Slate video on Andrew Johnson as America's worst president

Excellent video on racist president Andrew Johnson and how he destroyed Lincoln's legacy and enabled the defeat of Reconstruction. The link to the video is:

http://www.slate.com/articles/video/politics/2015/02/america_s_worst_president_is_andrew_johnson_president_s_day_video.html

Click on the full screen button in the lower left corner so the video isn't chopped off.



Consider mentioning this on your blog, Facebook page and elsewhere.

Oh My Captain, My Captain - Lincoln, Booth, and the League of the South

The League of the South had said that it was going to celebrate the assassination of Abraham Lincoln by John Wilkes Booth. http://leagueofthesouth.com/honoring-john-wilkes-booth569/

This sentiment has been present since the time of Lincoln's assassination among ex-Confederates and neo-Confederates. Southern Partisan magazine in their Christmas catalog sold a t-shirt celebrating the assassination of Lincoln.  CLICK TO ENLARGE.

The Confederate Veteran magazine, official publication of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV), a neo-Confederate group, (or if you are Kevin Levin, a 'Southern Heritage' group) publishes pictures of members with Lincoln re-enactors in jokes about the assassination of Lincoln. 

In the Jan./Feb. 2010 issue of Confederate Veteran magazine, on page 29, there is a photo of a group of SCV members giving a Lincoln re-enactor a ticket to Ford Theater. On page 31 there is a photo of an SCV member pointing a gun at a Lincoln re-enactor with the re-enactor not realizing it. The SCV thinks this is hilarious. 

The neo-Confederate (or if you are Kevin Levin, 'Southern Heritage') groups have a seething hatred of Lincoln. The May/June issue of the Confederate Veteran has a major article where Lincoln is compared to Hitler by James Ronald Kennedy. There is a book about the Republican Party being a hot bed of Marxism by Al Benson Jr. and Walter Donald Kennedy which is sold by the SCV, You can find the book "Lincoln's Marxists" being sold on www.amazon.com. 

Rick Lowery, editor of National Review, has this article about the Lincoln haters.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/06/17/the-rancid-abraham-lincoln-haters-of-the-libertarian-right.html

So it should be no surprise that a neo-Confederate group has come out and said point blank they celebrate the assassination of Lincoln. Among the neo-Confederate groups a seething hatred of Lincoln is common. 

The questions to be asked is why the League of the South is doing this now. Is it for the publicity it will give them among other neo-Confederates? It is a recruitment effort? 

Or is it a continuing shift in the neo-Confederate movement where factions are one upping each other in denouncing Lincoln? After the dialog among neo-Confederates has reached the point where Lincoln is denounced in vitriolic terms and compared to Hitler, Marx, and Stalin what is the next step in being plus ultra on hating Lincoln? 

The SCV has steadily increased its animosity against Lincoln in its writings and the books it recommends, however I don't think that they are ready to come out openly in favor of celebrating the assassination of Lincoln. SCV members might privately celebrate John Wilkes Booth's assassination of Lincoln, but publicly doing so would demolish their efforts at "heritage defense" and their involvement with the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC), and their public acceptance would be gone.

The League of the South knows this and their celebrating the assassination of Lincoln gives them a competitive edge over the SCV. It might cause some problems within the SCV since some members might demand that the SCV also celebrate the assassination of Lincoln openly. 

The drive to openly celebrate the assassination of Lincoln might simply be driven by a feeling that the anti-Lincoln message isn't getting before the public.  It would be the next logical stage of activity in an anti-Lincoln campaign. To get public awareness and interest in their message. The celebration of the assassination of Lincoln might simply be rage bursting forth from the confines of the fear of public opinion. 

As for Kevin Levin's outrage over the League of the South celebration of the assassination of Lincoln, he needs to recognize that he is an enabler when he gives the SCV and neo-Confederates a free pass. A person who won't use the term neo-Confederate is an enabler of neo-Confederates. 

A good history of anti-Lincoln hatred is John McKee Barr's book "Loathing Lincoln." 

His web page is http://loathinglincoln.com/

On a closing note I refer to Walt Whitman's famous poem, "O Captain, My Captain," regarding the assassination of Lincoln.

Some readings on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSAymj4hp7Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBL8wT6Pm9g

In the above readings I find something that might be said at a funeral. I think the readings would be much better is they were done in a voice distraught as if the speaker was discovering that the captain is dead and as if they were on a deck on a ship headed home. 

I was unable to find a YouTube reading like this. 

Protest against Confederate ceremony in Baltimore

The Baltimore Sun had this article recently. A protest against the holding a Confederate event near Martin Luther King's birthday.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/bs-md-confederates-quakers-20150117-story.html

Of course I don't think a ceremony honoring the Confederacy or Confederate leaders is good whether it is near Martin Luther King's birthday or not.

