BUY THIS BOOK! "Searching for Black Confederates: The Civil War's Most Persistent Myth," by Kevin Levin is released.

My copy of "Searching for Black Confederates: The Civil War's Most Persistent Myth," arrived this morning by UPS. I consider it an important addition to my library. I think this book is an important book to demolish neo-Confederate mythologies, specifically the stuff and nonsense about Black Confederate soldiers.

BUY THIS BOOK!

So when I give this book a critical review about it, I don't want people think I am saying you shouldn't buy this book. Even good books get analyzed and some gaps seen, some paths not pursued are commented on.

I don't know how Kevin M. Levin will take my blogging on his book. I heard him speak a while back and commented I thought it was a good speech with a good delivery. I suggested an item that I thought would have made it better and supported the speeches conclusions, and Levin saw it as an attack and was somewhat bent out of shape about it. This was in his days when he had one reason or another to keep a Confederate monument.

In this case he will find legitimate cause for being irate.

For example, he refers to the book, "Black Confederates," by Charles Kelly Barrow, J.H. Segards and R.B. Rosenburg.

What I am not finding in the book was that this was originally "Forgotten Confederates," Vol. XIV of the Journal of Confederate History Series, published by Southern Heritage Press. It says it is in the frontpage of "Black Confederates" published by Pelican Publishing Co.

The development of the Black Confederate idea originates in the volumes of the Journal of Confederate History Series.  Earlier there was "Black Southerners in Gray," edited by Rollins which was Vol. XI.  Rollins published a book titled "Black Southerners in Gray" by Rank an File Publishing. The covers of both books are copies of the copies when they were volumes in the Journal of Confederate History Series. 

The Journal of Confederate History isn't mentioned in the book, at least as far as I can find. One reason maybe that if you look at Vol. X1V of the Journal you will find a lot of prominent Civil War historians listed as being members the Editorial Advisory Board. There is Dr. Gary  Gallagher, Dr. James I. Robertson, Dr. Frank Vandiver, and other prominent individuals. Dr. Anne Bailey  is there.

The credibility of the whole Black Confederate idea was given a boost and launched by the Journal of Confederate History Series which could claim prominent Civil War historians on its masthead. The complicity of the Civil War historical profession in getting this Black Confederate mythology going is avoided. Again, perhaps I will find something in some paragraph which isn't in the bibliography  or index or I missed it.

We see now interest in the Civil War falling off a cliff.  Some of this is that a significant part of the Civil War history profession is complicit promoting basically a Civil War history with a white nationalist base. Ever the establishmentarian, Levin avoids road and paths that lead to these challenging questions.

BUT DO BUY THE BOOK. It will be very useful to thwart neo-Confederates. (I don't find the word neo-Confederate in the index.)

The plan to bring down the Sons of Confederate Veterrans. The how to.

I have been asked how the Sons of Confederate Veterans as an organization can be brought down. Also, some clarification as to what I mean by that.

CLARIFICATION:

1. I don't mean violence or vandalism or lawlessness. Such type of actions are counter productive and unnecessary. They are also wrong. Issues and view points should be a matter of public debate and discussion. I don't mean harrassment like anonymous phone calls or flashing lights in people's eyes and stuff like that.

2. I do mean educating the public as to what they stand for such that they will have no credibility and no assistance from other groups, and individuals will be embarrased to be known as members.

PLAN:

The Sons of Confederate Veterans before the public represents itself as a sentimental organization with a nostalgic fondness for the past

1. I am going to research and make it publically available. It will focus on what the SCV states in its publications and what merchandise it sells and what its actions are.

2. I will be asking individuals to help me get the work out. On Twitter, Facebook, in your blog, on your website, or whatever social media you use, to get my research out to the public.

3. There will be notifications of new materials at AntiNeoConfederate Action on Facebook. I always post links at my Facebook page. I will be tweeting about these materials on Twitter. There will be materials at my website. My Youtube channel AntiNeoConfederate will have videos.

Blog: 

This blog will post items. http://newtknight.blogspot.com/

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/Anti-Neo-Confederate-Action-122398324590629/

Video Channel: (Search term is "antineoconfederate", one word, all lower case.)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRrFf_2mEqolBVwrMIz0q_w

This channel willl have Dallas related material also, just look for the neo-Confederate stuff.

Twitter:

Look for Fight NeoConfederacy or look for Edward H. Sebesta.

