Edward Sebesta's April 29 selection for Confederate Heritage Month also looks at one of the books offered by sale in 2002 through Confederate Veteran magazine, the journal of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV).
He quotes from several favorite books of the neo-Confederates, including Michael Andrew Grissom's Southern by the Grace of God (1989). He quotes Grissom there on the post-Civil War terrorist organizations in the South:
The clandestine organizations which proliferated across Dixie were called by different names, including the Knights of the White Camellia, the Red Shirts, the White League, and the White Brotherhood; but, the association which attracted the most attention was the Ku Klux Klan. Not to be confused with the Ku Klux Klan of the present day, the original Klan was organized for the same reason as the White League of Louisiana -- to rid the land of the curse of carpetbag tyranny. ...
Without the secret societies and rifle clubs, it is doubtful that home rule would have returned before the end of the century. Violence in Hamburg, South Carolina, on July 4, 1876 gave birth to the Red Shirts, who rode through hill and dale with the same fervor of Paul Revere who had ridden a century earlier for the sake of freedom. Brutal insults were the daily fare from the foul mouths of freedmen, and womanhood was imperiled in the state. Former Confederate Generals M.C. Butler and M.W. Cary advocated the "straight-out" system, declaring that nothing but a straight-out fight could now succeed in overthrowing the corrupt government.
The excerpt from his book available at Amazon.com illustrates the eccentric nature of today's neo-Confederates. Grissom complains about a "new breed" of "loud" Southerners who like to "call themselves the New South." This New South "breed" is "braying" on behalf of the damnyankees, according to him:
In their litany, they find nothing good south of the Mason-Dixon line. There is no joy to be hand in being southern, and they pine for the day when South will be spelled with a little s. They also like to be called revisionists. That sounds real good. It makes them feel better when someone calls them aside and gently suggests that they are whipping themselves. They point with great pride to the exploits of Lincoln and Webster while holding their New South noses over the graves of Calhoun and Lee. How odd! Do northerners waste one moment berating themselves? Do westerners curse the memory of Wyatt Earp and relentlessly search for something sinister in the westward movement?
I must admit, in my entire life I've never heard anyone say that they wanted to spell "South" with a small "s", much less that they "pine for the day." (Grissom uses lower-case for "southern" and "southerners" himself.) But conjuring up bogeymen is just part of the neo-Confederate scam.
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