"Our View"

Few Americans enter adulthood without at least some
understanding of where they, their families and their forebears stand or have stood in regard to the Civil War. For some, that understanding is little more than a vague notion, but for others — especially those with ancestors who wore a uniform, blue or gray — it’s far more clear.
Many Americans still bury relatives in the cemeteries where ancestors who took up arms in the Civil War were laid to rest.
For everyone, regardless of family and community history, reminders of the war are all around. In towns and cities throughout former Union and Confederate states, there are parks, statues and other physical manifestations of our memories of this turbulent chapter of U. S. history. On the spots where war was actually waged, bullets and other implements of war are still being extracted from the once bloodsoaked ground. Even vestiges of the old regionalism remains, as some people continue to refer to themselves as Northerners or Southerners.

But Americans today, despite any labels they attach to themselves and others, are — first and foremost — Americans. And that, ultimately, is perhaps the perfect lens through which to view the Civil War — the lens of contrast. The deep divisions of our past, the ones that led to war and existed for a time in its aftermath, stand in stark contrast to the unity that exists in present-day America.

Before you think us naive, let us be clear: We understand the United States is, in some ways, a divided nation. As much as we wish otherwise, it might be impossible, as things stand today, for so many cultures, ethnicities and points of view to co-exist in one place without at least some disagreement.

But our disagreements today take the form of debate, not bloodshed. And where the Civil War is concerned, despite how deeply those years scarred our nation, we’ve consigned the anger and the animosity of those dark times to the past, where they belong. In doing so, we’ve become the union we had to become to thrive and persevere as a nation.

In spite of the occasional passionate flare-up — an argument over the statue on the town square, perhaps ? — we have, in many ways, become the antithesis of our ancestors. We’re a people who can hardly imagine taking up arms against our neighbors, our brothers, our countrymen.

We’ve become a people who can study and learn from even the most painful and divisive period of our history. That’s what happens when the past becomes what it’s meant to become: history.

That history has been observed and celebrated in Benton County over the past several days as the first Festival of Ozarks Civil War Heritage has been held at Pea Ridge National Military Park. Park officials conceived the festival as a reunion for descendants of those who fought in the Battle of Pea Ridge — and, of course, as yet another opportunity for anyone interested in the Civil War to visit the park and soak in its rich history.

As anyone who’s been to the park knows, history permeates its structures, monuments and battlefields. It’s almost impossible to take a step without feeling as if the ghosts of Union and Confederate troops are walking beside you, guiding you as you tour this place where they fought and died. One can gaze upon the park’s windswept fields, over which troops once advanced in fighting formation, and almost see the skirmishes that made this patch of earth in the Ozarks a permanent fixture of our history.

Festivals like the one held this weekend are planned for each year leading up to the 150 th anniversary of the Battle of Pea Ridge in 2012. We look forward to each of them, and to the learning opportunities they represent. Of course, learning opportunities are present at the park every day, but the sentiment behind the reunions is something we especially applaud.

The calling together of descendants of both Union and Confederate troops to celebrate a shared heritage — minus the anger that underscored the conflict itself — perfectly represents how far we’ve come as a nation since the Civil War was fought.

We’re in a position now to keep learning from the past, to keep moving forward — together, as one. United. Americans haven’t always learned from the examples set by history, but the way we study and remember the Civil War today shows the conflict’s lessons have indeed been taken to heart.

("Our view", Arkansas Democrat Gazette)