Review by Choice Review
Escott, author of several major works on the history of the US South and the Civil War, examines the relationship between civil and military authority in the Confederacy during the Civil War. In this recent entry to a series on the larger subject of US civil-military relations, Escott (Wake Forest Univ.) finds that the pressures of war on a smaller, less industrialized, less modernized society forced Confederate leaders to make increasingly difficult decisions about the role of the military in a nation dedicated to civilian control of the military. When faced with the possibility of defeat and extinction, the Southern nation depended increasingly on military answers and seriously eroded the traditional US allegiance to civilian superiority. Indeed, this erosion was deeper than at any other moment in US history. Still, "the Confederacy became neither a police state nor a dictatorship," and neither Jefferson Davis nor Robert E. Lee would consider becoming a dictator, though some urged them to do so. This is a clearly written, sensibly argued, and valuable perspective on the Civil War period. Illustrations, maps, endnotes. ^BSumming Up: Recommended. Professionals, graduate students, and undergraduates. R. G. Lowe University of North Texas
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
