Secession, Slavery, and Racism: Confederates Barely Eighty Pages, Followed by an Appendix and Vs

Charles B. Dew. Apostles of Disunion: Southern Secession Commissioners and the Causes of the Civil War. Charlottesville and London: University Press of Virginia, 2001. x + 124 pp. $22.95, cloth, ISBN 978-0-8139-2036-8. Reviewed by Christopher Olsen Published on H-South (January, 2002) Secession, Slavery, and Racism: Confederates barely eighty pages, followed by an appendix and vs. Neo-Confederates only a minimum of notes, which should make it This slender volume examines the work of se‐ appealing for classroom use. The prose is clear, cession commissioners sent from the deep South jargon-free, and includes enough of the narrative to other slave states in the winter of 1860-1861. of secession that even beginning students will be The men were charged with defending secession able to follow the book. But the material is com‐ and urging fellow southerners to follow them out plex enough, and the representative documents of the Union. Charles B. Dew properly notes that well chosen, so that it should also stimulate dis‐ historians trying to uncover the emotions and mo‐ cussion among advanced readers. tives behind disunion have rarely examined the For the book's primary audience--non-aca‐ words of these commissioners. The men them‐ demics and beginning students--the author's in‐ selves are commonly ignored by historians entire‐ tent clearly is to disabuse them of the (incredibly) ly or dismissed as minor fgures. Dew has speech‐ still popular notion that secession was not about es or letters from forty-one of the ffty-two men preserving slavery and racial subordination (and who served as commissioners. They were all the southern culture based on them), but rather to slaveowning politicians, with varying experience assert some sort of abstract commitment to states' and partisan affiliations; most were natives of the rights. Academic historians, of course, have long- states to which they were appointed. This is not a since concluded that states' rights was the means, complete study of the men or all of their work, not a primary motive, for secession and war. but it is an important contribution to the litera‐ Dew's principal target is the somewhat shadowy ture on secession and a good introduction to the "Neo-Confederate" movement, including the story of these neglected figures. League of the South and the patrons of "Neo-Con‐ Dew evidently intends the book for both aca‐ federate web sites, bumper stickers, and T-shirts" demics and a more general readership. The text is (p. 10). He notes correctly that secessionists them‐ H-Net Reviews selves "talked much more openly about slavery Domingo servile insurrection, consigning her citi‐ than present-day-neo-Confederates seem willing zens to assassinations and her wives and daugh‐ to do" (p. 10). The book's frst chapter makes clear ters to pollution and violation to gratify the lust of the relevance of his discussion to recent contro‐ half-civilized Africans" (p. 54). Dew touts Hale's versies over the Confederate fag in a number of letter as the best summary of secessionist argu‐ states and Virginia's Confederate history month, ments about slavery and race--indeed, he quotes among others. The author writes with some obvi‐ the passage cited above on three separate occa‐ ous passion. A native southerner he recalls "my sions--and its full text is presented in the Appen‐ boyhood dreaming about Confederate glory," and dix. confesses that he is "still hit with a profound sad‐ Another of the book's strengths is Dew's effec‐ ness when I read over the material on which this tive juxtaposition of comments made by the same study is based" (p. 2). men before and after the war. Through the words Not surprisingly, Dew has little difficulty of Jefferson Davis, Alexander Stephens, J. L. M. demonstrating his primary thesis. The secession Curry, John Smith Preston, and others, the author commissioners repeated the same message wher‐ demonstrates that ex-Confederates created the ever they went: Lincoln and the Republicans were myth of states' rights causation when they wrote abolitionists determined to establish racial equali‐ Lost Cause memoirs. Before and during the war ty or promote amalgamation; secession and inde‐ these men framed arguments for independence pendence offered white men the only alternative and Confederate nationalism in terms of slavery to degradation and cultural destruction. The Re‐ and racism. After the defeat, however, they sang a publican threat, the men argued, was really three- different tune. Stephens, of course, delivered his fold: racial equality, race war, and racial amalga‐ famous "cornerstone" speech in March, 1861, and mation. The authors of Mississippi's "Declaration Dew presents a thorough discussion of his re‐ of Immediate Causes," for instance, claimed that marks. In his 1868 memoirs, however, Stephens the North "advocates negro equality, socially and insisted that the war "was a strife between the