Way too much thought was given to making rebels ok with rejoining the government and not enough to punishing them for being so fucking stupid to think that they should rebel against the government
Worth stating explicitly and often that justice really demanded that the liquidation of every asset of every slave owner to then be distributed to their emancipated former slaves. There shouldn't have been a single slave owner/family with a dime left to their name.
Even setting aside the morality, it was extremely obvious from a political, economic, strategic, and logical perspective that the Union should have confiscated the land and resources of the Southern aristocracy and redistributed it to loyal Americans.
This is one of my strongest held beliefs. And there's a real actual historic precedent.
Many people get that German culture today is totally different from the militaristic, imperialistic, authoritarian culture that existed even pre-Nazi.
But mostly people don't understand WHY...
It's not just post war guilt, Nuremberg, education etc.
German militarism was really PRUSSIAN militarism, driven by the dominant German state Prussia.
Prussia's culture in turn was shaped by a landowner aristocracy, who supplied most of the army officers, politicians, diplomats and other elites.
Their power came from landed estates, built on conquered land in what is now Poland.
After WWII the allies agreed to redraw Germany's border, and give most of this land to Poland.
So most of the landed estates were destroyed, the owners expelled and Prussia wiped out along with them.
The parts not in Poland were mostly now in East Germany, where they were forcibly collectivised.
So with the land system wiped out, Prussian militaristic elite culture was wiped out...and normal Germans became peaceful and mild.
