Bingo! This was an overwhelmingly reactionary institution & pearl-clutching over whether to honor those graduates who committed literal treason glosses over the ways that so many of those who remained hated democracy & equality, & fought vigorously to suppress it.
Sorry I should have been clearer in the OP; the McClellan quote above is from his correspondence, not from the article, which I think kinda misses the point of the actual role that West Point played in the Civil War. Tried to squeeze too much into too small a space.