Context

Leaves of Grass had gone through a numerous amount of revisions during its inception, each edition facing a set of their own unique challenges and issues. As an example, the 1860 edition of the book caused Whitman to be fired from his job at the Department of the Interior in Washington D.C. by his superior James Harlan, who decided to assess the moral turpitude of his employees. After discovering Whitman’s book on his desk, Whitman was fired as the content was viewed as immoral.

Regarding the 1881 edition, the book was banned a year after its release by the district attorney of Boston Oliver Stevens. The assumed reasoning for this decision was the formatting of the book – One which Whitman constructed to resemble a bible, that also contained “sexually charged poems” that violated “the Public Statutes concerning obscene literature”. Even though it was seen as controversial for its time period, there were still glimpses of praise for the work found within the book as a Time review of the time acknowledged, “Occasionally, a gleam of the true poetic fire shines out of the mass of his rubbish, and there are tender and beautiful touches in the midst of his most objectionable and disagreeable writings”. (Whitman Archives).

The 1881 edition was written post-Civil War, and therefore reflected Whitman’s thoughts of the time since the event. He would specifically use the section within the book titled Drum-Taps and takes its underlying message and apply it to the other poems. In a sense it showed Whitman's uncertainty of the future post-war and the current state of the US.