This is another report on the protest.

http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=13020

I hope to help them out.

Speaking to two more groups

I am scheduled to give a presentation on neo-Confederates at a local university in March some time and there is a group in Baltimore which is interested in having me speak and so I am going to meet with the leadership and give them the presentation and show them some neo-Confederate publications. Some issues of Confederate Veteran and Southern Mercury should be real eye openers for them.

One speaking engagement will likely to lead to another.

AUTHOR OF LOATHING LINCOLN ON C-SPAN

AUTHOR OF LOATHING LINCOLN ON C-SPAN

John McKee Barr, author of "Loathing Lincoln" was on C-SPAN talking about those who hate Lincoln. This includes neo-Confederates. People have found this to be very interesting.

http://www.c-span.org/video/?322129-1/book-discussion-loathing-lincoln

The good thing about this is a lot of people are now learning about the nature of the neo-Confederates and also learning to recognize a neo-Confederate discussion of Lincoln when they hear it.

#BlackLivesMatter in history and historians who don't get this.

#BlackLivesMatter is a hash tag used in regards to public policy and practice involving policing and the justice system where obviously Black lives don't seem to matter much. The choking death of an African American man in a arrest involving the sale of a few loose cigarettes in New York City is an example where it seems that Black lives were disposable.

In the last few days I began to realize that #BlackLivesMatter could also be a call to change the practice of historians, to study and write history understanding that #BlackLivesMatter.

For example biographers and historians who minimize the racist policies of Woodrow Wilson are those for whom Black lives don't matter.

More specifically among those involved in Civil War history for whom Black lives don't seem to matter it would be those avoid recognizing the racial agenda of some of those involved in Civil War history. It would be those who make excuses for the Museum of the Confederacy and its historical practice. It would be calling neo-Confederate groups "Southern heritage" groups. It would be being involved in commemorations at Confederate monuments. It would be those Civil War historians that seek to minimize slavery as the cause of the Civil War.

It would also apply to some of our public school textbooks.

It would certainly apply to those use minimizing language over conflicts over Confederate symbols, like journalists who use terms like "flag flap." Would they every use the term "history hissyfit" over holocaust denial, absolutely not.

It would apply to churches that host neo-Confederate groups.

It would be for those who don't have necessarily a hostility towards African Americans, but for whom African Americans don't count for anything, for whom they are a nullity.

It would be those for whom African Americans are "them" and not a part of "us."

I think one reason that for some Black lives don't matter is that in the teaching of history all too often Black lives don't matter and people internalize this message.

I call upon all historians to take the stand that #BlackLivesMatter in the writing of history. To not be silent when other historians' practice of history shows that for them Black lives don't matter. The hashtag would be #BlackLivesMatterInHistory.

For related reading www.templeofdemocracy.com/breaking.htm.

The 2012 Presidential Questionnaire on issues related to neo-Confederacy

The following was the 2012 questionnaire. I am going to review it and send out a 2016 Presidential Candidate questionnaire. The 2016 presidential campaigns are beginning to get underway. 

2012 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE NEO-CONFEDERACY QUESTIONNAIRE

INTRODUCTION:

The questions are divided into two sections. The first section pertains how neo-Confederacy impacts policy; the second are cultural questions in which the issue is who we are.

POLICY:

1. As President for the following positions would you nominate or appoint a person who is a member of the neo-Confederate organizations such as the Sons of Confederate Veterans, League of the South, United Daughters of the Confederacy, and the Council of Conservative Citizens?

A.    Justice Department Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division.

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

B.     Commissioner for the United States Civil Rights Commission.

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

C.     Justice Department Attorney General

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

D.    Justice Department Deputy Attorney General, Associate Attorney General, or Solicitor General.

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

E.     Federal judgeship.

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

F.      Cabinet

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

G.    Member of the National Council on the Humanities.

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

H.    National Endowment for the Humanities.

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

2. As President would you oppose the involvement of neo-Confederate organizations such as the Sons of Confederate Veterans, League of the South, United Daughters of the Confederacy, and the Council of Conservative Citizen in the Reserve Officer Training Corps or the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

3. As President would you oppose the U.S. military working with neo-Confederate organizations such as the Sons of Confederate Veterans, League of the South, United Daughters of the Confederacy, and the Council of Conservative Citizen in the awarding of medals and the granting other awards to U.S. military personnel?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

4. Do you think a state has a right to secede?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other

5. Do you think that a nullification is a legitimate action?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other

6. Do you support the 14th Amendment to the Constitution?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other

CULTURAL

1. Are you a member, regular, associate, honorary, or otherwise of a neo-Confederate organization such as the Sons of Confederate Veterans, League of the South, United Daughters of the Confederacy, and the Council of Conservative Citizens?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

2. As President would you send a wreath to the Arlington Confederate monument?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

3. As President would you fly or display the Confederate flag at the White House or any other place of presidential residence?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

4. As President would you allow a Confederate monument to be erected on Federal property?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

5. As President would you declare a day, week, month of Confederate memorialization?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

6. As President would you support the naming of a Federal bridge, building, park, ship, vehicle, or some other Federal public structure or place for purpose of honoring a member of the Confederacy as a hero?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

7. As President would you participate in a celebration, observance, or ceremony to honor, memorialize, or celebrate the Confederacy or a member of the Confederacy or send a representative to do so?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

8. As President would you support having Civil War battlefield parks explain the role of slavery in the Civil War?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

9. As President would you place in the White House or some other place of presidential residency pictures or memorials of Confederate leaders?