politically, and promotes insurrection and incen‐ principles of Federation, on the one side, and Cen‐ diarism in our midst" (p. 13). Alabama's Leroy tralism, or Consolidation, on the other." Slavery Pope Walker summarized that Republican rule "was but the question on which these antagonistic would cost southerners frst, "our property," "then principles" fnally collided (p. 16). After the war our liberties," and fnally "the sacred purity of our Preston defended the Confederacy as a noble de‐ daughters" (p. 79). fense of "true constitutional liberty," a far cry Perhaps the most effective evidence Dew of‐ from his antebellum characterization of Republi‐ fers is the coarse racism that punctuated many of can "canting, fanatics, festering in the licentious‐ the commissioners' appeals. Thoughtful and open- ness of abolition and amalgamation" (p. 75). minded readers will recognize that the preserva‐ For specialists, of course, these themes--if not tion of slavery and racial purity--of the Ku Klux specifically the material--will be very familiar. Klan variety--were founding principles of the Con‐ Many historians of the secession movement will federacy. As Stephen Hale, Alabama's commission‐ object to Dew's contention that "there is no better er to Kentucky, wrote: Republican victory was place to look [for the "secessionist mind"] than in "nothing less than an open declaration of war, for the speeches and letters of the men who served the triumph of this new theory of government de‐ their states as secession commissioners on the eve stroys the property of the South, lays waste her of the conflict" (p. 18). Furthermore, probably few fields, and inaugurates all the horrors of a San would agree that to the commissioners fell "the 2 H-Net Reviews challenge of providing such an explanation [for ton Anderson. Northerners were corrupted, he secession] -- of informing the Southern people of said, by "an infidel fanaticism" that warped men the dark forces threatening their region and driv‐ and women into believing "that we are a race in‐ ing their states to seek sanctuary outside the ferior to them in morality and civilization." Re‐ Union" (p. 24). Editors, politicians, and a host of publicans were determined to wage "a holy cru‐ other public spokesmen hammered away at the sade for our benefit in seeking the destruction of same themes throughout the 1850s and certainly that institution which...lies at the very foundation the 1860 presidential campaign; the arguments to of our social and political fabric" (p. 63). Numer‐ explain and justify secession had already received ous passages repeated the ubiquitous terms--al‐ full expression when Lincoln was elected. ways linked by southern spokesmen--of "degrada‐ Dew also does not engage the historiography; tion and dishonor." In short, Dew's work should his list of "recent" scholarship includes only two prompt readers to consider the many themes re‐ books published since 1988 (one of them a collec‐ lated to slavery that informed the secession crisis tion of essays). More frustrating for some readers and affected how southern men understood the will be the lack of attention to how "slavery" con‐ imperative dangers that Republicanism brought jured different images for different listeners. home. The inclusion of two full texts in the Ap‐ Some of the most innovative work on secession-- pendix is especially welcome in this regard. books by Lacy Ford or Stephanie McCurry, for in‐ Apostles of Disunion should, although it stance--has considered the various meanings of won't, end the discussion of whether or not the slavery within the context of southern political South's primary goal in 1861 was to defend its culture and secession. The call to protect slavery slave-based culture. The book offers all of us who from Black Republicanism was tied to the preser‐ struggle with the irrepressible myth of states' vation of regional equality and honor, personal rights devotion an effective way to force students manhood, the rights of white male property own‐ to confront the integral place of slavery and ers and husbands, and more--in short, the duties racism in the mind of the Old South and the popu‐ and privileges of white men were at stake as well lar movement for secession. as the actual future of slavery and racial superior‐ ity. None of these objections takes away from the author's primary thesis or the book's effective‐ ness. In fact, much of the material in the book may make it even more valuable as a teaching tool for advanced students. A careful reading and discussion should force them to engage the notion that many southerners understood "slavery" as more than just the institution itself and racial su‐ periority. For instance, the words of South Caroli‐ na's Leonidas W. Spratt, commissioner to Florida, related the importance of masculinity as well as slavery: "We knew that the men of the South were too instructed, and too brave, to submit to the severities of fnal subjugation" (p.

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