Gov. Bob McDonnell's proclamation of Confederate History Month for Virginia is only the latest example of right-wing southern politicians injecting Confederate imagery into current public debate. Rather than being nostalgic for the lost past, or out of touch, this is a calculated appeal to the racist, nativists elements in the constituency. It is also a message to others, including ourselves, that they are heirs to the tough, mean, unscrupulous tradition of intransigent refusal to yield to progress. They are dangerously effective opponents.
Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell has proudly proclaimed Confederate History Month. Texas governor Rick Perry talks of secession. Texas conservatives have voted to give equal Jefferson Davis equal billing to Abraham Lincoln in school textbooks. Governors of several southern states have flown the Confederate battle flag (the stars and bars) over their state capitols.
These -- and many other comments like them -- beg the question: Why do right-wing southern politicians persist in bringing the memory and imagery of the Confederacy into modern political debate?
It is tempting to dismiss these actions as out of touch, or nostalgia for the dead past, but successful politicos like McDonnell and Rick Perry are no nostalgic dreamers. They are tough, skillful politicians whose invocation of the long-dead Confederacy is a calculated political act.
My grandfather’s grandfather soldiered for the Confederacy for four years and was wounded shortly before the end of the war. I am conscious of being a descendent of a Confederate veteran.
The Civil War was an immense tragedy that brought the immense good of ending slavery and preserving the Union. It was a necessary first step in beginning the eradication of the evils of slavery and racism. The process of reconciliation has been long and painful, and is not over; public officials should promote eliminating the vestiges of racism and hatred, not revival of them. It is offensive when politicians like McDonnell use the history of that tragic period to revive old hatreds in the service of their selfish political interests.
So what are they doing? They are sending a twofold signal:
First, it is a signal to the racist, nativist, hateful elements of their right-wing constituency. In the century and a half since its demise, the Confederacy and its imagery have been used repeatedly to support of white supremacist activity and unyielding, violent resistance to racial equality; public approval Confederate imagery is a clear signal of affinity for those doctrines which should have no place in modern America.
In mainstream American politics today, overt racism is unacceptable. Use of the N-word is unacceptable. But modern political skills include saying unacceptable, offensive things with deniability, by signals rather than words. Invoking the Confederacy announces McDonnell, Perry and others like them as the heirs to the white supremacist tradition of Jefferson Davis, George Wallace, the KKK, the White Citizens Councils. Raising and invoking Confederate symbolism is a modern political tactic for making a covert, deniable appeal to racist, violent elements.
Second, it is a signal to the rest of us. By placing themselves in this tradition, McDonnell and his like also announce that they are the heirs to a political philosophy of intransigent refusal to yield. They announce themselves part of a tradition willing to use “massive resistance,” racism, the rhetoric of hate and demonization, and actual violence and intimidation. They announce themselves as as tough, mean and unscrupulous.
We would do well to understand both messages. We should be prepared for a hard-fought, vicious struggle on all progressive issues.
Right-wing groups and rhetoric today are detailed in “Wingnuts, How the Lunatic Fringe is Hijacking America,” a book by John Avlon, former speechwriter for Rudy Guiliani. His book is a history of the extremists of the right and left in recent American politics, who they are, what they say and do -- and why.
Avlon documents how violent and racist rhetoric pervades the activist right-wing movements today, and is tolerated and encouraged by Republican party leadership. The rhetoric is unchanged from the 1960s with one major exception -- the overtly racist rhetoric has gone underground. Overt racial attacks against Obama are not made by the leadership in public, but when made by others they are countenanced and excused by the leadership. Today’s right-wing is squarely within the white supremacist tradition.
Politicians like McDonnell know that white supremacy is dead. Rather, they cynically appeal to fringe elements, seeking to incite fringe activity for their own selfish purposes.
The party of Lincoln has become the party of Jefferson Davis and the white citizens’ councils. Moderate Republicans, born in the tradition of Lincoln and Eisenhower are now a small minority in the Republican Party; as the right-wing mounts more purges in the primaries, they are in danger of becoming extinct.
We must remember that bipartisanship is a two-way street. Moderate Republicans had a tradition of partisanship, accommodation and compromise. That is not the tradition of the right-wing which now controls their party.
McDonnell’s invocation of the Confederacy tells much about himself and today’s Republican Party.