The british. On the other side unionists will say George Washington in his farewell address said the price the union of any allegiance. Actually robert e. Lee is reading a biography of George Washington in the months before the civil war and he is hearing these arguments and he concludes that he basically agrees with the unionist position. He believes George Washington would have opposed secession. So what else does lee say to Francis Blair . He says he would would gladly washes hands of slavery. He would gladly get rid of all slavery if it would avoid war rate but then he says how can i raise my sword against my native state . Here the blair family position says lee hesitated that is lee told the story he gave the answer once, no biggie turned down the command though he did not turn his commission to the army surfer more than three decades. He returns to arlington house. He soon learns that virginia in fact has voted to secede from the union and there on april 20 the writes a letter r
Next Jonathan Horn recounts robert e. Lees decision to join the Confederate Army after being sought by the north and the south. From louisville kentucky, its about an hour. Its my pleasure to introduce dr. Horn. He is an author and former white house president ial speechmaker who spent years researching and writing his robert e. Lee biography the man who would not be washington published in january of this year. Jonathan has appeared as a commentator on msnbc and nbc radio. His writing has appeared in the New York Times the Weekly Standard and other outlets. During his time the white house jonathan served as a speechwriter and special assistant to president george bush and as a graduate of io university and we welcome him to louisville university. [applause] thank you so much for that lovely introduction judy. As was mentioned i used to work as a president ial speechwriter before i started writing this book. So you can imagine my shock when i learned that the subject of my new book did