Dwelling on Cold Mountain

I recently listened to Charles Frazier's audiobook reading of his novel, Cold Mountain while doing some of my work related driving. He tells a great story that doesn't often connect with my faint recollections of the movie version. I was jarred a bit by his portrayal of the main character, Inman, and of the Home Guard, a force that patrolled the countryside rounding up Confederate deserters. Inman seemed to be pretty muched stripped of loyalty to the South, being rather a character wholly loyal only to his native and local mountains (where Cold Mountain is located). The Home Guard are vicious killers, embittered by impending loss, and interested more in retribution on retreating soldiers than in returning them to the battle.

I figured Frazier probably had his history muddled by prejudice, since the Southern armies consisted of State and local militia groups manned by volunteer forces. At least I so assumed. But it turns out this was only true early in the war, before the Confederate Conscription Act of 1862, the first of three conscription acts. The South actually began conscription before the North, much to my dismay. Whether Frazier's portrayal of Southern home guard units is accurate is debatable regarding their brutality, but not their mission, as bounties on deserters were in fact offered by the Confederate government. I'm not exactly a history buff, as my dismay at learning these things reveals, but it causes me to question some of my other assumptions about the South and the confederacy.

The first of these is the idea of a basically unified South, where slave owners, yeoman farmers, and townspeople were united in opposition to the North. This may have held sway early in the first heady days of the war, as people reacted to the threat of invasion, but as the war proceeded, old divisions and animosities apparently rose more and more to the surface. One of those areas of tension was between the wealthy owners of many slaves and the poor white farmers with no slaves. I recently read a statement in a book on Missouri history that sums up the difference in perspective quite nicely. A slaveowner, in persuading others to join the Southern cause makes a remark to the effect that the South needs to fight for freedom and slavery, for no man can be free who must labor for his own bread. Much as I hate industrialism and the de-humanizing factory, I am forced to admit that it is no more an enslaver than the Southern plantation, for in both, the freedom of some is dependant upon the slavery of others. The chief difference is that the factory is able to convincingly propogate the lie that its wage slaves are really free.

The recourse to conscription (government kidnapping and enforced bondage) reveals the true nature of the Confederacy, although the Union was far worse and prevailed, essentially, because it had more slaves in the fight. But, such was the rule historically, as virtually all armies including Napoleon's were conscriped armies. The effectiveness of volunteer forces was considered highly questionable.
In light of this, the situation in the United States during the Viet-Nam war and following is all the more significant. The large scale resistance to the draft and the formation of an all volunteer army on the scale we now have are both unusual and possibly promising. Draft resistance may not have been the decisive factor in bringing about an end to the war, but it made a significant dent in the machine. It proved that the refusal to cross an ocean and kill people could have an effect on the governments ability to wage war. The all volunteer army is now proving something similar, as it is becoming exhausted by prolonged distant conflict.

The question is this: If our government tries to re-instate a draft, how will the people respond? In the aftermath of 911, the government missed it's golden opportunity to restore conscription at a time when few would have objected. Proposals for compulsory national service seem to be everywhere and it seems like military conscription is part of the package, as people would be given the choice between military service and "volunteer" social work. Involuntary servitude is the same whether people are kidnapped and forced to serve soup or kidnapped and handed a rifle. Considering that the U.S. already has one of the highest rates of volunteer service in the world, it's hard not to suspect that the main aim of these calls for national service is to bring back the draft to shore up an exhausted imperial military force.

The simple ability to stay home is almost non-existent in the personal lives of most of us, but it is a discipline we probably should cultivate. We scoot off on the slightest whim to whirl about in our little consumer paradise. But stay home long enough and you'll find some useful, satisfying work that needs to be done, some conversation that needs to be enjoyed, some book that needs to be read, and sometimes just some pipe that needs to be smoked on the front porch. Stay home long enough and rather than scooting out the door in ten different directions, you can plan your steps and shepherd your hours for the most good. Leaving home is sometimes good and has to happen, but staying home more than we do is a pre-requisite for using that time wisely.

Soldiers should want to stay home, too. In the history of wars, whenever one side has been a little closer to being on the right side, its soldiers usually have not had to travel far to get to the war. Since the curse of Cain, violence and wandering have been linked. Even in the life of Abraham, called by God to a rare righteous wandering, transience leads to conflict and violence. Abraham acts out the curse and becomes a man without a home, the grace is all in the fact that he is headed home. If people want to object that our true home is in heaven and all that, all I can do is ask why over-spiritualizing people with a pale concept of an earthly home would flatter themselves that they desire a heavenly home, since they obviously don't know what heaven is like and have neglected to learn what home is like.

On that note, I've found something better to do.