the states. Georgia's governor [[Joseph E. Brown|Joseph Brown]] warned of a secret conspiracy by Jefferson Davis to destroy states' rights and individual liberty. The first conscription act in North America, authorizing Davis to draft soldiers, was said to be the "essence of military despotism".<ref>Rable (1994) 257. For a detailed criticism of Owsley's argument see {{cite book |first1=Richard E. |last1=Beringer |first2=William N. Jr. |last2=Still |first3=Archer |last3=Jones |first4=Herman |last4=Hattaway |title=Why the South Lost the Civil War |publisher=University of Georgia Press |year=1986 |pages=443–457 }} Brown declaimed against Davis Administration policies: "Almost every act of usurpation of power, or of bad faith, has been conceived, brought forth and nurtured in secret session."</ref><ref>See also {{cite book |first=Richard |last=Beringer |display-authors=etal |title=Why the South Lost the Civil War |publisher=University of Georgia Press |year=1986 |pages=64–83, 424–457 }}</ref> [[Roger Lowenstein]] argued that the Confederacy's failure to raise adequate revenue led to [[hyperinflation]] and being unable to win a [[war of attrition]], despite the prowess of its military leadership such as [[Robert E. Lee]].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Foner |first=Eric |date=March 8, 2022 |title=The Hidden Story of the North's Victory in the Civil War |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/08/books/review/ways-and-means-roger-lowenstein.html}} Review of Lowenstein, Roger, ''Ways and Means: Lincoln and His Cabinet and the Financing of the Civil War''. New York: Penguin Press, 2022.</ref>

Though political differences were within the Confederacy, no national political parties were formed because they were seen as illegitimate. "Anti-partyism became an article of political faith."<ref>Cooper (2000) p. 462. Rable (1994) pp. 2–3. Rable wrote, "But despite heated arguments and no little friction between the competing political cultures of unity and liberty, antiparty and broader fears about politics in general shaped civic life. These beliefs could obviously not eliminate partisanship or prevent Confederates from holding on to and exploiting old political prejudices ... Even the most bitter foes of the Confederate government, however, refused to form an opposition party, and the Georgia dissidents, to cite the most prominent example, avoided many traditional political activities. Only in North Carolina did there develop anything resembling a party system, and there the central values of the Confederacy's two political cultures had a far more powerful influence on political debate than did organizational maneuvering."</ref> Without a system of political parties building alternate sets of national leaders, electoral protests tended to be narrowly state-based, "negative, carping and petty". The [[1863 Confederate States House of Representatives elections|1863 mid-term elections]] became mere expressions of futile and frustrated dissatisfaction. According to historian David M. Potter, the lack of a functioning two-party system caused "real and direct damage" to the Confederate war effort since it prevented the formulation of any effective alternatives to the conduct of the war by the Davis administration.<ref>{{cite book |editor-first=David Herbert |editor-last=Donald |title=Why the North Won the Civil War |year=1996 |pages=112–113 }} Potter wrote in his contribution to this book, "Where parties do not exist, criticism of the administration is likely to remain purely an individual matter; therefore the tone of the criticism is likely to be negative, carping, and petty, as it certainly was in the Confederacy. But where there are parties, the opposition group is strongly impelled to formulate real alternative policies and to press for the adoption of these policies on a constructive basis.&nbsp;... But the absence of a two-party system meant the absence of any available alternative leadership, and the protest votes which were cast in the [1863 Confederate mid-term] election became more expressions of futile and frustrated dissatisfaction rather than implements of a decision to adopt new and different policies for the Confederacy."</ref>

The enemies of President Davis proposed that the Confederacy "died of Davis". He was unfavorably compared to [[George Washington]] by critics such as [[Edward Alfred Pollard]], editor of the most influential newspaper in the Confederacy, the ''[[Richmond Examiner|Daily Richmond Examiner]]''. Beyond the early honeymoon period, Davis was never popular.<ref name="Coulter pp 105-06">Coulter, ''The Confederate States of America'', pp. 105–106</ref> [[E. Merton Coulter|Ellis Merton Coulter]], viewed by historians as a [[Lost Cause of the Confederacy|Confederate apologist]],<ref name="Bailey, 2001">Fred A. Bailey, "E. Merton Coulter", in ''Reading Southern History: Essays on Interpreters and Interpretations'', ed. Glenn Feldman (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2001, p. 46).</ref><ref>Eric Foner, ''Freedom's Lawmakers: A Directory Of Black Officeholders During Reconstruction'', New York: Oxford University Press, 1993; Revised, Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1996, p. xii</ref><ref>Foner, ''Freedom's Lawmakers'', p. xii</ref><ref>Eric Foner, ''Black Legislators'', pp. 119–20, 180</ref> argues that Davis was unable to mobilize Confederate nationalism in support of his government effectively, and especially failed to appeal to the small farmers who made up the bulk of the population. Davis failed to build a network of supporters who would speak up when he came under criticism, and he repeatedly alienated governors and other state-based leaders by demanding centralized control of the war effort.<ref>{{cite book |first=Paul |last=Escott |title=After Secession: Jefferson Davis and the Failure of Confederate Nationalism |publisher=Louisiana State University Press |year=1992 |isbn=0-8071-1807-9 }}</ref>