A fascinating piece of history, and especially relevant to us Northerners who want nothing more to do with the federal beast in Washington.  Heartening to learn that there were large amounts of Copperheads in such places as I used to live, such as in big cities out east and in my current state of residence in Wisconsin.  There is some interesting stuff about so-called Copperheads in this book which can be read online. Sounds as if the Midwest came quite close to siding with the Confederacy. Wouldn't that have been something!     The Hidden Civil War - The Story of the Copperheads     http://www.archive.org/details/hidde...warth009295mbp     http://www.archive.org/stream/hidden...95mbp_djvu.txt     Thus they got squarely in the way of one of the    most effective epithets in American history  Copperhead.  The    first use of the term is still uncertain (it appeared in the New York    Tribune as early as July 20, 1861), and it had in fact been used as    a general term o opprobrium long before the war. Apparently it    grew out of a comparison with the supposed habit of the poisonous    copperhead snake of striking without warning from concealment,    but it may have been definitely fixed on the peace Democrats by the    practice some of them followed at one time of wearing the head of    Liberty cut out of a copper penny as a protest against the arbitrary    arrests of the government.      Since it was purely an epithet, it never had any definite range of application, being sometimes used to    refer only to those believed to be actively in sympathy with the    Confederates but on other occasions fixed on the Democratic party    as a whole. Tory was employed earlier in the war, but it lacked    spontaneity. Also used was the term Butternut, a contemptuous    reference to the home-dyed clothing of the ignorant rustics of    Southern origin who so loyally supported the Democratic stand-    ard, but Democrats considered it a badge of honor, since they    boasted that theirs was the party of the common people. Some even    wore emblems made by cutting out a cross-section of a butternut    to show two hearts joined together those of the Northern and    Southern people. But Copperhead stung like a lash.     Henry M. Rice of  Minnesota   told the    United States Senate that they must not expect any of the  North-    western  states ever to vote a dollar or a man for war.  To Governor    Ramsey he wrote that there are thousands of brave men who will    never draw the sword. They will look to our State/' 75 From Wis-    consin came the promise of the Green Bay Advocate that men who    did not intend to let their regular business activities and personal    interests suffer because of a fuss about a paltry stone fort or the    moral condition of the n*gg**s in the South would, if war should    come, turn without mercy upon those within their own state whom    they would hold responsible. 76  In the  Michigan  legislature State    Senator Brownell threatened revolution at home in case of war    with the South,  77 and the  Detroit Free Press  spoke out most bluntly    of all, threatening that      ...  if troops shall be raised in the North to march against the people    of the South, a fire in the rear will be opened upon such troops which    will either stop their march altogether, or wonderfully accelerate it.    ... if ... war shall be waged, that war will be fought in the North    . . . here in Michigan, and here in Detroit, and in every Northern    State . . . 78 there are some sixty-five thousand able-bodied men, voters at the late election, citizens of this State, who will interpose themselves    between any troops that may be raised in Michigan and the people of    the South. 79       One direction in which the growing sentiment of opposition was    taking form was revealed by increasing testimony to the spread and    augmenting strength of the  Knights of the Golden Circle  and of    other secret, semi-treasonable organizations of similar methods and    objectives. Disturbing reports came from southern Illinois, where    lodges of the order were reported to exist in a number of counties.    In this section open admission of sympathy with the Confederacy    was occasionally heard. An early summer picnic party at Carlin-    ville was reported to have given cheers for Jefferson Davis and    groans for Lincoln, and in both Charleston and Vandalia groups of    men dared to ride through the streets hurrahing for Jefferson Davis    and for General John Morgan, the Confederate raider. Western    Illinois, in the vicinity of Quincy, was also believed to have been    penetrated by anti-war organizations. 73  The Detroit Tribune  like-    wise found that branches of the K.G.C. were established in many    parts of  Michigan .  74 Some of the state executives of the  Northwest    became so alarmed for the security of their own section that they    urged the formation of a home guard force for emergency service.    Governor Tod of  Ohio  believed that detachments of this reserve    might be required in  Indiana ,  Illinois , and his own state.     75 Morton    of Indiana in the latter part of June dispatched to Stanton a full    and confidential report of the existence of  a secret political organization in Indiana of an estimated strength of 10,000 members,     whose ascertainable purposes included the obstruction of recruit-    ing, opposition to the collecting of taxes for war purposes, and in    general the fostering of distrust of the constituted authorities. As    a defense he recommended that the Indiana Legion, already or-    ganized in the Ohio River counties as a protection from sudden    raids across the river, be made a state-wide force and equipped by    the federal government with ten thousand stands of arms.      Officials feared that dangerous subversive forces were at work.    At first under Secretary 'of State Seward and then under Edwin M.    Stanton, the new Secretary of War, steps were taken to check them.    Agents were stationed at Detroit to ferret out a suspected clandes-    tine trade between the South and the outside world by way of    Canada; a number of residents of southern Illinois, Cincinnati,    and Lapeer County, Michigan, were arrested on executive order;    and a watch was placed upon newspapers regarded as having dis-    loyal aims. 88 These measures not only suggested the existence of:    undesirable conditions but in themselves created disturbance and    ill feeling.