Webpage

My website now has a page for the Sons of Confederate Veterans where materials will be available online.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/sons-of-confederate-veterans.html

4. Counter protesting at the 2020 SCV reunion in St. Augustine, Florida. Local activists there are already planning protests. If possible drive down. The following are some Facebook groups that include fighting neo-Confederacy in their agenda. You don't have to agree with all their views, but you can see what local activists are doing.

 https://www.facebook.com/ronrawls   Rev. Rawls has made fighting neo-Confederacy a priority item.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/newflmajoritynfl/

https://www.facebook.com/JAXTAKESACTION/

If there is a group I have overlooked I will update this posting.

5. There are these resources that you can share right now.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/sons-of-confederate-veterans.html  Has a paper about their theological war ideas.

http://www.blackcommentator.com/526/526_confederacy_sebesta_guest_share.html

The  head and the deputy head of the Heritage Committee of the SCV have this website.

http://www.kennedytwins.com/

POSTSCRIPT:

As the real face of the SCV emerges, I  think their influence will decline. It will also educate the public what honoring the Confederacy is really about.

Again, I don't support violence or something like violence.

The SCV along with the UDC constitute the two major influential groups working to keep Confederate monuments and defend the Confederacy. We can shred their credibility by letting the public know what they really believe by quoting their own words.

Already, I am noticing that things are being pulled off line.

Updated Paper on the Sons of Confederate Veterans promoting the idea of a theological Civil War, and that opposition to Donald Trump is driven by the devil.

The paper is at this link.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/sons-of-confederate-veterans.html

The author, Chaplain-in-Chief White of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV), sees opposition to President Donald Trump as being driven by the devil.

Confederate Thin Blue Line Flag, the Sons of Confederate Veterans and the Black Lives Matter movement

I was able to obtain the Confederate thin blue line flag.

When the Black Lives Matter movement started up in 2015 the Commander-in-Chief of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) started to have part of his reports discussing what was to me obviously the Black Lives Matter movement and in opposition to it.

I am going to use this flag as a starting point to discuss the Sons of Confederate Veterans and their writings which I think applies to the Black Lives Matter movement.

I think that this will make it very clear what the SCV and Confederate Heritage is about.

The Confederacy really isn't popular anymore

The headline is "Chocolate shop sells out of sweets after offering deal to anyone who burns Confederate flag."

http://www.fox4news.com/news/u-s-world/chocolate-shop-sells-out-of-sweets-after-offering-deal-to-anyone-who-burns-confederate-flag

Perhaps the shop only really sold 80%  of their chocolate, perhaps it is a little hyped more than it was.

However, if it was only a sales surge, and they actually have half their chocolate, it is still very important. A shop thought that being known as anti-Confederate was a good business strategy and perceived that their potential market would receive this proposal very favorably.

A chocolate shop potential customer base is likely affluent and educated and not representative of the public in general.

However, for that audience the shop owners decided that the opinion would be overwhelmingly against the Confederacy and events seem to have confirmed that assessment.

Also, it won't be long before other shops realize that being against the Confederacy is good for sales and undertake some similar action to let the public know.

The Confederacy is unpopular and it is going to publically knocked by businesses wanting the public to know that they don't like the Confederacy.

When your concept of patriotism is really a form of white nationalism.

The American Legion indexes Confederate monuments. Click on the link.

https://www.legion.org/memorials?keywords=confederate&location=&sort=created_desc&submit=View

Does the American Legion understand that if the Confederate effort was successful there would be a fractured America. When your idea of patriotism is really white nationalism this type of idea of including Confederate memorials would make sense. 

This is 2019 and it isn't as if the issue of Confederate monuments hasn't been in the news. 

Paper with pictures about the Triumphalist White Supremacy of Fair Park Completed. / On to bringing down the SCV

PAPER ON FAIR PARK WITH ABOUT 100 PICTURES

There are formally listed 84 Figures, but some of those figures are sets of pictures. There is a total 102 pages.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/history-paper-the-triumphalist-white-supremacy-of-fair-park.html

It is a big pdf so it might take some time. It is over 50 megabytes.