Yes, No, Undecided, Other.

Books about Newton Knight and The Free State of Jones.

My particular favorite about the Free State of Jones is:

"The Free State of Jones" by Victoria Bynum. I read it and it is really good. She points out how the pro- and anti-Confederate factions in the country where Knight led his resistance to the Confederacy split along class lines where upscale and slave vested interests supported the Confederacy and ordinary people didn't.

http://www.amazon.com/Free-State-Jones-Mississippis-Longest/dp/0807854670/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1420770405&sr=8-1&keywords=Free+State+of+jones


There are also books about other Southerners who didn't support the Confederacy.

There is "Secret Yankees: The Union Circle in Confederate Atlanta" by Thomas G. Dyer.

http://www.amazon.com/Secret-Yankees-Confederate-Atlanta-Society/dp/B008SLEOMI/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1420770691&sr=1-1

A major work on the topic was:

"Lincoln's Loyalists: Union Soldiers from the Confederacy" by Richard Nelson Current.

"The Free State of Jones" to be shot in New Orleans and Lafayette

http://www.nola.com/movies/index.ssf/2015/01/matthew_mcconaughey_civil_war.html

"Entertainment Weekly" reports that Gugu Mbatha-Raw has been cast for the movie "Free State of Jones"

Gugu Mbatha-Raw has been cast as Newton Knight's love in the the movie project "The Free State of Jones."

http://insidemovies.ew.com/2015/01/06/casting-net-gugu-mbatha-raw-joins-matthew-mcconaughey-in-free-state-of-jones/

Movie about Newton Knight about to begin production

The movie is going to be titled "The Free State of Jones."

The producers are now lining up talent for the movie. The following is an article in the Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Mississippi.

http://www.clarionledger.com/story/entertainment/2015/01/07/matthew-mcconaughey-actors-models-mississippi/21395657/

The story of southerners who opposed the Confederacy is largely not known to the public. This movie will results in a significant change in popular historical memory. The movie will first be released and show in theaters, then it will be available as a DVD, then it will be shown on television both broadcast and cable. Then it will be on Netflix and Hulu. It will be one of the movies shown on cable to fill channels.

Film critics will review it. There will be articles about southerners who were against the Confederacy. The public will be aware that areas in the South that were not supportive of the Confederacy were areas where there wasn't a lot of slavery. The connection between slavery and support for secession and the Confederacy will become manifest. Some people will purchase books on southern resistance to the Confederacy.

Some people will be interested in looking up ancestors who resisted the Confederacy.

The neo-Confederate idea that South = Confederacy will lose a lot of credibility with the general public. The Lost Cause interpretation of the Civil War will also lose credibility with the general public.

Additionally, the neo-Confederates will be in a bind. If they publicly condemn the movie they will draw attention to it. If they don't oppose it the movie will still grind down the Lost Cause.

Previous blog about the movie.

http://newtknight.blogspot.com/2015/01/movie-planned-to-portray-life-of-newt.html#.VK85nyvF_UU

Jack Hunter fooling around at "American Conservative" website. UPDATE

American Conservative has this article by Jack Hunter at their website.

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-rights-race-deafness/?mc_cid=6c9d76b70d&mc_eid=3e97b81a9f

He is concerned that the conservative movement is coming across as anti-African American.  The following is the subtitle for the article.

"Too many conservatives give the impression that refusing to listen to black perspectives is a point of pride."

The article itself is good. It points out what is obvious to most people outside the conservative movement. The conservative movement is becoming reflexively anti-African American. 

Hunter also admits that he was the Southern Avenger who was a character of inflammatory rhetoric. 

I should as part of disclosure mention that he also denounced me. I had claimed that the Charleston alternatively weekly ran his material for entertainment, that is as a sort of freak show, to which he took great umbrage and denounced me as an elitist. It turns out later the editor of the paper admitted that they ran Jack Hunter's material for that purpose to provide entertainment. Hunter hasn't apologized to me. I am not sure I want him to do so or care if he did. 

