Confederate revisionists are to be despised. They argue so high-mindedly of the right of each state to decide if it was lawful to enslave and own humans as property, and to treat such property as they would.
Here are some history to consider (with links):
Confederate Vice-President Alexander Stephens' 1861 Cornerstone Speech:
http://civilwarcauses.org/corner.htm
Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests upon the great truth, that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery -- subordination to the superior race -- is his natural and normal condition. [Applause.] This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth.
From the Confederate Constitution:
http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_csa.aspArticle I, section 9, clauses 1 and 2:
The importation of negroes of the African race from any foreign country other than the slaveholding States or Territories of the United States of America, is hereby forbidden; and Congress is required to pass such laws as shall effectually prevent the same.
Congress shall also have power to prohibit the introduction of slaves from any State not a member of, or Territory not belonging to, this Confederacy.
Article I, section 9, clause 4:
No bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves shall be passed.
Notable in the foregoing is that it specifically guarantees the right to own "negro" slaves. Ownership of slaves of other races may or may not be banned, but the right to own "negro" slaves was to be forever. Thus the Confederate constitution not only defined itself by slavery, but also by racism.
Note also the hypocrisy of the "states rights" argument. While the supposed cause of the Confederacy (among the revisionists) is that the states have a right to decide, not the federal government, but within the Confederate Constitution is enshrined a prohibition on any state's right to settle the question of whether "negro slavery" will exist within its borders. That is, in the following section:
Article IV, section 2, clause 1:
The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States; and shall have the right of transit and sojourn in any State of this Confederacy, with their slaves and other property; and the right of property in said slaves shall not be thereby impaired.
No state could exercise a "state's right" to prohibit slavery within its borders inasmuch as the citiziens of the other states were guaranteed a right to "transit and sojourn" in any state, "secure in the right of property in said slaves." Could a state that outlawed slavery within its borders then prohibit a slaveholder from another state from having those slaves work while in "transit or sojourn" status. That would likely be held to be an impairment of the right of property. And the definition of "transit or sojourn" would be a matter of the Confederate supreme court to decide. So, effectively, "negro slavery" could not be prohibited by any individual state when the law could easily be circumvented by use of slaves putatavely owned by a citizen of another state and simply "transiting" or "sojourning" in the other state.
So much for the "states rights" argument. The Confederate constitution effectively wiped out the right of a state to determine whether there would be "negro slavery" within its borders.
Should the Confederacy acquire new territory:
Article IV, section 3, clause 3,
In all such territory the institution of negro slavery, as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected be Congress and by the Territorial government; and the inhabitants of the several Confederate States and Territories shall have the right to take to such Territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the States or Territories of the Confederate States.
The importance of slavery could not be more clear. Defining "negroes" as an inferior race, and protecting the ownership, transportation, and commerce of "negroes" wasn't just a major aspect of the Confederacy, it was the central and defining idea of the Confederacy.
When people cheer for and spread romantic revisionist notions of the Confederacy as a somehow noble lost cause,they not only are celebrating and commemorating treason, they are celebrating and commemorating inhumanity itself. Which defines them.
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