I am now going to ask scholars and cultural leaders to co-sign our letter. We have a total of 40 signatures so far.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/fair-park-letter.html

The following blog will be tracking the Dallas white landscape closely, as opposed to this more general blog which deals with neo-Confederacy.

https://dallaslandscape.blogspot.com/

On to bringing down the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

Getting a Powerpoint Made, a video made, and then this 102 page paper, has taken time. I have had to concentrate on it intensly since it is a current issue with events underway. However, with this done, it is now going to be more time to pursue other topics, which specifically be about leting the general public know about the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

I have set up my video studio and gone through and prepared materials and hope to do the first video soon.

I expect to bring down the Sons of Confederate Veterans by informing the public what their agenda is. I want to make it very clear I don't support violent actions.

Time to bring down the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

The other major neo-Confederate groups have gone under or just live on as remnants.

The League of the South is just perhaps a dozen or maybe two dozen.

The Rockford Institute is acquired by the Charlemagne Institute.

The Council of Conservative Citizens is just a remnant.

Southern Partisan has long since ceased publishing.

The Abbeville Institute is still operating. Though I don't know as if too many members have positions in any university.

What remains is the Sons of Confederate Veterans and the United Daughters of the Confederacy. It is time to bring both organizations down by the means of exposing them.

I am going to have time to do this, since the immediate agenda, of taking down the Confederate statues in Dallas, seems to be over. The court case will wind up, the statues will come down. I will have to be photo documenting everyting and gathering all the news articles, and other things of the historical record, and then I am done.

I was in a situation of having to do research on the Confederate War Memorial to be prepared to support bringing it down if the city council didn't vote to do so, and also to gather all the records of what was happening, news articles, video,print, webpages, etc. and archiving it, as well as doing photo documentation. Events would move fast and then slow and I was constantly racing to catch up.

The contextualization committee for Fair Park seems to have come to a halt. I am also finishing up the research  on Fair Park and writing it up so that isn't going to be a big burden.

I have also finished reseaching the entire racialized landscape. Work will be more oriented to writing it up, then Powerpoints for presentations, then video.

So in terms of working on the Dallas racialized landscape, it is now going to be done at my pace. The city of Dallas has largely stopped doing anything. I can set my time devoted to it to a set amount each week and balance it with my work on the neo-Confederate movement in general.

Now the focus will be on the neo-Confederate movement.

I have set up my video logging work area. I purchased tripods, got carrying cases for their storage. I found my handycam and re-read how it works, got some accessories, a table to do the video cast, etc. I am going to do my first video starting next Monday or earlier.

I think I am going to outline the podcast and readit from a PowerPoint, but I am not going to write a script.

I have to make up a short introduction video for AntiNeoConfederate with my resume. There is a lot of stuff to do to set up an operation. Also, I am going to make podcasts. I want to add working URLs into the video, and I probably want to drop in some text boxes. So there is some software things to learn also.

I think the SCV provides an abundance of topics to talk about.

I will provide links to new material as it gets completed on this blog. Please share on Facebook and Twitter.

UPDATE:

Resources

1. A recent paper on the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/sons-of-confederate-veterans.html

OTHER RESOURCES

Blog: 

This blog will post items. http://newtknight.blogspot.com/

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/Anti-Neo-Confederate-Action-122398324590629/

Video Channel: (Search term is "antineoconfederate", one word, all lower case.)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRrFf_2mEqolBVwrMIz0q_w

This channel willl have Dallas related material also, just look for the neo-Confederate stuff.

Twitter:

Look for Fight NeoConfederacy or look for Edward H. Sebesta.

Webpage

My website now has a page for the Sons of Confederate Veterans where materials will be available online.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/sons-of-confederate-veterans.html

4. Counter protesting at the 2020 SCV reunion in St. Augustine, Florida. Local activists there are already planning protests. If possible drive down. The following are some Facebook groups that include fighting neo-Confederacy in their agenda. You don't have to agree with all their views, but you can see what local activists are doing.

 https://www.facebook.com/ronrawls   Rev. Rawls has made fighting neo-Confederacy a priority item.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/newflmajoritynfl/

https://www.facebook.com/JAXTAKESACTION/

If there is a group I have overlooked I will update this posting.

5. There are these resources that you can share right now.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/sons-of-confederate-veterans.html  Has a paper about their theological war ideas.

http://www.blackcommentator.com/526/526_confederacy_sebesta_guest_share.html

The  head and the deputy head of the Heritage Committee of the SCV have this website.

http://www.kennedytwins.com/

Chronicles Magazine leaves the Confederacy behind. Charlemagne does publish it, but they haven't left the Confederacy behind.