An earlier blog of mine reviews this history. 

http://newtknight.blogspot.com/search?q=hunter#.VKeHTyvF_UU

What I think is happening is that Jack Hunter is trying to live down his role as Southern Avenger and his prior career pandering to neo-Confederate sentiment. 

Also, for this article to appear in the American Conservative is somewhat humorous. 

This is the magazine that published Samuel Francis, a rabid racist. This is the magazine that publishes Patrick Buchanan, former Senior Advisor of Southern Partisan magazine  and contributor to Southern Partisan magazine, contributor to Chronicles magazine and member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. I could mention others. Note to American Conservative, I have every single issue, so don't say I know nothing of the magazine. I collected every issue because I recognized so many names from my researches into the neo-Confederate movement.

UPDATE: One of the three founders of American Conservative is Taki Theodoracopulos. In my reading of his columns I see an outspoken and gleeful bigotry. 

If one was against racism you wouldn't appear in American Conservative in the first place. Additionally all he is doing is providing cover for American Conservative magazine. For the American Conservative to be concerned that the conservative movement is pandering to racism is somewhat ludicrous. Who knows, perhaps Satan will denounce sin.

I wonder who Jack Hunter will be tomorrow? 

The Campaign for 2015, getting churches and other mainstream institutions to give up the Confederacy and stop enabling neo-Confederated groups

The major focus for 2015 will be to get churches and other mainstream organizations to stop enabling neo-Confederate groups.

The campaign with the churches is documented at www.templeofdemocracy.com. You can look at the over view of the campaign, or the campaign by denominations and cities. The letters written and responses will be reported on those pages.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) will be having their national convention in Richmond, Virginia and the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) is having their national convention in Raleigh, North Carolina.

The Edenton United Methodist Church pastor has written me and told me that they are not hosting the UDC and that he doesn't know why his church showed up on the North Carolina Division UDC website as being a hosting church. I don't know whether to believe him. I am not saying that he isn't to be believed, but I don't think the North Carolina Division UDC would have the Edenton United Methodist Church as its location for its service if it didn't have some idea that it was going to meet there.

Last year I had a lot of time devoted to developing a presentation I could take on the road and present and getting together a working set of equipment for the presentation. This year a lot more time will be devoted to this campaign.

Movie planned to portray life of Newt Night, rebel against the Confederacy in Mississippi

The URL for this blog is newtknight.blogspot.com.

The movie is to star the popular article Matthew McConaughey as Newton Knight. 

The following are some articles about the movie project. 

http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/nov/06/matthew-mcconaughey-play-anti-slavery-newton-knight

http://deadline.com/2014/11/matthew-mcconaughey-gary-ross-free-state-of-jones-stx-entertainment-1201268420/

http://www.clarionledger.com/story/news/2014/11/12/matthew-mcconaughey-play-mississippi-anti-slavery-renegade/18928311/

Here is a good source for historical information about Newton Knight.

http://mshistorynow.mdah.state.ms.us/articles/309/newton-knight-and-the-legend-of-the-free-state-of-jones

I am looking forward to this movie. 

Victoria Bynum has written a good book on Newton Knight. http://www.free-state-of-jones.com/

Convicted former Sons of Confederate Veterans Commander-in-Chief Ron Wilson, an update. What type of people are attracted to the Sons of Confederate Veterans. UPDATE

Some time ago I posted a blog on former Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) Commander-in-Chief Ron Wilson and his conviction for fraud in running a ponzi scheme. The posting is:

http://newtknight.blogspot.com/2012/03/former-sons-of-confederate-veterans.html#.VKLJtV

He is now serving a 17 year sentence for the ponzi scheme.

It seems he has been indicted again for trying to hide some of  his ill gotten gains with his estranged wife and his brother. They are being indicted along with him. This is an article from The Independent Mail in South Carolina.

http://www.independentmail.com/news/new-indictment-in-ron-wilson-ponzi-case

http://www.justice.gov/usao/sc/news/8.12.14.ponzi.html

They were convicted according to this article.

http://www.greenvilleonline.com/story/news/local/2014/12/22/ron-wilsons-brother-ex-wife-sentenced-home-confinement-probation-community-service/20765919

The Ron Wilson case reminds me of another SCV officer from whom there has been unfavorable public news reporting.

There is Ray McBerry, Commander-in-Chief of the Georgia Division SCV.

This is one news story.

http://www.myfoxatlanta.com/story/26154510/mcberry-former-employee

There are a series of text messages shown for the article. They seem creepy to me.

This is another news story.

http://politics.blog.ajc.com/2014/07/29/report-ray-mcberry-seeks-out-18-year-old-for-bikini-clad-photo-shoot/

And this is another news story.

http://www.myfoxatlanta.com/story/26131771/mcberry-modeling

Along with some other things I have observed, which I am not going to go into here, I wonder if the SCV hasn't reached a certain stage in its history.

