John C. Breckinridge...better as President of CSA?

[EricJacobson]

William C. Davis has written bios about both Davis and Breckinridge and I think author Davis lays out a case, with which I agree, that Jeff Davis was about the best the South could have had.

Davis constantly takes heat for people like Bragg, Hood, and even J. E. Johnston. But Davis had a serious problem, no one in the West was ever going to match up to Lee. And as for Bragg, personality doesn't carry the day. Forrest's personality was about as abrasive as one could get, the difference was that he succeeded on the battlefield.

On the political/economic front, Davis had a mess that none of us would want. Industry problems, specie shortages, snotty governors like Brown from Georgia, a Congress that was practically in rebellion, a VP who was so distant as to be irrelevant, Yankees in hordes, slave owners screaming about their rights, a blockade, etc etc etc. Try building a country and then try to do it in the midst of a war. Oh yeah, we're trying that right now in Iraq.

No knock on Breckinridge, but there is NO QUESTION he had a weakness for the bottle. Being President of the CSA might have put him right in the bottle. I'd take Davis.

[OpnDownfall]

I too, question the idea that Breckinridge, was more capable than Davis, to nation build, while engaged in an all out war for survival, at the same time.
It seems to me, that Breckinridge, was more suited to the arena of politics of a already securely established and functioning gov't.
Davis had many faults, but it can be argued that most of his failings as President of the CSA stemmed from a lack of money, manpower, industry, transportation, i.e., All the necessities for fighting a all out war for nat'l survival. except an indominatable will to see an independent south.
It seems unlikely that Breckinridge, had those qualities of intellect and character to overcome the insupperable disadvantages of the south's war making abilities, that Davis, supposedly, lacked.



P.S. Only Lincoln matched Davis, in having an indominatable will to win.

[whitworth]

By the time the slave oligarchy got around to deciding who would be president of the secession states, the die was cast.

It would never have an army, big enough or supplied adequately to defeat the Union army. Defeat it in battles, but not destroy its operation.
It never had a significant navy. This for a "nation" that had a huge seacoast and inland navigable waters.
It ran short on many necessary military supplies, throughout the war. The Confederacy had "eyes bigger than its stomach". It would never succeed, even early, at many of its goals.

The Confederacy was a nation tied down by its smaller population, and the millstone of slavery around its neck.