The Civil War after the Civil War

Although the Civil War ended in 1865, it did not leave American politics. A review of campaign songs during Reconstruction show Republican candidates often using the war as a justification for their own election, more specifically always blaming the Democrats for the war. Let's look at a set of lyrics from the losing 1884 Blaine and Logan campaign from the song Our Next President:

They say we wave the "bloody shirt," 
Hurrah! hurrah! 
And if we do—who does it hurt? 
Hurrah! hurrah! 
We have a right, by all the tears, 
By all the war's great woe and fears! 
Hurrah for Blaine our coming President!

For a variety of reasons, this did not work for Blaine as well as it did for past Republican politicians. Grover Cleveland won the election and became the first Democratic President since James Buchanan

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