This would be a stage in which normal people tend to avoid the SCV and the SCV instead more and more attracts persons who are extremists or mentally a little off or both. As the SCV becomes more explicit in its agenda SCV members who are Confederate enthusiasts but not wanting to secede or support the neo-Confederate agenda feel uncomfortable belonging, but this more explicit agenda tends to at the same time attract more extremist elements. This further shifts the SCV to a more extremist agenda and the process repeats. Perhaps this process is already underway in the SCV.

Also, the SCV has a fair quantity of assets in terms of money and real estate. Some scammer might even now be planning to be Commander-in-Chief to get at the assets of the SCV.

Again this is a speculative thought. However, if you organized a flat earth society what type of members do you think you would attract?

UPDATE:

In the "With friends like this you don't need enemies," category there is this response to this blog posting about the SCV.

http://www.lsrebellion.blogspot.com/2014/12/sebesta-exposes-scv-scandal.html

The defense of the SCV by the League of the South (LOS) in my opinion hardly helps dispel the idea that the SCV might be becoming an organization of people who are cranks.

For the League of the South I might point out a person's misbehavior is not excused by the misbehavior of others.  It is a child's response when one is caught taking cookies to exclaim that a sibling has also been taking cookies.

The United Daughters of the Confederacy and their shrine to white racist terrorists the Red Shirts is getting national news coverage.

I have been trying to bring this to the public's attention for years. I am happy to report that the Red Shirt museum in Edgefield, South Carolina which is run by the United Daughters of the Confederacy is being given news coverage via an Associated Press news story.  The Red Shirts were violent white supremacists who overthrew democracy in South Carolina in 1876.

The following are links to the story appearing in different newspapers.

http://chronicle.augusta.com/news/metro/2014-12-20/edgefield-museum-shrine-south-carolina-red-shirts-who-attacked-blacks-during  (Georgia near the border of South Carolina.)

From the article:

The home of a Confederate officer who helped take power away from blacks and drive Republicans out of South Carolina’s government after the Civil War is now a museum honoring the Confederacy and its leaders. Those leaders include the “Red Shirts,” who used violence and intimidation to end Reconstruction in the state.

The article also mentions the Hamburg "massacre" of African Americans.

It appears the same article is being run in newspapers across the country.

http://www.dailyjournal.net/view/story/98da36b17b6844c9b1274fec9ded7e5f/SC--Red-Shirts-Museum/    (Indiana)

http://gazette.com/museum-remembers-controversial-sc-red-shirts/article/feed/189822 (Colorado)


Hopefully this news story will get more circulation.

Kevin Levin enabling neo-Confederates and his uncritical thinking of history and his elitism. UPDATED. UPDATE 2

I was recently going through my copy of The Journal of the Civil War Era, Vol. 4 No. 4, Dec. 2014 and I came across Kevin M. Levin, "Black Confederates Out of the Attic and Into the Mainstream," pages 627-635.

The article isn't entirely bad. Levin points out that the myth of the Black Confederates is pushed to sanitize the Confederacy. He talks about some the specific myths advanced by neo-Confederates such as the claim that there is a Black Confederate soldier on the Arlington Confederate Monument and disposes of them. However, in general the article really fails and a person has to wonder what the editors of The Journal of the Civil War Era were thinking.

There are three problems with the essay. The first is his enabling of the neo-Confederate movement. The second is his lack of critical thinking regarding history. The third is a failing to connect it to either the use of token African Americans by neo-Confederates and the neo-Confederates use of identity.

Levin refers to "Southern Heritage" groups as being the advocates of the myth of Black Confederates. On page 630 Levin states, "None of the print sources published during this period had much of an impact beyond a small select group of readers within the southern heritage community."

The neo-Confederate movement uses the term "Southern heritage" to assert that being critical of the Confederacy is to be critical of the South and to conflate the two. Levin uses the neo-Confederate movement's own terminology reinforcing the neo-Confederate assertion that Southern identity doesn't exist without embracing the Confederacy as a positive thing and that the Confederacy is central to Southern identity. The term "heritage" though technically means what is inherited from the historical past has in general use come to mean what is positive from the historical past. This is enabling white supremacy.

The magazine Oxford American and the journal Southern Cultures could be called southern heritage publications, but the UDC and the SCV are about the Confederacy and not about Southern history in general excepting as it relates to the Confederacy and Reconstruction.

On page 631 Levin states, "Southern heritage groups such as the SCV and UDC have utilized these stories to counter a narrative of the war that increasingly has come to embrace emancipation and the role of United States Colored Troops in ending slavery."

It would have been illuminating if Levin pointed out the irony of these two groups promoting the myth of the Black Confederate while at the same time promoting a white supremacist view of history. However, Levin, like many Civil War historians and enthusiasts, wishes all the controversy would just go away and they could get back to the toy soldier gaming of the Civil War. (Maybe a special issue devoted to it.) Levin has stated that he doesn't like the word "neo-Confederate." He likely fears that it will lead to loud voices at Civil War Round Tables and disquieting questions about some of the members of the Civil War history profession.

