All those who believe that the heritage of the Confederacy and that of the South is purely about a cherished and all but sacred way of life and nothing more should be encouraged to read the famous Cornerstone Address given on March 21, 1861, in Savannah, Georgia, by Alexander H. Stephens, who served as Vice President of the Confederate States of America from February 18, 1861, to May 11, 1865.
An excerpt from that speech is provided below.
"The new Constitution has put at rest forever all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institutions—African slavery as it exists among us—the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution. Jefferson, in his forecast, had anticipated this, as the 'rock upon which the old Union would split.' He was right. What was conjecture with him, is now a realized fact. But whether he fully comprehended the great truth upon which that rock stood and stands, may be doubted. The prevailing ideas entertained by him and most of the leading statesmen at the time of the formation of the old Constitution were, that the enslavement of the African was in violation of the laws of nature; that it was wrong in principle, socially, morally and politically. It was an evil they knew not well how to deal with; but the general opinion of the men of that day was, that, somehow or other, in the order of Providence, the institution would be evanescent and pass away... Those ideas, however, were fundamentally wrong. They rested upon the assumption of the equality of races. This was an error. It was a sandy foundation, and the idea of a Government built upon it—when the 'storm came and the wind blew, it fell.'
"Our new Government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man (emphasis added); that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and moral condition.This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth."
Near the end of his Cornerstone Address, Alexander Stephens boldly summarized Southern Heritage for all to see: “With us, all of the white race, however high or low, rich or poor, are equal in the eye of the law. Not so with the negro. Subordination is his place. He, by nature, or by the curse against Canaan, is fitted for that condition which he occupies in our system.” For the full address see: http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/cornerstone-speech/
Southern Americans proud of their heritage also should never forget that on January 9, 1861, the State of Mississippi issued its Declaration of Secession from the Union, stating: “Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery—the greatest material interest of the world.” Source: http://http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/csa_missec.asp
In short, the Confederacy, the way of life of the South so innocently and eagerly promoted as Southern Heritage and the sacrifice of soldiers, as well as the post-Civil War Jim Crow world was founded on one thing only: white supremacy and white domination over black slaves who with their descendants would remain slaves in perpetuity. All the other characterizations are smokescreens, wistful myths, or scurrilous lies.
Watching Southern whites demonstrating their passionate belief in revisionist history on national TV/cable news shows leads you to the conclusion that a great many if not the overwhelming majority give every appearance of being poorly educated, inarticulate, ignorant, and proud of it. Their words/actions leaves little doubt as to their intentions: We might not be smart but we vote; so don’t fuck with us.
As an aside of sorts, could it be that the South is inhabited only by whites who are ferociously proud of their heritage? Or could it be that millions of Black Americans also live in that region who do not identify with the white supremacy, oppression, and slavery represented by the Confederate flag? As an on-point example, South Carolina is home to 1.35 million Black Americans, which is about 28 percent of the State population. Take a guess as to what they think of the Confederate flag and of the whites who rant and rave about their proud Southern heritage.
