Whats the point?

Immediately following the civil war, many people were unsure as to whether the south should be granted amnesty. For those who don't know, amnesty is defined as the act of an authority (as a government) by which pardon is granted to a large group of individuals (Marriam-Webster). In my opinion this argument should not have even taken place, and yet it is merely by human nature that it did. If we, the union, did not grant pardon to the southern states following the civil war, what would have been the point? Hundreds of thousands of innocent American lives shed, for what? It is a hard thing to do, however the Civil War was a situation in which, yes the south must pay in some way, however in a general sense, the north must forgive and forget. For if the north simply won the war, and yet did not forgive the south, then were they not back to the same place they were to begin with. It order for the war to mean something, the north had to provide amnesty to the south; and they did. I will leave you with the same words Abraham Lincoln did, in 1863, on the Gettysburg battle field. ""...We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."