ShareThisBy JOHN M. CRISP
Thursday, November 09, 2006
One might think that interest in the heritage of the Old South would have a natural half-life and that, as the events of 1861-1865 recede into the past, so would our infatuation with the symbols of that conflict.
But as recently as last month the mayor of Franklin, Tenn., endured considerable criticism for urging participants in the commemoration of the 142nd anniversary of the Battle of Franklin to display the Second Confederate National Flag rather than the more well known and symbolically volatile Confederate Battle Flag. Complainants called his Southern pedigree into question.
Meanwhile in Alvin, Texas, which is hardly a bastion of the Old South, two boys in middle school are fighting the administration for the right to wear the flag, one on his backpack and the other on a belt buckle. In Mississippi a corner of the state flag is still prominently occupied by the flag, and in Georgia a few citizens are insisting that the most recognizable symbol of the Confederacy be restored to their state flag, as well.
I suspect that at least some of this interest is perpetuated by the Internet, where sites trafficking in Confederate symbolism have proliferated. Let's face it: the Confederate battle flag is a handsome banner whose connection to a very dramatic period in our history is attractive. Generally, the preservation of heritage is desirable. But it's impossible to glean merely the good out of a given set of symbols; they often have another set of less attractive meanings that can't be eliminated.
In the attempt to control them, however, many of the Confederate Web sites traffic in ideas, as well as in flags and lapel pins. You can buy books like "The South Was Right." You can discover that Abraham Lincoln was actually a white supremacist. You can learn that, really, in many respects blacks were actually better off before emancipation. It's not hard to see why the ideas connected to the symbols that many want to preserve make some of our fellow black citizens extremely uncomfortable.
An anecdote: On June 14, 2005, I was meandering along back roads near an imaginary line that separates West Texas from East Texas, past Cross Plains and Rising Star. This is lovely country with green hills that grow progressively more forested as you travel east. Gradually the land and the culture become more Southern than Southwestern.
A few miles past Sipe Springs, on a very rural road, I stopped at a gravel pullout where a Confederate flag was flying on a tall flagpole. Near the road was a four-sided stone pyramid, 10 or 11 feet tall, with a small cannonball on top, painted black. On the side of the pyramid was a large bronze plaque with this inscription:
"Following the war between the states (1861-1865) many Confederate veterans who had so faithfully fought to defend their homes and country against the ravaging yankee invaders found little left on their return and set out for a new life in Texas. During the 1870's these courageous pioneers settled northwest Comanche County. These veterans established farms, schools and churches and brought the blessings of Anglo-Saxon civilization to the frontier. To the honor and memory of these brave patriots this memorial is dedicated by their grateful descendents on the 3rd day of June, A.D. 2005, at Sipe Springs."
At least three things are worth noting:
_ "Ravaging yankee invaders:" A deep sense of grievance persists.
_ "Blessings of Anglo-Saxon civilization:" The sense of exclusion is unmistakable.
_ Finally _ and this is the part that sent a mild shiver along my spine _ this monument isn't a relic from the past that was erected during, say, the '60s, in reaction to forced integration. It had been dedicated less than two weeks prior to my visit. Suddenly, the quiet countryside was even quieter, and it wasn't hard to imagine the misgivings of a black American standing beside that ominously remote rural road.
There are good people in Comanche County, but their own geography betrays an ironic misunderstanding of what the weave of our American fabric is really like. You can check this in an atlas, but I swear the next town to the east of Sipe Springs is De Leon. And the one after that: Dublin.
(John M. Crisp teaches in the English Department at Del Mar College in Corpus Christi, Texas. For more news and information visit www.scrippsnews.com.)
Monument 2005
Sir your mind set as a teacher is appalling! Your opening statement reeks of genocide.
To begin with you do not admit that we were invaded and conquered and occupied and forced back into a Union we had determined no longer was suitable; and not by violators across the waters but by ravaging, burning, killing, raping, stealing yankees in this country of America.
Your type is one of the loudest to scream against Hitler's invasions and occupations and Russia's actions in the Balkans and against Georgia. Yet, you are blind to the fact that the Confederate States did not invade or takeover anybody. They defended themselves from invaders. They fought because the yankee army was down here!
You don't see the hypocrisy in this, and are a yankee - Yankee is a mind set and not a place.
You state: The deep sense of grievance persists; This grievance that persist is the direct cause of people like you who have put the South to an ongoing siege from 1830 to 200- forever. People with your mind set who have no knowledge of what Lincoln's War was all about, no knowledge of plantation life, no social science sense at all and you delight in pointing fingers and bashing Southern white people no matter what they do.
There is no difference between the events in the annihilation of the Indian nations or the false Japanese imprisoned during WWII in this country and the imprisonment of the 11 Southern States by the Yankee USA (Missouri and Kentucky and Arizona were occupied and taken over by the Union in 1861 they had voted to join the Confederacy as Gen Stan Watie of the Indian Nation had).
You say you are alarmed because: "Blessings of Anglo-Saxon civilization:" is on the memorial and The sense of exclusion is unmistakable. As an English expert this is probably over your head, but you should know that the Declaration of Independence as written by my Ancestors gives everyone "The Right To Take A Walk" it is called FREE ASSOCIATION - The Natural Law of Freedom to Associate. (The Constitution in Exile by Judge Andrew P. Napolitano, page 62).
I am positive that you would scream racist if anyone protested Moslems in this country having their mosque with their symbols, yet in your bashing article you make slurs at us for our Celtic Symbols.
Then you play the race card stating "the misgivings of a black American standing beside that ominously remote rural road." Since the likes of you have banned "The Song of the South" from viewers I do agree with you: you will not see any friendly black American skipping along the road singing Dixie nor will you see any white person stop what they are doing, greet them and offer them a spot to sit in the shade, give them a drink of lemonade and chat awhile. ominously remote rural road you describe was made that way by people like you!
I have dedicated the rest of my life to writing people with your mind set, refuting your invalid statements with facts, yet your style always gets published.
Since you teach English and you slurred a Southern Writer (Kennedy's "The South Was Right.") I recommend the following recently published books be added to your class list for balance. All of them written by Yankees.
Don't Tread on Me - a 400 Year History of America at War, form Indian Fighting to Terrorist Hunting - by H. W. Crocker III.
Complicity, How the North Promoted, Prolonged, and Profited from Slavery by Anne Farrow, Joel Lang, and Jenifer Frank.
The Constitution in Exile by Judge Andrew P. Napolitano
Lincoln Unmasked and The real Lincoln by Prof. Thomas J. Dilorenzo
How The Catholic Church Built Western Civilization by Prof. Thomas E. Woods, Jr. P. H. D.
In the Course of Human Events by Charles Adams
Perpetuating Black Slavery
The great perpetuators of American slavery were John Adams, John Hancock, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and their group, through their work on July 4, 1776, and other efforts at Trenton, N.J., and Yorktown, Va. This work made American Blacks ineligible for the 1784 British Emancipation Program in which the British King bought all the slaves in the Empire and set them free. Note that the Civil War also becomes impossible, because the Kings Men put Lincoln in jail when he calls for volunteers. Errrr, why do American blacks celebrate the fourth of July?
Al
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