States' Rights |
One of the most common arguments brought by those defending the use of the Confederate flag is stating that it is not about racial hatred, but rather "states' rights." This is erroneous in at least two ways. First, the Confederate States of America were fighting against the rights of individual northern states to decide how to enforce federal laws. That is, the south was fighting against states' rights. Second, the cry of "states rights" rarely specifies which rights the states were fighting for. The only rights cited by the secessionist governments were those of slave-owners over their "property", that is, their slaves of African decent.
In South Carolina's Declaration of Causes for Secession, they cite “an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery” and that Northern states had failed to “fulfill their constitutional obligations” by failing to return fugitive slaves to bondage. These were federal laws that Northern states had ignored or passed legislation against. In the Texas version, they went so far as to call out individual states, stating, "The States of Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan and Iowa, by solemn legislative enactments, have deliberately, directly or indirectly violated the 3rd clause of the 2nd section of the 4th article [the fugitive slave clause] of the federal constitution, and laws passed in pursuance thereof...to secure the rights of the slave-holding States in their domestic institutions... without the enforcement of which the compact fails to accomplish the object of its creation. Some of those States have imposed high fines and degrading penalties upon any of their citizens or officers who may carry out in good faith that provision of the compact, or the federal laws enacted in accordance therewith." Other states wrote similar statements, but James W. Lowen summarized the south's opposition to states' rights very succinctly when he wrote in the Washington Post, "South Carolina was further upset that New York no longer allowed 'slavery transit.' In the past, if Charleston gentry wanted to spend August in the Hamptons, they could bring their cook along. No longer — and South Carolina’s delegates were outraged. In addition, they objected that New England states let black men vote and tolerated abolitionist societies. According to South Carolina, states should not have the right to let their citizens assemble and speak freely when what they said threatened slavery." (1) Secondly, when the question of states' rights is brought up, one must ask what rights the states are fighting for. The Secession page of this website gives links to the causes given by several Confederate states for their secession in their own words. Each state's convention specifically, deliberately, and repeatedly states that the primary right they are seeking is the right for white men to own and retain other human beings of African decent as slaves. The "States' Rights" argument is one of revisionist history. Following the war, southern families had lost virtually everything, including their homes, incomes, free labor force, and a full third of their sons, husbands, and fathers. In order to justify such a loss to themselves, they had to find something honorable- anything but slavery- to give credence to their cause and allow them to perceive these deaths as noble. Thus, the "States' Rights" revision of history began. |
Heritage, not Hate |
This rallying cry is often used to terminate further discussion on issues surrounding the Confederate flag. To attack someone's heritage is perceived to be an attack on them and their family, making this an efficient and effective defense. Heritage implies a sort of pride, a call to look at a person's lineage and history. When we look at southern heritage, the things that southerners historically pride themselves on, it becomes glaringly obvious that the heritage they speak of is one built on oppression and slavery.
Southerners often promote their heritage as one of a landed aristocracy, full of high manners with "ma'am" and "sir" being liberally sprinkled throughout conversations. One pictures men in white suits and women in corsets and flowered hats, sipping lemonade and juleps on the porch of a stately, columned manor house, surrounded by open farmland. What is this scene? It is obviously one of an antebellum plantation, where the "sirs" and "ma'ams" were originally directed towards the masters and their kin, where the suits were cleaned and pressed by slaves sweltering in the oppressive heat of the south, where the corsets were laced by "the help" who were restricted to the most modest of clothing and accommodations, where the lemons and mint were farmed and picked by unpaid slaves spending twelve or more hours a day working the land in the same suffocating heat, where the children were out of sight and out of mind in the care of a "Mammie" who lived in constant fear of her own children being sold down the river, where the house was built by those who received lashes from a whip if they didn't work quickly enough, and where the fields were worked by broken bodies who had been ripped from their families at the auction house. It is from these roots that southern wealth grew, and much of it remains in the same southern families today. Another version of southern heritage is presented as the down-home variety. Full of fried chicken, biscuits, gravy, greens, and grits, it is often portrayed on its culinary and musical merits. Both of which were appropriated from African slave culture, where they ingeniously found ways of making the most meager of foods appealing and sought solace in the hymns of their church, which would later develop into the blues and rock 'n roll (where many whites would later make their fortunes). Or perhaps they speak of a later heritage...one of George Wallace and Robert Byrd, of Klan rallies and lynchings. That heritage is usually omitted in this debate, though the Confederate flag that they are defending was first used extensively during the mid-20th century's Civil Rights Movement. So what exactly is this heritage that the south is so proud of? How do we separate it from the hate that built the south? Is it possible to do so? Every aspect of southern culture was built on the backs of others, not earned. It is, in the end, a heritage of hate. |
Honor and Pride
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Ancestry |
Those flying the Confederate flag at Exit 16 claim that they are doing so to honor their ancestors who fought against the United States military during the Civil War. If this were truly their intention, one would think that a flag that those ancestors fought under would be their choice. In fact, very few of Kentucky's soldiers fought under the flag that is displayed or carried it into battle. Of the comparatively few troops from Kentucky that fought for the Confederacy rather than the Union, virtually all of them fought in the First Kentucky Brigade, which became commonly known as "The Orphan Brigade." None of the infantry or artillary regiments of the Orphan Brigade were organized in Paducah, or even in the in Jackson Purchase area. A majority were organized in Tennessee, with the westernmost location in Kentucky for organization being Bowling Green.(2) These troops carried a variety of flags, but only the 5th and 6th Regiments flew anything resembling the flag flying at Exit 16. The Confederate States of America flew a half dozen national flags and a multitude of battle flags. There were several flags flown by the Orphan Brigade, yet the one chosen to fly at exit 16 is the one that was resurrected in the mid-20th Century to oppose the Civil Rights Movement and fight against equal rights for minorities. This decision betrays a second, more sinister, motive in the choice of this flag over others. Some of the other flags that could represent the Confederacy without representing the opposition to the expansion of civil rights in the 20th Century can be found below. While still problematic due to the inherent racism in the southern cause, these would appear to present a more sincere pride in the small number of Kentuckians who fought for the Confederacy, rather than the racism and hatred represented by the current flag.
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(1) James W. Lowen, "Five Myths About Why the South Seceded," The Washington Post, Feb 26, 2011.
(2) Edwin Porter Thompson, History of the First Kentucky Brigade, Caxton Publishing House, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1868.
(2) Edwin Porter Thompson, History of the First Kentucky Brigade, Caxton Publishing House, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1868.