However, the essay really fails in Levin's understanding of historiography. It is something that someone might believe in when they were in middle school. It doesn't have any comprehension of the problematic nature of historical narratives.

Levin thinking in the essay goes like this:

1. Historians with their training and expertise and knowledge have in their possession true history.

2. Unfortunately with the Internet, those without this training and expertise and are wrong headed are making false historical assertions.

3. This problem would be solved by informing people to only listen to properly credentialed historical experts and authoritative institutions.

On page 627 in the beginning Levin asserts:

"The success of the black Confederate phenomena can be traced directly to the expansion of the Internet, including access to rich databases of primary sources and the availability of digital tools such as blogs, wikis, and other platforms that allow practically anyone to publish a Web site and engage and influence a wide readership. This has led to a sharp increase in the amount of history published online by individuals and organizations with little or no formal training in the field."

However, the Internet is not needed at all to propagate blatantly false history. The Lost Cause interpretation of the Civil War and Reconstruction flourished in the early 20th century long before the Internet or even before radio transmissions. Holocaust denial was widely known about, much to popular disgust, before the Internet. About half the American public doesn't believe in the geological history of the earth and evolution and this refusal to accept science is previous to the advent of the Internet. Similarly the notorious "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" and Anglo-Israelite identity theories both had wide circulation prior to the invention of the Internet.

The Black Confederate narrative served the interests of neo-Confederates and a broad section of the white South which embraces the Lost Cause historical narrative and so it had an audience of those who wanted to believe. The Internet merely served to make more efficient the communication of this narrative to those who very much wanted to believe it, who are grasping for straws to justify the Lost Cause.

Levin portrays the general public which uses the Internet as naive and uncritical consumers of information on the Internet. He states on pages 632-633:

"Rather than assuming the static position of dispensing historical knowledge ex cathedra, public historians, along with academics and other history educators from junior high school through college, need to focus their efforts on teaching the kinds of digital literacy skills that will assist students and the public generally in their quest for reliable information." 

The public already knows that the Internet is full of misinformation. There is a website www.snopes.com devoted to it and people refer to it. Misinformation on the Internet is a topic on the Internet. Levin is avoiding the issue that the Black Confederate narrative is something some people want to believe against all odds, and attempts to position it as an issue of the gullible public who unfortunately are not guided by the expert history establishment, the League of Distinguished Civil War Historians of which he is so fond of thinking that he is a member. (Didn't Coski tell him that he was a member?)

Levin continues on page 633 stating what questions an Internet user might ask to to avoid ending up in believing in Black Confederates, he states:

"Is the site associated with reputable institution like a museum, historical society, or university? Can you identify the individual or organization responsible for the site, and are in the proper credentials displayed? Is the information provided on the Web site, including text and images, properly cited? What can you discern from the site's incoming and outgoing links?"

This is fairly direct. Believe what the establishment tells you about history and be very skeptical of all others.

However, academics and institutions have their agendas and problems. If the Internet existed in the first half of the 20th century distinguished professors like William Archibald Dunning of Columbia University would  have had the reputable Internet site explaining that Reconstruction was a terrible period of "negro misrule." Dunning could probably provide footnotes.

I wonder what the reputable institutions of history in Turkey have to say about the Armenian holocaust? I am sure they have footnotes.

With all the problems with public school texts and the teach of American history in public schools should junior high and high school history teachers be employed to refute historical mythologies outside their teaching. I suggest they start first with their own text books.

Historical memory and knowledge is contested. Histories are written to serve agendas. People believe what they want to believe. That fact that history itself is problematic has been realized for some time.

Napoleon Bonaparte quipped, "History is a set of lies agreed upon," shows that even in his time, people had an idea that established history was questionable and might just be a narrative serving an agenda.

"Treason doth never prosper. What's the reason?  Why if it prospers none dare call it treason," states an epigram by John Harrington in the 16th or early 17th century. The epigram is a commentary on the contested nature of historical memory.

The historical narrative of Black Confederates is another example of many examples of contested historical memory and how different groups advance histories to serve their own agendas including the respectable establishment historians. There is a whole field of inquiry regarding historical memory.

Additionally, Michel Foucault has written "The Archaeology of Knowledge," examining how knowledge is produced.  How is historical knowledge produced and consumed?

Thomas Carlyle stated, " Every new opinion, at its starting, is precisely in a minority of one." Perhaps the website lacking institutional credentials might be a website to read.

The issue of Black Confederate historical narratives is about contested historical memory, how beliefs are accepted or rejected, and how we construct our world views.

