-Caveat Lector- ---------- Forwarded message--- Date: Fri, 13 Aug 1999 16:13:06 -0500 (CDT) http://www.lbbs.org/ZMag/articles/dec96britt.htm ------ Neo-Confederate Culture by Brian Britt Some say that everything good in the South is vanishing and everything bad is spreading nationwide. One growing trend in America is neo-Confederate culture, which encompasses history, literature, museums, reenactments, monuments, battlefields, and organizations dedicated to the principles and founders of the Confedrate States of America. Neo-Confederacy intersects with white supremacy, the Christian Right, the Populist Party, and the states' rights movement. To an increasingly diverse set of Americans, neo-Confederate culture supplies a regionally-and historically-grounded message of right-wing righteousness and urgency. Neo-Confederate culture presents two faces to the world: one of heritage and another of hate. Heritage bespeaks the mythical past of the antebellum South and its valiant defenders, but this gentility often adjoins angry right-wing extremism. There are many history buffs, collectors, genealogists, and fans of Ken Burns PBS Civil War series whose interest in the Confederacy is casual and innocuous. But there is also a hard core of politically-motivated, right wing neo-Confederates from the North as well as the South. According to Al Benson, Jr., of Arlington Heights, IL.,"There are a lot more of us Northern Confederates out there than most people realize. We are the worst nightmare of the politically correct--people that grew up under their brain washing (sic) in their public schools, and still, by God's grace, rejected their abolitionist propaganda!" Benson, who edits the CHRISTIAN EDUCATOR, a home-schooling newspaper, also belongs to a secessionist group called the Confederate States of America and circulates a crudely-reproduced pamphlet called "the Communist Revision of Reconstruction (Paving the Way for Civil Rights." There is nothing new about passion for Civil War history or even its use to justify defiance and rage. By the 1890's, many organizations, holidays, and memorials had been established in honor of the Confedracy. The 1915 film BIRTH OF A NATION electrified Americans with a myth of white goodness (the Ku Klux Klan) against black evil and ushered in an era of unprecedented Klan activity. What is new about the neo-Confederates of hate is their urgent appropriation of Confederate culture for new political attacks on immigration, welfare, gays and the federal government. The first and most strident neo-Confederate publication was SOUTHERN PARTISAN, first published in 1980; several others, notably THE SOUTHERN RE-ENACTING VETERAN and CITIZENS INFORMER, have appeared more recently (1992 and 1993, respectively). Neo-Confederates generate numerous conferences, newsletters, reenactments, and journals, all drawing paralllels between the supposed raw deals of the past (ie Northern agression) and current debates over equal opportunity federal bureaucracy, immigration, foreign policy, and Black History Month. Neo-Confederate culture comes from the myths and traditions of the Lost Cause that emerged after the Civil War. The term goes back to Edward Pollard's 1866 history of the Confederacy called THE LOST CAUSE, which refers to the war as " the most gigantic struggle in the world's history." Pollard hoped for a "new political conflict, in which the South will stand stronger," this cause, he wrote, "is the supremacy of the white race." Lost Cause tradition teaches that bad things happen to good people, but also that the South shall rise again. Several myths, dating back at least tot he 1880's sustain the Rebel cause. Robert E. Lee is the central hero, a "Christian knight" who leads the battle. Jefferson Davis, imprisoned after the war, is the tragic martyr: "Davis sat in the silence of his prison cell 'at midnight alone with his open Bible before him'...His suffering had a redemptive quality for the Southern people." Stonewall Jackson was "like a stern Old Testament warrior," and the executed private Sam Davis was a Christ figure. The Lost Cause recalled the Edenic harmony of antebellum plantation life, and the yankees' wanton torching and plunder of the South. According to historian E. Eckert, "The antebellum South became more than fact; it was transformed into legend and remembered as a Garden of Eden, a noble culture, a benevolent way that had been struck down by Yankee materialism and overwhelming numbers." Losing the war plunged white Southerners into grief, and Lost Cause mythology provided consolation. For neo-Confederates, the Lost Cause is concentrated and stuck in one stage of the grieving process: anger. Debates over Confederate symbols like the Rebel battle flag are the most visible side of neo-Con culture. Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, and Mississippi have all struggled over the issue. In South Carolina, where the flag has flown over the state building since 1962, business leaders and the mayor of Columbia are suing the state, and African Americans have threatened a boycott of state goods and tourism to end the practice. Republican presidential candidate Pat Buchanan praised the banner before the primary there. In Georgia, three years after the Governor surrendered his drive to change the state flag, thousands of cars still display front-end car tags bearing the flag design. An informal survey of hundreds of such vehicles has found that every one of them (except for a single delivery truck) has had exclusively white drivers and passengers. A recent measure to change the flag failed, even though it was attached to a bill making English the official language of Georgia. And in Todd County, Kentucky cross burnings and a barbecue in honor of James Earl Ray have followed the killing of a white teenager by black youths over a Confederate flag in the victim's pickup truck. In Richmond, Virginia, many whites recently objected to placing a statue of the African-American tennis star Arthur Ashe on Monument Avenue, which is lined with statues of Confederate heroes. But neo-Confederate concerns go beyond symbols to the core of the right wing. SOUTHERN PARTISAN, a quarterly magazine with a circulation of 10,000 specializes in a shrill blend of neo-Confederate culture and politics. The cover of a recent issue shows a veiled woman in black resting her hand on the shoulder of ablond boy in gray suspenders and pants, a white shirt, and a black armband. In his hand is a Confederate battle flag. He and the woman are staring wistfully to the side above the caption, "Is the Confederacy Obsolete?" The magazine features Southern culture, book reviews, and regular columns like the "Scalawag Award" (given to traitors of the cause), "The Smoke Never Clears," and "UnCivil War." SP's contributors and advisors include: Pat Buchanan; J.O. Tate, who appears on the masthead of the NATIONAL REVIEW; Paul Gottfried, Senior contributing editor of WORLD AND I; and prominent conservative, Russell Kirk. The neo-Confederates are well-represented in Congress: SOUTHERN PARTISAN has published fawning interviews with Senators Phil Gramm, Jesse Helms, and Trent Lott, who describes the Republican Party as the party of Jefferson Davis, and with Rep. Dick Armey, who once referred to Rep. Barney Frank as "Barney Fag." Armey shows his genteel side in response to an interviewer's question about the South: "I grew up with the bitter winters of North Dakota and the starkness. The romance of the South was a big attraction. I tell my wife that like in the Li'l Abner comic, every Yankee boy has a fantasy about a Southern woman, and she's my fantasy. There's just something about Dixie that is absolutely special." Idaho Representative Helen Chenoweth, a descendent of a Confederate soldier, was quoted by the NYT as saying,"White men are an endangered species...what with affirmative action and everything." Chenoweth has the support of the Militia of Montana and former Ku Klux Klan leader E.R., who sees her election as a win for "race-based campaigns." Another member of Congress, David Funderburk of North Carolina, appears on the masthead of SOUTHERN PARTISAN as an advisor and contributor. Lott also writes regularly for the CITIZEN INFORMER, the mouthpiece of Council of Conservative Citizens, a national group with chapters in about twenty0-four states that leads the fight for the Rebel flag in South Carolina. The CCC calls for an end to forced busing, limits on welfare and immigration, and preserving "our honored traditions by fighting efforts to destroy America's heritage." In addition to Lott, the list of politicians affiliated with the CCC includes Mississippi Governor Kirk Fordice; Rep. Mel Hancock of Missouri, Governor Sundquist of Tennessee, and former Governor Guy Hunt of Alabama, named the 1992 "Patriot of the Year" for keeping the Confederate battle flag flying above the state's capitol. Eric Foner, a professor of history at Columbia and author of the award-winning book, RECONSTRUCTION, compares SOUTHERN PARTISAN to a rock: "You turn it over and all sorts of things come out." One of those things is the racism of Reid Buckley's column on immigrants: Can anybody tell me of a Latin nation that has successfully practiced democracy even as a formal system....No. Well, then, we must ask why. It is because the basic principles of democracy are secret? Tampoco. (No, senor, there ees no meesteree about eet. You geeve the vote to avery paisan, and then you shoot the estupidos who vote against you.) Foner himself was recently the subject of an attack in SOUTHERN PARTISAN for his alleged "Marxist-Leninist" and "anti-South" views. According to Foner, what bothers these critics most is the idea that slavery is basic to understanding Southern history. "You can search SOUTHERN PARTISAN in vain for any recognition of black history," said Foner. ..... DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! 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