​Author's note: A version of this editorial was first published in the November/December 2025 edition of the Confederate Veteran Magazine. 


For millennia, the date palm was a staple crop in Judea. (1) It served not only as food, but also medicine, shelter, and shade (it was even rumoured to be an aphrodisiac!). These massive palms, some growing to over 80 feet in height, were cultivated from the Jordan River valley, from the Sea of Galilee in the north, to the Dead Sea in the south. It was one of the main economic drivers of the region, highly prised and valuable, making it a target of the Romans in their invasion and occupation of the region. In 70 AD, when they had secured their dominance over Judea and the surrounding regions, the date tree was purposefully destroyed by the invaders to cripple the Jewish economy. By the year 500 AD the once thriving crop was almost completely decimated. Following the Roman conquest and into the Byzantine and Arab period (4th through the 14th century AD), the remnants of the great palm continued to diminish. Some trees remained here, there, and yonder, but were determined by the experts to have become completely extinct by the 19th century. The once great agricultural staple and major export crop that once dominated the region was gone—crushed to the ground, as it were, never to return; indeed, a very real lost cause.


But was it really lost? There was no reason to think otherwise at the time.


Every indicator pointed to the complete extinction of the once great palm, but then something unexpected happened. In fact, several unexpected things happened, which forever changed the seemingly tragic story of the lost Judean Date Palm.


Our story picks up at Masada—the mountain-top fortress where the final confrontation between Jewish “rebels” and the Roman empire transpired. Archaeologist Yigael Yadin, while excavating the Masada ruins in 1963 came across a cache of seeds in a clay jar that had laid dormant and undisturbed for almost 2000 years. Among the seeds were those of the Judean Date Palm. These seeds eventually made their way to a drawer at Bar-llan University in Tel Aviv where they sat untouched for another 40+ years until botanist Elaine Solowey had a crazy idea. She’d plant one and see what, if anything, would happen, especially given the age of these recovered seeds. Then it happened. After eight weeks in the soil, a small shoot sprang forth from the seed and a sapling of the date palm—a sight that had not been seen, or even thought possible to see for centuries appeared; yet there it was, a plant long lost, now found. Despite all odds and expectations, the plant was back from the “dead.”


Seeds are a potent symbol and even used by our Lord on at least two occasions—the parable of the sower and faith the size of a mustard seed. While we are not directly involved as an organisation in the spread of the gospel, I do not think it a bad thing to follow the example of the Master when seeking to fulfil our mission: to vindicate the cause of our Confederate fathers and see that the true history of the South is presented to future generations.


The Jew(s) that gathered the seeds at Masada never intended for them to be discovered by the archaeologist, they were to be planted. This intention never came to fruition because the Romans eventually breached the fortress and that remnant of the Jewish people—those resisting the occupier—decided to commit mass suicide rather than become Roman slaves. Although apparently lost, the seeds were good and remained good even after a very long period of time. Like truth, those seeds held the power to regenerate the long-lost Date Palm. The cause of self-government and the rule of law, as in the case of our Fathers, may at times appear lost and the truth inaccessible or at least so greatly suppressed by those who claim authority over us that it might as well be, yet sooner or later, when the conditions are right, like the “extinct” Judean Palm Tree, will sprout forth again.


What lessons can we derive from this most interesting account of lost and found? Like the Jewish rebels we need seed to sow. This might manifest itself in many ways. It may include learning and being able to effectively recount and (if necessary) defend our people’s history and counter any slanderous or false accusations levelled against them. You never know who might be listening or if someone other than the confronted will have the seeds of truth planted in their minds. For this reason, we should be well versed and capable of expressing ourselves eloquently, calmly, and with honour. We are representing a people whose name has been continuously trashed for over 160 years and we should be good representatives and not hot heads. It may include camp activities that take place in the public sphere, such as a booth at a gun show or flea market or participation in a parade or other community events. It may include writing letters or sending out email communications to influencers in the community or those in positions of authority. It may posting or reposting on social media so that our message is spread far and wide—giving those seeds of truth a much bigger field where they have a better chance to find fertile minds where they can take hold—maybe to sprout quickly, maybe to lay dormant for a season. The more seeds we sow, the closer we will come to changing the hearts and minds of the Southern remanent and others who value truth over empire and slavery.


The outcome is never up to us. It never is. Our duty lies in sowing as many seeds as we can as far and wide as we can. Nothing more, nothing less.


