History is the propaganda of the victorious, said Voltaire, and such has it permeated our modern-day interpretation of the so-called Civil War that Southerners and descendants of Confederate soldiers, like a recent correspondent in the Richmond Times-Dispatch, are crying mea culpa, rolling in the dust, and covering themselves in sackcloth and ashes. It is unbecoming of descendants of men who were fighting to defend their country from invasion, conquest, and coerced political allegiance, just as their forefathers had done in 1776. Perhaps a true perspective of history will assuage their guilt.
