Robert E. Lee was someone Lincoln desperately wanted to lead the Army of the Potomac.  Certainly, with Lee's connections to George Washington, many in the north believed he would support nation over state.  So, do we dismantle any and all statutes of Lee?  How far back into ante history do we go?  Calhoun?  Do we erase the histories of the southern presidents who led this country prior to the Civil War?

In the book The Presidents' War: Six American Presidents and the War That.. we are exposed to an excellent discussion of the divisions that existed long before 1861.  Three views of how the nation was structured (Andy Jackson, Calhoun, Van Buren) – for the president the union was sacred and permanent; for the vice president the union was subject to the unique standards of the south, dissolvable in the event things were not mutually advantageous; and, for the secretary of state a reminder that the union was a creature of compromise.

The Civil War in this country began long before 1861.