We can expect no harvest if we are unwilling to do the work. We have no idea when one finds a fertile spot at a fortuitous time. It’s a miracle that so many events aligned to resurrect the Judean Date Palm. We all know that our history and inheritance is and has been sought out and marked for destruction by our friend, the enemy, but there is always hope that a seed somewhere at sometime will make the difference between revival and extinction.


We have everything to gain and nothing to lose by our efforts. Let us make sure we cover the field of battle with the seeds of truth and trust that the invisible hand that rules the universe will help us find good soil and prepare us for the coming harvest. With His help and our commitment to the cause, all things are possible—even the impossible. Just ask the people that wrote off the “long extinct” Judean Date Palm.
​

‘Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation…’ (from Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address,” emphasis added)


AS MUCH AS LINCOLN may have wished it to be the case, no new nation was brought forth on the American continent ‘four score and seven years’ before his speech.


In 1776, thirteen English colonies, with thirteen different governing bodies (out of 20 English colonies on the continent and in the Caribbean), collectively declared the reasons why they thought it necessary to sever their ties, that is, to secede from their mother country.


They were ‘held together’ by common practical interest, nothing more. It was mutually beneficial to unite for the purposes of defence against an aggressor that meant to subjugate and deny them the rights, privileges, and representation in their own assemblies of governance to which they had come to enjoy over the course of many, many years. The colonists were not inventing something new; they were protecting something old, namely, self-government and their inherited rights as Englishmen which was being threatened by the English Parliament and allowed by the only sovereign they recognised, namely, King George III. Anyone who says that America was founded on anything other than this, an idea, or ‘proposition,’ for example, has missed the entire essence of the War for American Independence.

This was not the first time British America appealed to their king. It had been an ongoing affair, beginning (as far as I can tell) with a series of remonstrances and resolutions by individual colonies in the 1760s in response to the Sugar, Currency, and Stamp Acts,13 that eventually led to the First Continental Congress (1774), a representative body of the various colonies that gathered to determine what course of action they should take to collectively respond to these acts of usurpation by Parliament which had become intolerable to them.


Why?

Since the first English settlement at Jamestown in 1607 (no, my dear friends, it was not Plymouth, Massachusetts—that occurred in 1620), and in each successive settlement, the colonists had enjoyed, by royal charter, the same privileges and inherited rights they would have enjoyed if they had remained in the mother country:​

The first Continental Congress adopted what was then called the Continental Association or Articles of Association to collectively deal with the issues they faced. This association could hardly be said to be the preamble to the creation of a nation, although Lincoln certainly thought so, as evidenced in his first inaugural address. While it is outside of the scope of this work to enumerate their grievances and responses taken up by the First Continental Congress, it is interesting to note that their adoption of the ‘non-importation, non-consumption, non-exportation’ of British goods—what we would call a boycott—opened with a pledge of loyalty to the King.


I’m not trying to belabour the point (or am I?), but this was a mere association of loyal subjects, each representing the interest of their own communities, attempting to persuade the King to secure their collective rights which each colony had enjoyed under their separate and distinct Royal Colonial Charters and the English Constitution. They figured collective bargaining had a better chance of success and went with it. There is nothing revolutionary about this. The King wasn’t following the laws and they wanted to persuade him to do so.


By the time the Congress of Colonies (AKA, the Second Continental Congress) met again in May of 1775, the cold war of words had become a hot war of men and arms—the Battles of Lexington and Concord—along with other violent altercations of various sizes—having already soiled the ground with blood. Still, even when independence seemed, and indeed turned out to be, the only way forward, the Congress still sought a peaceful resolution to the strife as evidenced by the Olive Branch Petition of July 8, 1775.


These are not the acts of men trying to establish a ‘new nation.’ Even The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America—what is now referred to as simply ‘The Declaration of Independence’ (for some reason)—does not hint at any desire or intention to create a new nation, only—given the ongoing outrages by King and Parliament, which were enumerated in detail in the document itself—that ‘these United Colonies [plural] are, and of Right, ought to be Free and Independent States [plural],’ together with all the powers associated therewith. By declaring themselves to be States they were not saying they were like Mississippi, Vermont, or North Carolina in the way that we have come to ‘use’ the word ‘State,’ but more like, France, Germany, and even Great Britian.