What would be useful for the non-professional historian is training how to critically interrogate all history whether it is on the Internet or published by Harvard University or some other distinguished body. All of history is contested. All sources might be subject to skepticism.

Levin doesn't locate the invention of Black Confederates in their obvious contexts. The neo-Confederates have also proposed the idea of the Celtic Confederacy and the South being a Celtic nation. This proposed ethnic identity replaces the older Lost Cause idea of the South being an abode of Anglo-Saxon purity and the Lost Cause mythology of the Cavalier and Round Head.

There is also the issue of the invention of ethnic identities to avoid confronting the issues of race in the South.

I think also that Black Confederates is part of a larger agenda of neo-Confederates to use African Americans to justify neo-Confederate beliefs. The Sons of Confederate Veterans parades around African American H.K. Edgerton wearing a Confederate uniform and flying the Confederate flag in their defenses of the Confederacy.

An even larger context to locate this invention of Black Confederates would be to consider it in the context of the larger practice of using token African Americans to justify white racist beliefs.

Other topics in which Black Confederates might be compared to is the Melungeon mythologies which served largely for some people to escape believing in their African American ancestry. 

The article is a simplistic, cartoonish, idea that a gullible public is being led astray by persons lacking proper historical training and credentials. It is an article that would be written by an elitist unconscious of the larger issues or critical theory. 

That the editors of the journal accepted this article raises concerns about Civil War scholarship in general.

UPDATE 2:

Recently Salon.com published a parody of a writer in the New York Times who was upset with the Internet.

The Salon parody is online here:
http://www.salon.com/2015/01/21/the_internet_has_destroyed_human_civilization_americas_greatest_writer_finally_weighs_in/

The New York Time's article that Salon parodies is online here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/18/books/review/among-the-disrupted.html?_r=1

Information and discourse is being democratized which upsets by those who were previously privileged. When the privileged are dispossessed they usually scream in outrage.

Witness this blog posting by Brooks D. Simpson who is actually on the editorial board of Civil War Era.

https://cwcrossroads.wordpress.com/2014/12/18/cries-for-attention/

As you will note his tirade doesn't actually address any specifics in my blog posting. It is just sputtering rage. When I saw the Salon parody I thought of Simpson's raging article and Kevin Levin's complaint about the Internet.

League of the South allowing it to be used by a foreign power against American interests. UPDATE:

I was reading this interesting article about Putin and Russia at the New York Review of Books in the latest issue. You can read it here:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2014/dec/18/how-he-and-his-cronies-stole-russia/?insrc=hpma

In place of a genuine media and a real civil society, Putin and his inner circle slowly put into place a system for manufacturing disinformation and mobilizing support on a new and spectacular scale. Once the KGB had retaken the country, in other words, it began once again to act like the KGB—only now it was better funded and more sophisticated. Today’s Russian “political technologists” make use of their state-owned media, including English-language outlets such as the TV news channel Russia Today; armies of paid social media “trolls” who post on newspaper comment pages, as well as on Twitter, Facebook, and other sites; fake “experts” whose quotes can be presented with fake authority; and real experts to whom Putin’s officials have granted special access, or have simply paid. Former Western ambassadors to Moscow, businessmen who have been recruited to Russian company boards, European politicians as high-ranking as Schröder and Silvio Berlusconi—all have been well compensated, directly or indirectly, for offering their support.

Using these different sources, the Kremlin began putting out messages designed not necessarily to make Russia look good, but rather to undermine the Western establishment and Western institutions, including the European Union and NATO. Using both money and information, they seek to empower the Western far right, the anti-establishment left, and the international business community all at the same time. Thus Russia Today supports Occupy Wall Street. A Russian oligarch organizes a meeting in Vienna attended by the French National Front, Hungary’s nationalist political party Jobbik, and Austria’s Freedom Party.3 Whispering campaigns, conducted in the world’s financial capitals—especially Frankfurt and the City of London—hint at the dire things that will happen if sanctions against Russia are not lifted. In an article recently published by The Interpreter, an online publication dedicated to exposing Kremlin disinformation, the journalists Peter Pomerantsev and Michael Weiss argue that:

since at least 2008 Kremlin military and intelligence thinkers have been talking about information not in the familiar terms of “persuasion,” “public diplomacy” or even “propaganda,” but in weaponized terms, as a tool to confuse, blackmail, demoralize, subvert and paralyze.4

In understanding this we can see why Russian media has been interested in giving League of the South President Michael Hill and some others a platform in their media. Recently the League of the South was exultant in the fact that they were on Russian media.

http://leagueofthesouth.com/league-president-interviewed-on-russian-tv/

The Russians may not take the League of the South very seriously but want to assist any group that they feel could harm the United States of America and in the case of giving League of the South media access they are covering all their bets.

It would suit the Russians very well if a real secessionist movement would gain some traction in the United States.

