ve actually been
made.

In this respect the policy adopted by the National Government in
1861 was about as weak as possible, while that of the Confederates
was comparatively strong. It is said that this weak policy was
due largely to General Scott, and grew out of his distrust of
volunteer troops; he having thought it necessary to have a considerable
body of regular troops to give steadiness and confidence to the
volunteers or militia. This is a very good theory, no doubt,
providing the regulars could be provided in advance in such numbers
as to produce the desired effect. But if that theory had been
relied upon in 1861, the "Confederate States" would have established
their independence long before the regular army could be organized
and made effective. What was demanded by the necessities of the
country in 1861 was the best large army that could be made in the
shortest possible time, not a better small army to be made in a
much longer time.

The United States government actually had in hand the means of
creating in a very short time a far larger efficient army than the
South could possibly have raised in the same time. This means had
been provided, with great care and at great expense, through a long
term of years, by the education of young men at the Military Academy,
and their practical training in the small regular army in all kinds
of actual service, including one foreign war and almost constant
campaigns against the Indians. Nowhere in the world could have
been found a better corps of officers to organize, instruct, and
discipline new troops. Yet those officers were hardly employed at
all in that service at first, when it was of supreme importance.
Some time later, when the necessity was not so great, a few officers
of the army were permitted to accept commands in the volunteers.
Even then it often required great "influence" to secure such
"indulgences." Scores of young officers, qualified in every way
to do such service in the first six months of the war, sought in
vain for opportunities to render the valuable services for which
the government had educated them, and were compelled to drag along
four years in the discharge of duties several grades below their
qualifications.

WEAKNESS OF THE MILITARY POLICY

In the regular army in 1861 there were, exclusive of those who went
South, at least 600 officers who, after graduating at West Point,
had served sever