HAVE NOT LEFT THE CONFEDERACY BEHIND.

My correctiong blog. https://newtknight.blogspot.com/2020/02/completely-wrong-about-chronicles.html#.XlqxuSieGiM

There has been a merger between the Rockford Institute which publishes Chronicles Magazine and the Charlemagne Institute.

Relevant links.

https://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/about/the-rockford-institute/

https://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/magazine/

https://charlemagneinstitute.org/

It seems that the Rockford Institute has been acquired by the Charlemagne Institute because they wanted to have a print magazine with some established readership.

The Charlemagne Institute purpose is that they are "Defending and Advancing Western Civilization."  Charlemagne was the person who founded a local European empire in the late 8th and early 9th century and for many the founder of modern Europe. Likely this is so. Charlemagne was constantly at war, this was the Early Middle Ages, and so this name selection indicates a military spirit of those who think Westeren Civilization is under attack.

The Charlemagne Institute had this online publication for which they claim a large following in terms of million of page views or something like that. I have no reason to doubt their claims.

https://www.intellectualtakeout.org/

Backstory

John Howard founded the Rockford Institute in 1976 which undertook to published Chronicles Magazine. He apparantly had the financial resources to fund the effort. He brough Thomas Fleming in the mid-1980s.  Fleming made it into a paleoconservative and neo-Confederate publication. Fleming launched the League of the South in the Chronicles Magazine pages. Howard died in August  2015. Chronicles Magazine circulation had been in servere decline. Fleming retired from Chronicles Magazine in June 2015.  From reading accounts it seems that Howard was very much in decline and I speculate that the board of the Rockford Institute saw a change to dump Fleming.

This is the link to the Fleming Foundation.

https://fleming.foundation/

He hasn't given up on the Confederacy. At this website there are links to the Abbeville Institute and Shotwell Publishing.

The Merger and Chronicles Magazine

This has meant some changes for Chronicles Magazine.

Aaron Wolfe who was going to be one of the key players running the magazine suddenly and unexpectedly died. Chilton Wlliamson reportedly decided to leave the magazine.

Williamson has this web presence.

https://www.chiltonwilliamson.com/

On this page he announces that "Articles will now be posted more frequently." https://www.chiltonwilliamson.com/articles/index.html

So I don't think Williamson is going to retire, he just isn't going to be running Chronicles Magazine. I speculate with Aaron Wolfe gone, Chilton Williamson decided he would be there alone and the magazine was going to go in a new direction and he would be kept on but isolated.

On the masthead is Bill Murchison, a person seen in neo-Confederate publications here and there, and Donald Livingston who headed the league of the South Institute and now heads the Abbeville Institute. https://www.abbevilleinstitute.org/

The current subscription base has been concerned about the new direction of Chroniclces Magazine so I think Murchison and Livingston will be kept on. However, I think the old Chronicles Magazine, excepting some token articles, is gone. Murchison and Livingston will likely pass on to retirement or just pass on so there isn't any urgent need to have them resign.

I don't think the topic of the Confederacy will be avoided, but it will be only engaged as part of a general rightwing antipathy  to losing a white landscape as opposed to being part of any neo-Confederate agenda. There base, the readers of Intellectual Takeout, (don't worry, no heavy meals here, and we are hip I tell you we are hip.), I don't think are that interested in the Confederacy. I think  the Confederacy will come up as part of a general antipathy to demands for racial justice and as part of fear of losing a white landscape in general, but not as a specific neo-Confederate agenda. Perhaps there might be a token article or two so they hang onto current subscribers while getting their Intellectual Takeout readers to subscribe.

But as the Intellectual Takeout readers becomes the magazine's base of readers, the prior subscribers of the matgazine will not be needed. After all it there are millions of readers of Intellectual Takeout, with a few percent of them subscribing, they will have several times more readers than Chronicles Magazine ever had before.

They can depend on some Chronicles Magazine subscribers continuing out of habit anyways with an occasional bone thrown them.

As a force for the neo-Confederate agenda, that phase of the Chronicles Magazine existence appears to be over.

Some of the things that happened since the 1990s when Chronicles Magazine was in its heyday is that people now know what neo-Confederacy is and can recognize it. Also, I had for years an online index of the issues, title of the article, one sentence summary, and author. I know people were not happy being known to be in the index. Like with the Southern Partisan, a point came where I suspect people did not want to have Chronicles Magazine on their resume and the association with neo-Confederacy. John Shelton Reed dropped out in the mid-1990s.

