Suddenly the same businessmen and newspapers changed their tune severely. The New York Times, which in January had argued for peace rather than military conquest and subjugation of the South, in March said, “At once shut down every Southern port, destroy its commerce and bring utter ruin on the Confederate States”. 1
But how did the Northern thought leaders sell this to the average Northerner, who was not generally tuned into or concerned about the profitability of the big money interests any more than the average American is today? It is noteworthy that they did it without any mention of slavery.
“Preservation of the Union” was converted into a sacred and spiritual good by Northern thought leaders. As Confederate nurse Kate Cummings wrote in her journal on May 9, 1862: “I have conversed with a number of the [Union] prisoners; they all express the same opinion as the others, that they dislike Lincoln and the abolitionists as much as we do, but they are fighting for the Union.”2 Almost to a man, Yankee soldiers gave “preservation of the Union” as their reason for fighting. (Never mind that many of them were conscripted—to wit, were slaves–or were being paid more than they could otherwise earn as an immigrant just off the boat.)
That uniformity of attitude was possible because Lincoln eliminated freedom of the press and freedom of speech, arresting any who attempted to use their First Amendment rights to oppose his war and imprisoning them indefinitely without charging them with a crime. Lincoln assumed a military dictatorship to prosecute his war (which like Trump he refused to call a war).
