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A Louisiana Redeemer and a New Perspective

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A Louisiana Redeemer and a New Perspective Mary Gorton McBride, with assistance from Ann Mathison McLaurin. Randall Lee Gibson of Louisiana: Confederate General and New South Reformer. Southern Biography Series. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2007. xiii + 320 pp. $45.00, cloth, ISBN 978-0-8071-3234-0. Reviewed by Rod Andrew Published on H-CivWar (August, 2009) Commissioned by Matthew E. Mason (Brigham Young University) Mary Gorton McBride, with the research as‐ Gibson was born in 1832 to Tobias and Louisi‐ sistance of her colleague Ann Mathison McLaurin, ana Breckenridge Hart Gibson. Tobias Gibson has produced a well-researched, thoughtful study made his home in Kentucky but his fortune in of Randall Lee Gibson, a key fgure in Louisiana’s Louisiana as a sugar planter, thanks to his own Reconstruction and Redeemer periods. Despite hard work and the institution of slavery. Tobias Gibson’s influential role in postwar politics and later often confided to others that he was “in con‐ New South reform, historians have largely over‐ science opposed” to the institution (p. 25). Besides looked him. This frst full biography of Gibson is, Tobias’s discomfort with slavery, McBride shows fortunately, a balanced and sensitive one. As that the Gibson family defied several other mod‐ McBride explains, Gibson’s family origins, charis‐ ern assumptions about the southern planter class. ma, and brave Confederate service make him sus‐ For example, while thoroughly grounding her ceptible to both traditional and modern stereo‐ study in scholarship on antebellum Victorian cul‐ types of southern Redeemers--either the “roman‐ ture and the southern “honor” ethic, she illus‐ tic symbolism of the Old South Cavalier or the trates that Tobias “appealed to the inner-directed rigid imagery of the Victorian white male who concept of character” as well as the “outer-direct‐ ruled females and minorities alike with the heavy ed ethic of honor” in raising his son (p. 42). The hand of oppression” (p. 2). McBride ably avoids Gibsons valued economy, thrift, and self-discipline both nineteenth-century sentimentality and twen‐ rather than ostentatious displays of authority and ty-first century cynicism, providing a compelling aggressive assertion. Later in life, in two cases in reminder of the complexity of the Redeemers’ mo‐ which a southern gentleman might be expected to tivations “in the face of defeat, humiliation, and demand a duel with a personal enemy (General social reconstitution” (p. 2). Braxton Bragg’s slanderous charges of cowardice both during and after the Civil War, and an un‐ H-Net Reviews scrupulous political rival’s claim that the Gibsons and the respect of other officers throughout the had a mixed racial heritage), Randall Gibson ap‐ war, Gibson became an excellent brigade com‐ parently never even considered that course of ac‐ mander who probably could have performed well tion. at the next higher level of command. Randall Gibson matriculated at Yale in 1848 After the war, Gibson avoided the worst just as the sectional crisis was about to enter its symptoms of posttraumatic stress that many oth‐ most acute phase. McBride treats Gibson’s Yale ers of his generation experienced. He established years as crucial to the formation of his sectional a busy law practice in New Orleans; became a outlook for the rest of his life. He was universally charter member of the Southern Historical Soci‐ popular and admired among his northern class‐ ety dedicated to telling his, and the South’s, ver‐ mates, who seemingly accepted the southern Cav‐ sion of the war; and participated in various veter‐ alier myth and saw Gibson as a fne example of ans’ benevolent societies. He married Mary Mont‐ the best of the southern aristocracy. Even after his gomery, a woman who brought “southern roots death, Gibson’s fellow alumni from the North hon‐ and a northern fortune” to their union (p. 129). ored his memory as a “superior type of gentle‐ Mary’s father was a northern-born merchant who man,” admiring his simple manners, lack of pre‐ had made his fortune in New Orleans and New tense, and intelligence (p. 28). While at Yale, York, then abandoned New Orleans during the though, Gibson found his native section increas‐ war due to his pro-Union sympathies. ingly on the defensive, and became more self-con‐ In her coverage of the postwar period, sciously southern in his political outlook and so‐ McBride emphasizes the variety and complexity cial views. At the same time, he managed to nur‐ of Gibson’s goals and concerns, in contrast to the ture affectionate ties with his northern friends, current consensus that reestablishing white beginning a “lifelong quest for common ground” supremacy was the central, overriding project of on which he could help northerners and south‐ the Redeemer generation. McBride argues that re‐ erners reconcile contradictory interests and val‐ building “community” or “common ground” with ues (p. 26). his former enemies became “the defining chal‐ After graduation, Gibson traveled and studied lenge of Gibson’s