Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era

by James M. McPherson

Support for the Davis government was strongest among congressmen from areas under Union occupation: Kentucky, Missouri (both considered part of the Confederacy and represented in its Congress), Tennessee, and substantial portions of Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Virginia. Regular elections were impossible in these areas, of course, so the incumbents merely continued themselves in office or were “elected” by a handful of refugees from their districts. These irredentist congressmen had the strongest of motives for supporting “war to the last ditch.” They constituted the closest thing to an administration party that existed in the Confederacy. They provided the votes for higher taxes that would not be levied on their constituents and for tougher conscription laws that would take no men from their districts. The areas of the South still under Confederate control, by contrast, sent an anti-administration majority to Congress. From the