Having "listened" to this flag debate for the past few days, I find myself wanting to express an un-academic but honest opinion. I am not a historian. I am a southern woman-- born and bred-- with ancestors who fought for the Confederacy (some were slave-holders and some were not).
As someone with deep southern roots, I cannot imagine flying, wearing or otherwise displaying a Confederate flag for any reason other than a history-related event at a museum or other legitimate, educational venue. You may believe that the Civil War was not fought to maintain slavery. That really doesn't matter. No matter what your personal belief or reasoning is for displaying that flag, you are shouting to the rest of the world that you are a racist. You may not be, but those who see your display will believe it of you. So... why would you want to send that message?
-Melinda Skinner
> Professor Harold Forsythe, of Fairfield University, requests
> that I forward this to the list. His university, for
> whatever technical reason, won't permit him to post directly.
>
> Warm regards,
> Kevin
>
>
> > To Kevin and All,
> >
> > Kevin it is good to read you in this debate.
> Kevin you will remember you and I met first in Richmond back
> in 1992 when we were both researching our doctoral
> dissertations.
> >
> > A simple answer to the question about the racial
> values of southern politicians today as compared to say the
> 1950s, is to look at those who are in the national spotlight
> today. We can say that Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton are
> each unique, but it is important to remember that they were
> (former) Confederate State governors before they became
> President. Each has talked openly and authoritatively about
> race; Carter more comprehensively and honestly than
> Clinton. Indeed, listening to Jimmy Carter, particularly
> post-Presidential, is like listening to the late Hubert
> Humphrey, but with a southern accent and a deeper, more
> probing (engineer-like) mastery of the details.
> > In fact, for the last 25 years, to my mind, only
> southern politicians have spoken honestly about race: on
> both sides of the issue. A leader as renowned as Ronald
> Reagan could say with a straight face that he could remember
> a time when this country didn't have a racial problem. (To
> which the San Francisco wit, Mort Saul, said "Gosh, the man
> must be four hundred years old!)
> > Strom Thurmond, who shifted from strong
> segregationist to mild non-segregationist in a long career,
> wouldn't have gotten away with saying anything so
> rediculous.
> > Many southern Republicans address race with more
> care and consideration than do those from say the Mountain
> West. Name Trent Lott and I reply with Thad Cochrane. It
> is my guess that Cochrane is incapable to the gaff that
> wrecked Lott's career as Republican Senate leader. Ditto
> John Warner, Bill Frist, and Kay Hutchison. Partly, this is
> just a matter of maturity and length of time spent in the
> public eye, perhaps along with considerable higher
> education. But there is also the matter than running for
> office in the South now, as compared to 1950, means shaking
> the hands of many black women and men and asking for their
> votes, even if you are a Republican. Most people's
> personalities are not so complex that they can do this day
> after day, and then the minute they are behind closed doors,
> start telling "N*****" jokes to the good ole boys.
> > (Please note that the typical woman or man in public
> life is not as complex as was Richard Nixon.) Such an
> internal contradiction would inevitably leak out at the most
> inopportune moment, as it apparently did to the Texas
> Agriculture Commissioner (fact?) back in the late-1970s in a
> speech about Booker T. Washington.
> > And where are the 1950s southern "moderates" in
> national, state, and local southern politics now? They are
> generally African-Americans!! The era of the "Cape
> franchise" in southern politics is over. Blacks represent
> blacks in districts at every level of government. The
> gerrymandering of representative districts in the South has
> not only produced black districts but safely white ones,
> too. And these districts (and in some cases whole states)
> have produced an array of white southern politicians: some
> in the "traditional" mode, some "New Right" Republicans
> (i.e. Tom DeLay), some remarkably "progressive," even on
> matters of race. The name that comes to mind just this
> moment in John Edwards, senior Senator from North Carolina.
> Were he anything like the southern Senators that Adlai
> Stevenson was compelled to choose as running mates in the
> 1950s (and Senators Sparkman and Kefaver were politicans of
> considerable ability), Edwards would never have been
> considered for national leadership by the Democrats.
> > I don't doubt that racial prejudice abides,
> certainly here in New England, and probably in the South as
> well. But as a political historian I am bound to tell you
> that the U.S. South has changed radically since 1950-1955,
> and those changes are reflected in its political
> leadership. It is the complexity and nuanced nature of
> those changes that is fascinating.
> > One other thing and then I will close. A major
> change that has taken place within the South is the rise of
> a critical intellectual class, chiefly harbored in southern
> institutions--universities, newspapers, etc.--that
> mercilessly critiques the foibles of the leadership class in
> a way that was unthinkable in the 1950s. For instance, in
> 1955 to be safe Molly Ivans would have to have written from
> Madison, Wisconsin. The white South now has an independent
> and critical conscience, that isn't forced into exile or
> silenced. All southerners get to read and hear several
> sides of an issue, whereas those dissident voices had been
> stiffled if not silenced generally since the "long coup" of
> 1877-1898. It is this latter phenomenon that has
> constituted or reconstituted the American South as a whole
> society.
> >
> > Harold S. Forsythe
> > History & Black Studies
> > Fairfield University
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: [log in to unmask]
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> > Sent: Fri 3/12/2004 9:25 PM
> > To: [log in to unmask]
> > Cc:
> > Subject: Re: VA-HIST Digest - 10 Mar 2004 to
> 11 Mar 2004 (#2004-33)
> >
> >
> >
> > Paul Finkelman argues that there is still
> substantial racism
> > in the South today. He cites a range of
> evidence to support
> > this claim--statements by Senator Lott,
> intimidation of
> > black voters in Florida. He is correct, it
> seems to me.
> >
> > OK. Fair enough. Let's probe that a bit,
> though.
> >
> > Has there been any meaningful change in the
> cultural values
> > of mainstream southern whites in the last 50
> years with
> > regard to race?
> >
> > Douglas Smith wrote a superb short biography
> of Armestead
> > Boothe, a moderate Virginia state senator in
> the 1950s and
> > 1960s. Smith's essay originally appeared in
> the VHMB--it
> > has been republished twice to my knoweldge,
> once by Hershey
> > and Lassiter in the MODERATES DILEMMA, and
> once by Hardwick
> > and Hofstra in VIRGINIA RECONSIDERED. As
> Smith makes clear,
> > Boothe--a true moderate, well "ahead" of
> most politicians of
> > his generation--was also a true racist,
> committed to the
> > notion that as a group, blacks were inferior
> to whites.
> >
> > Are moderate Southern politicians today,
> relatively
> > speaking, comparable in their racial values
> to those of
> > 1950s moderates like Boothe? Has the public
> conversation
> > about race in the South remained static, or
> have the values
> > and assumptions underpinning the
> conversation changed?
> >
> > I am most interested to hear how folk
> respond to these
> > questions.
> >
> > Warm regards,
> > Kevin
> >
> > Kevin R. Hardwick, Ph.D.
> > Department of History
> > James Madison University
> >
> > To subscribe, change options, or
> unsubscribe, please see the instructions
> > at http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-
> hist.html
> >
> >
> Kevin R. Hardwick, Ph.D.
> Department of History
> James Madison University
>
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