The Confederate and Neo-Confederate Reader: The “Great Truth” About the ‘Lost Cause” by James W. Loewen, Edward H. Sebesta
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Overview: Most Americans hold basic misconceptions about the Confederacy, the Civil War, and the actions of subsequent neo-Confederates. For example, two thirds of Americans–including most history teachers–think the Confederate States seceded for -states’ rights.- This error persists because most have never read the key documents about the Confederacy.
These documents have always been there. When South Carolina seceded, it published -Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union.- The document actually opposes states’ rights. Its authors argue that Northern states were ignoring the rights of slave owners as identified by Congress and in the Constitution. Similarly, Mississippi’s -Declaration of the Immediate Causes …- says, -Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery–the greatest material interest of the world.-
Later documents in this collection show how neo-Confederates obfuscated this truth, starting around 1890. The evidence also points to the centrality of race in neo-Confederate thought even today and to the continuing importance of neo-Confederate ideas in American political life. The 150th anniversary of secession and civil war provides a moment for all Americans to read these documents, properly set in context by award-winning sociologist and historian James W. Loewen and co-editor, Edward H. Sebesta, to put in perspective the mythology of the Old South.
Genre: Non-Fiction > History
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