[Let that sink in for a moment… It’s important to understand how they saw themselves.]

As we all know, this collective bargaining did not work. In fact, things got worse as time progressed.


Can the United States be one thing—a nation born in 1776—if the document to which Lincoln refers in his Address as the document that marks the birth of his imaginary nation says in its very title that there are Thirteen united States of America?

This question, of course, is rhetorical.

The meaning and implication should be plain to any honest mind even slightly familiar with this time period and the documents and actions (either by individual colonies, or collectively in the colonial/ continental congresses) which preceded this joint declaration to the world which explains and justifies their act of secession from their mother country.

​I make no claim here to have given a comprehensive account of the events leading to the joint Declaration of Independence of July 4, 1776, to which Lincoln points to as the birth of his imaginary nation, only enough to show that there was no intention of creating a nation, nor did there exist any American Nation in 1776.

As I have already shown, there was no formal agreement binding those 13 colonies together in 1776. It may be characterised—at best—as a loosely constructed alliance between interested parties. It was The Articles of Confederation and perpetual Union between the States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts-bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia of 1777—the first American Constitution—which did formalise the nature of their association—but would not be ratified by all of the participating colonies, now independent States, until 1781. But since that document expressly declared that each State retained (not gained) its ‘sovereignty, freedom, and independence,’ one would be hard-pressed to call this voluntary union of States a ‘nation.’


Just as there was no nation in 1776, there was no nation created by the First American Constitution, AKA, The Articles of Confederation, when fully ratified by the several States in 1781.


Sadly, the Articles of Confederation—the document birthed in the American War for Independence—is all but lost to American consciousness. If one were only exposed to a college level survey of American History, they would come away believing that there was a Declaration of Independence, followed by a ‘revolutionary’ war, and concluded by the quick adoption and ratification of what is commonly referred to as the U.S. Constitution.

The Articles, if mentioned at all, are usually portrayed as a weak and unworkable document that brighter minds had the good sense to toss on the garbage heap to create a ‘more perfect union.’

But was it?

The Articles of Confederation was the Constitution of the 13 United States. It was the terms on which and with which the former colonies would associate and cooperate with one another as a collection or union of States (think countries) and to which every State, in their sovereign capacity freely ratified. The word ‘united’ is lower case throughout the Articles because it was a descriptive term, not a title as such, except in Article I.


This was a fact that no one at the time disputed—a fact that was still understood by most Americans, even after the adoption of the Second Constitution of 1787.

This was not a myth dreamed up by States’ Rights ‘schemers’ like John C. Calhoun to protect ‘the slave power’ as many of us were taught and a majority of us—with scant exception—have come to believe. It was a well-known, commonly accepted, and well documented fact: the States made the union; the union was a creature of the States, and as such, the union was not sovereign in and of itself. It was established for specific and enumerated purposes on behalf of the States and only those purposes. That’s it!


The Articles provided 1 vote to every State, and it took a unanimous vote to amend it, not a mere majority or super majority, it took ALL OF THEM as co-equal members of a community of sovereign States—what they called a ‘league of friendship’ which was to be perpetual.

States Rights were not, in the parlance of our betters, some form of neo-Confederate revisionism, they were (and still are) the foundation, indeed the bedrock, on which the Union—in whatever form it took, whether under the First American Constitution or the Second American Constitution—squarely and solidly rests.

There is no ‘compact theory,’ that stands in contradistinction to the ‘nationalist theory,’ both of which may be said to be equally plausible. The nature of both governing documents were as compacts between sovereign societies (referred to as States). Anyone who defends the ‘nationalist theory’ has to go around their ass to get to their elbow to spin it in any other way.

This false rendering of plain history and documented facts could only be rendered ‘true’ (politically true, or ‘politically correct’) by bullets, bombs, and bayonets, that is, total war as well as by the skillful silencing of dissenting voices wherever they could be reached so that only one version of American history—the nationalist version—would be left.


This was done by Lincoln and the Republican Party with the hope, one assumes, that what really happened could be driven from the collective memory after a sufficient amount of time and conditioning. Can I prove that this was Lincoln’s actual intention? No. But I can make the argument that he was less than honest (i.e., a liar) and knew that his telling of the birth of the American nation had nothing to do with reality.

Perhaps he thought the Union of 1787 should have been a national and not a federal style of government, but that was not the kind of government with which he was participating as president—poorly, I might add.