So I am happy to consider that I contributed some to their demise.

Am I going to track Chronicles Magazine in the future? Probably at some point in the future I expect to stop tracking them.

What Next?

I think it is time to inform the public about the Sons of Confederate Veterans and the United Daughters of the Confederacy.  They are still a major force to keep Confederate monuments. The SCV appears to be one of the two significant forces for neo-Confederate ideology. The other one is the Abbeville Institute which they work with.

I think I can be effective in ending their influence in a few years.

I will be expanding my efforts to the racialized landscape in general. For example this page on Fair Park.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/fair-park.html

And this page on the Hatton W. Sumner Court Room in Dallas.

http://templeofdemocracy.com/hatton-w-sumners.html

This is my blog for my efforts to deracialize the Dallas landscape.

https://dallaslandscape.blogspot.com/

United Daughters of the Confederacy whine as neo-Confederacy is rejected.

https://www.dailypress.com/news/hampton/dp-nws-davis-arch-letter-removal-20190802-story.html

The whining and dissembling of the United Daughters of the Confederac (UDC) is of note in this article. The reality of the UDC's agenda is denied by talking a narrative to make it an issue of something else.

There are some other notable aspects to this. Even with monuments locked into place by court order and by court decisions, there is still a lot of other things left to do in de-Confederating your locality. The neo-Confederates spent some time thinking of how to embedd the Confederacy into the landscape and historical memory in multiple ways. There is a substantial amount of non-monument things to be dealt with.

With each of these non-monument removals the remaining marks of the Confederacy landscape seem more anomalous and also less legitimate. They are seen as being present because the state against the local wishes has forced the Confederate monument on them. With each of these non-monument removals the issue is kept before the public.

The Confederate built landscape diminishes week by week. People just don't want it.

Confederate Railroad chooses to stick with the Confederacy / This will help de-Confederating the landscape

In this previous blog post I mentioned the three bad choices the band Confederate Railroad had open to them.

In this blog post.
https://newtknight.blogspot.com/2019/07/confederate-railrord-continues-to-derail.html#.XUWZgm82qiM

I said:

At some point, maybe soon, Confederate Railroad is going to be forced to either shut down, change their name, which will greatly annoy their fans, or embrace right wing support. None of these choices are appealing.

They have chosen not to change the name. 

https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/01/entertainment/confederate-railroad-name-backlash-trnd/index.html

I didn't expect them to shut down. Without their name they don't really have a reason to exist. It was the "Confederate" in their name that gave their fans a thrill and differentiated them from the many  other country western bands that exist and strive to be known to country western music fans. 

Now what that thrill was exactly will now progressively surfact as time goes on. As vendors, fairs, events decide they don't want "Confederate" in their event, the venues where Confederate Railroad appears will be constrained to areas of the country where there is a lack of concern over racial justice. 

Even then there will be protests over the appearance of the band Confederate Railroad and there will be counter-efforts to the protestors by individuals which the Confederate Railroad probably would rather not show up or be seen. 

Progressively Confederate Railroad will find that by a process involving the places that still do invite them and by the actions of their supporters in public debates their image will be progressively worse.

Confederate Railroad will help deConfederate the landscape also. As their appearances generate controversy people will think about their local Confederate monument and some will think that they would like it removed and some will take action to request that it will be removed.

Confederate Railroad will constantly agitate the issue and their appearances in locals where there are Confederate monuments will give an opportunity for local activists to get the issue of Confederate monument removal before the public.  

This is a previous posting about the band showing up for a Sons of Confederate Veterans event. 

https://newtknight.blogspot.com/2019/07/confederate-railroad-performed-at-neo.html#.XUWY8W82qiM

Sons of Confederate Veterans webpage has gotten "software issues"

This is the link to the Sons of Confederate Veteraans (SCV) webpage.

https://www.scv.org/

This webpage used to re-direct you to this page.

http://www.scv.org/new/

It does seem to be a broken web page.

I am not sure what has happened. It could be it is just that "software issues," but I am not sure exactly what makes a working webpage not work. Did one of the SCV staffers screw it up? Was it hacked? Or was the webpage an embarrassmet and they have pulled content hastilly?

I am not sure what makes a webpage spontaneously fail.

I suspect, speculate, that the webpage was disabled because of some reason the SCV doesn't want to make public.