political career” (p. 136). She de‐ in Europe, opened a law practice in Louisiana, picts Gibson as racially moderate, appealing to and acquired a sugar plantation. When the Civil certain segments of the African American elec‐ War began, he enlisted and later took command torate in New Orleans, and running unsuccessful‐ of the 13th Louisiana Volunteer Infantry Regi‐ ly for Congress on the “fusion” ticket of moderate ment. In covering Gibson’s Civil War career, Democrats and Liberal Republicans in 1872. Using McBride ably grounds her narrative in literature similar tactics in 1874 in a race against a Union on traditional military history, personalities of veteran and northern “immigrant” to Louisiana, key Confederate leaders, and the organization he was successful, aided by the violence of white and training of Civil War armies. She perceptively supremacist groups whose membership he explic‐ covers issues of unit morale in the early days of itly disavowed. During this period, Gibson became the war, as well as the inexperience of many ama‐ deeply disgusted by the corruption infesting the teur officers like Gibson. Though Gibson soon state’s politics, the arrival of which he blamed pri‐ proved to be a popular and effective officer, his marily on Republicans while conceding that it had advancement was stymied by the personal hostili‐ debauched the Democratic Party as well. As a ty and unfair treatment of his commanding gen‐ Louisiana congressman, he played a key role in eral, Bragg. Fully enjoying his men’s confidence cobbling together the Compromise of 1877. 2 H-Net Reviews McBride navigates the story of Gibson’s ca‐ trustees, Gibson skillfully guided the university reer through Louisiana’s byzantine politics in the through its frst decade of existence and em‐ postwar period and reminds readers of the fac‐ braced innovations in curricular reform and co‐ tionalism and philosophical disagreements that education, though there was never any thought of divided southern Democrats, particularly after admitting black students. McBride helpfully ob‐ Reconstruction. She explains that Louisiana serves that Gibson’s faith in education as a means Democrats were divided among three fac‐ to improve the lives of all people contradicted his tions--“Ring” politicians centered in New Orleans; acceptance of “a white supremacy that would “Bourbons” who were reactionary in their devo‐ deny full participation in society ... to those of oth‐ tion to the Lost Cause and Old South values, yet er races.... The conflict between the assimilation rejected noblesse oblige; and “Conservative and rejection of others, between the inclusive goal Democrats” or “Redeemers” who were political of education and the exclusionary intent of and fscally conservative, but moderate in their racism, was one of the most tragic contradictions social views, embracing noblesse oblige policies in 19th century American life ... [and] the great toward blacks. McBride places Gibson in the last contradiction of Gibson’s career” (p. 6). category. Her descriptions of each faction seem McBride’s biography is thoroughly re‐ weighted toward facilitating a positive portrayal searched, informative, and readable, yet it does of Gibson, though she is able to make the factional have weaknesses. The text occasionally bogs struggles comprehensible to readers; and it does down in overly extensive discussions of patron‐ seem clear that contemporaries generally ad‐ age and spoils system politics without pausing to mired Gibson’s character and integrity. provide larger context or broader explanations. McBride implicitly rejects the dichotomous The latter chapters cover, in serial fashion, fac‐ “left fork” vs. “right fork” characterization of Re‐ tional politics in Louisiana, patronage, protective deemer politicians in Washington. As a congress‐ tariffs, national party politics, the “Force Bill,” suf‐ man and U.S. senator in the years 1874-92, Gibson frage reform, the Louisiana lottery, and the Farm‐ voted with fellow southerners on reduction of tax‐ ers’ Alliance, while scarcely pausing to reflect or es on whiskey and tobacco, and with the West in summarize how the pieces ft together as part of a favor of internal improvements, such as railroads larger pattern in Gibson’s career, and even less (one of his important contributions as a states‐ how that career was affected by personal events man was the establishment of the Mississippi Riv‐ and crises in his personal life. Only in the epi‐ er Commission). Yet he generally voted with the logue, for example, do we learn that during the Northeast in favor of hard money policy and pro‐ period he was wrestling with these issues, he was tective tariffs (especially for Louisiana sugar). He a “loving but far too indulgent parent,” and of the advocated the New South agenda of progress, so‐ self-destructive behavior of his oldest son, and cial harmony, sectional reconciliation, and sup‐ that he transferred forty acres of property to one port for education while still encouraging Louisi‐ of his family’s black servants “in consideration of ana’s continued reliance on sugar, rice, and other his long & faithful service” (pp.
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