At some point what the League of the South is doing is treason.

UPDATE:

This is another item of the Putin government supporting the neo-Confederate movement in the United States.

http://leagueofthesouth.com/the-league-of-the-south-takes-its-southern-nationalist-message-to-moscow/

League of the South President Michael Hill is pleased to announce that he spoke via Skype at an Anti-Globalist conference in Moscow on the topic “The Right of People for Self-Determination and Constructing a Multipolar World.”

I am trying to find out some information about the conference. This is a YouTube video of it. Doesn't seem like a major affair.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=688xDoLgAY4

The same video can be found at:

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/12/14/390167/moscow-hosts-antiglobalization-conference/

I don't know if the Putin government is giving the League of the South any financial resources, but being on Russian TV and being invited to conferences certainly must encourage the neo-Confederates and maintain moral when their agenda doesn't seem to be going anywhere. Also, it has the potential to raise their prestige in the eyes of other extremists and help them recruit members and retain members.

I have not indication so far that the Sons of Confederate Veterans, United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Abbeville Institute are connecting with Russian groups as part of an anti-Western effort.  The people at the Rockford Institute have been in contact with all sorts of reactionary groups in Europe and been sympathetic to reactionaries in Eastern Europe, but I haven't really paid too close attention to this. I think I will need to pay more attention to it in the future.

This article in the Dec. 2014 issue of Chronicles certain shows that they are supportive of Putin and his regime in Russia.

http://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/2014/December/38/12/magazine/article/10826302/

The support for neo-Confederates by the regime in Moscow is a disturbing development and needs to be watched closely.

Neo-Confederates and the definition of the "Megastate"

I am not sure there is a definitive definition of what a megastate is. I found definitions online that said it was a large geopolitical state. I suppose that everyone would agree that Russia and China and the United States are very large states in comparison to the rest of the states.

I think others would agree that Luxembourg, Andorra and Lichtenstein are not megastates.

Evidently there is however a broad interpretation on what is a megastate by neo-Confederates.

I refer to this posting on protest by a secession movement in Yemen.

http://lsrebellion.blogspot.com/2014/12/thousands-rally-for-independence-in.html

The blog posting states:

First communism, now the megastate. Slowly but surely, the bloody legacy of 19th- and 20th-century ideology is being dismantled and discarded.

Really, Yemen is a megastate? It might be that it is merely a conflict local in nature and doesn't represent any world wide trends.

Other "megastates" at the League of the South blogs are:

Spain:

http://lsrebellion.blogspot.com/2014/11/81-of-catalans-vote-for-independence.html

Italy:

http://lsrebellion.blogspot.com/2012/10/mass-rally-in-venice-to-call-for.html

United Kingdom:

http://lsrebellion.blogspot.com/2014/08/as-scots-weigh-independence-wales-takes.html

Belgium

http://lsrebellion.blogspot.com/2010/06/separatist-party-polls-strongly-in.html

and

http://lsrebellion.blogspot.com/2009/06/watching-artificial-borders-dissolve_09.html

The second posting states:

The age of the megastate, with its internal oppression to hold it together, and its belligerent foreign policy to expand its power, is past. Good riddance.

Belgium, a megastate?

The possible break up of Belgium relates to the reason that it was a state put together by diplomacy for a variety of reasons. Again there are unique local factors driving the break up of Belgium. It doesn't represent any global trend of devolution.

Finally all these proposed nations, Scotland, Wales, Flanders, Catalonia, Venice, etc. plan as the first thing on their agenda to apply to the European Union so they can exist. I think the European Union is a developing megastate.  They are It is just trading one capitol for another. They are also counting on NATO to provide security for Western Europe.

The Scottish secessionists even hoped to continue to use the British Pound.

This fascination and discussion about secession overseas by neo-Confederates is just them trying to convince themselves and others that secession is possible in the United States.

So far secession in the United States is just people blowing off steam when they are contacted by pollsters.

It might be YOUR church in YOUR city that is hosting a neo-Confederate group

People presume that since there church or denomination has passed some resolution regarding race and racism, or has some group discussing the issues regarding race that THEIR church would never lend its facilities to a neo-Confederate group.

Don't be so sure. Some churches make all sorts of claims about being concerned over the issue of racism, but they give neo-Confederate groups the use of their facilities.

So it would do readers well to ask their church or temple leaders whether they would lend the use of their facilities to a neo-Confederate groups in general and specifically the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) or the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV).

At this time it is not known which city the UDC will meet in 2015 or what church they will use. It might be your church in your city.

For that matter the SCV is meeting in Richardson, Texas (suburb of Dallas) in 2016 and Memphis, Tennessee in 2017 and it isn't known which church they will use.

So go and ask your church leaders.

Also, don't presume the SCV wouldn't meet in a synagogue.