Chapter 1042: Patriots
Washington, the political capital symbolizing United States independence, had become a border city after the American Civil War. Yet after the war, the stubborn Union Government still moved the capital back.
By now, the traces left by the war had long since vanished. Only in deliberately preserved history museums could one still see the wounds it had left behind.
Originally, these were meant to make the people of the Union know shame and then strive for greatness, to work hard toward unifying America. Yet as times changed, the nature of these artifacts changed as well, becoming an important part of the anti-war movement.
There was no helping it. As a country made up of immigrants from every corner of the world, people simply did not have much of a concept of "unification."
Irish immigrants and English immigrants would never be able to piss into the same gourd. Italian immigrants and French immigrants continued their hatred, while discrimination persisted between whites and people of color...
Europe had sown the seeds, but the Union had to swallow the bitter fruit. Too many ethnic conflicts were tangled together, and internal problems had always plagued this newborn country.
In fact, the same was true in the original timeline. Many people in later generations believed that Americans were very good at lying low, possessing immense national strength yet enduring in silence until they finally erupted after World War II.
Little did they know that the real Union was nowhere near as powerful as they imagined. A weak central government, ethnic conflicts, and the boundless power of the individual states were all problems confronting this newborn country.
The unceasing internal strife every day drained too much of the nation's energy. From the nineteenth century through the early twentieth century, successive United States governments