Report on 2019
S D Lee Symposium
The Stephen
Dill Lee Institute of the National Sons of Confederate Veterans held its 2019
Symposium , with the theme "Reconstruction
and the Reconstruction of Southern History". The event was held at the Birmingham Marriott
Hotel, just off Highway 280 in Birmingham.
National Commander Paul Gramling Jr. and National Lt. Commander Larry
McCluney were in attendance, as were Past National Commanders Tom Strain, Chris
Sullivan (chairman of the event), and Charles E. McMichael, guest speaker for
the evening banquet. Dragoon Historian
Sam Reid attended the event with his wife Terri; also attending was Dragoon
Tyrone Crowley.
Speakers were:
1 Charles E. "Chuck" McMichael
Past Commander McMichael began by
saying he was proud to be the son of a Confederate and is proud to consider
himself a Southern Confederate even in this day and age. His main point was that the period known as
"Reconstruction" was not reconstruction at all but "Destruction
and Reconstruction" as stated in the title of a book written in 1879 by
Confederate General Richard Taylor. Commander
McMichael went on to say that today not only our culture but Western
Civilization itself is suffering "reconstruction" under the awful
influence of the Neo-Marxist powers attempting to rule the world, who want to
get rid of our traditional culture and traditional American culture, the main
target being Christianity. Commander
McMichael recommended reading George Orwell's Animal Farm as a good description of what's going on today.
2 Tom Hiter
Reverend Doctor Tom Hiter is a
clergyman from Kentucky, with deep roots there, and wore his Episcopalian
collar as evidence of his pride in being a Christian clergyman. Reverend Hiter urged us to study and
understand better the SCV Charge, and detailed it out for us. He criticized John Dewey and other socialist
educators who, beginning in the late 19th century, socialized our school system
so as to produce generations of Americans who saw their central government as
all-powerful and their country as "indivisible". This was all accomplished with the support of
the socialistic National Education Association, founded in Philadelphia in 1857
and today the largest labor union and special-interest group in this country. He said the key words in The Charge are
"vindication of the Cause": to
defend the truth of what the Confederate soldier fought for--liberty. He ended by saying the English Civil War, the
American Revolution, and the War Between the States were all three fought to
gain and protect the liberty of free men.
3 Alabama Division Commander Carl Jones
Commander Jones began by saying
that Reconstruction actually was applied to the entire country, since the
Northern states gave up their sovereignty, by choice, in 1861 and the Southern
ones in 1865, by force; it was then that the Old Republic died. His main point was that at least two distinct
cultures entered into the Union in 1789--Northern and Southern--and that at
that time all states agreed on the principle of secession (some Northern states
considered it during the War of 1812) but Northern states were duped by Lincoln
into opposing it in 1861.
4 Walter D. "Donnie" Kennedy
Donnie Kennedy needs no
introduction, due to his and brother Ronnie's having written several books in
defense of the Cause, the most popular being The South Was Right, published back in the 1990s. If you want a synopsis and clear defense of
the various reasons The South Was Right, read that book. Compatriot Kennedy urged all present to
visit and use the website
www.MakeDixieGreatAgain.com and to join the Confederate Legion, both of which
were listed in a brochure he handed out.
You can see what's in the brochure by visiting the website.
5 Loy Mauch
Mr. Mauch stressed that we all need
to study the Founding Documents: the
Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Federalist Papers, to name
the important ones. He described how
Lincoln and Seward deceived Confederate commissioners seeking a peaceful
solution to differences between the Confederate and U. S. governments prior to
the firing on Fort Sumter. Another main
point was that Americans are not only uneducated, they are miseducated by an
educational system under the control of Neo-Marxists. He ended by stating that the Fourteenth
Amendment, never legally ratified by a sufficient number of states, destroyed
the Constitution, and that "Reconstruction" continues, 150 years
later.
6 Philip Leigh
Mr. Leigh is the author of a number of books, including Lee's Lost Dispatch and Southern
Reconstruction. Using facts from his
book on Reconstruction, Mr. Leigh offered many interesting facts and
observations, among which are Southern characteristics of clannishness and love
for their ancestors. Other interesting
facts were that it took the South a century to recover from the War and
Reconstruction, i.e. to get back to a level of wealth something like it enjoyed
in 1860, when Mississippi was the wealthiest state in the Union. He made the point that Republicans, to
maintain their hold on the United States government, had to give voting rights
to blacks, regardless of their qualifications for same, while at the same time
excluding whites, American Indians, and Asians from voting. With the end of Reconstruction in 1876,
whites regained their right to vote, but Asians and American Indians had to
wait till the 20th century to be able to vote. Mr. Leigh also made the point
that Reconstruction was aimed strictly at the South. While blacks gained the right to vote in the
South, they continued to be prohibited the vote in several Northern
states. Another interesting fact offered
was that when the Southern states rejoined the Union after the War, they had to
pay taxes to pay for pensions for Union veterans (in the 1890s 40% of the national
budget) and to pay off the debt created by the United States government during
the War. Finally, there were
discriminatory freight rates put into place during Reconstruction that lasted
until the 1930s, whereby it cost more to ship by rail in the South than in the
North.
This was another interesting and educational day, thanks to
the Stephen Dill Lee Institute. We can
all be grateful for the lessons offered by these leaders and scholars.
Submitted by D. T. Crowley, 3 February 2019
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