​The consequence of all this, in our own time, is the inability of otherwise normal and rational thinking people to see what is right in front of them—that there was no nation and that there is no nation—at least not one legally established and freely chosen by the people of the several States as had been done under both Constitutions.

The Constitution for the United States—better described as the Second American Constitution for our purposes—which terminated the constitutional compact created by the Articles of Confederation—would not go into effect until the summer of 1788 (a dozen years from 1776), when 11 of the 13 States ratified it and made the document binding, but only on those States so ratifying.


If this created a nation—one and indivisible—as we are told ad nauseum through post-bellum nationalist history books, the so-called pledge of allegiance, and other means of perpetuating the ‘Proposition Nation’ myth, the sovereign States that pre-existed this new political arrangement were ignorant of this crucial detail and would not have ratified it if they thought that it did.


The creation of these documents is a curious one and the differences between the two American constitutions are striking (See Appendix C).

The gathering was billed as a convention to remedy the alleged defects of the Articles of Confederation, indeed, the credentials of each delegate representing their particular State only provided the authority to propose amendments to the existing constitution, NOT to create a new one.

Here are a few examples, including some smaller fragments so as to establish this was not an isolated position, but one universally held amongst and between the States of the Federated Union:

The fact that The Articles of Confederation WAS THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION (and was referred to as such) when some of the delegates trotted off to Philadelphia to do away with it.


This fact may just be an important detail in the understanding of how things actually happened.

I have not had one person so far accurately answer the following question: How many constitutions has the United States had since the American War for Independence?

‘One,’ is the only answer I have gotten so far—and not from people off the streets, but many well-informed people of my acquaintance!

Up until my research for this book, I would have answered the same!

Surprise! There are two!

This should be common knowledge, but it is not.

Why isn’t it?

Why didn’t I know that there was a constitution preceding the only constitution I ever knew to exist?

Why are the Articles referred to as an ‘agreement,’ ‘governing document,’ or some equally descriptive term that obfuscates The Articles’ true character in the relevant literature?

The people and their representative bodies called the Articles the ‘Federal Constitution,’ or ‘Federated Constitution’—why not use that?

Has no one in academia—or elsewhere—picked-up a primary source document or is something else at play?

It’s unbelievable, I know, but we really need to get back on track.

Sorry for the rant.

Let’s continue, shall we?​

The new constitution was hotly debated in many States and a few passed it by rather thin margins—some only with the assurance that a ‘Bill of Rights’ would be added to the document upon the first gathering of the new government.


Why?

Were they afraid that their States would infringe on their personal ‘rights’?

Uh, hell no!

They already had these rights, and these rights were protected by tradition and their own constitutions.

Rather, knowing that to ‘give an inch’ is to risk ‘losing a yard’ (or more), they wanted to bind the new government down and forbid them from meddling in the fundamental rights they fought to preserve in their war for independence.

The keystone of the Bill of Rights—the one that made all the other amendments and the constitution itself a document that provided only for enumerated and expressly delegated powers was the 10th amendment which explicitly and unequivocally states that

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Next time someone says that they have some constitutional right or other, tell them that the Constitution of 1787, as ratified, HAD NO AMENDMENTS or BILL OF RIGHTS. There is no such a thing as a First Amendment Right to Free Speech, for example. The first amendment was added to keep CONGRESS away from censorship or other means of suppressing language (and certainly not to enforce it or define it). If you read through the Articles and other documents mentioned herein, you will be better able to understand who these people were and what they did (or did not) agree to. If you have a right, dear reader, it didn’t come from an amendment to that constitution.

I know this is shocking, given the way we talk of various kinds of rights said to derive their legitimacy because a constitution was amended. (God, help us!)

Those opposed to the ratification of this new constitution were largely responsible for insuring the adoption and passage of the Bill of Rights. These patriots were called ‘Anti-Federalist’ by the Federalists (although they were, in fact, the real federalists and called themselves ‘republicans’).

These amendments were added as an assurance that the Federal Government would have nothing whatsoever to say about the establishment of religion, exercise of free speech, freedom of the press, the right to bear arms, etc. It was taken, explicitly taken, entirely from their jurisdiction. Every single last one of them. That was the whole point of putting them there!

Those were, and legally remain, in the hands of the States and the States alone regardless of what the Oracles on the ‘Supreme’ court in the District of Criminals (DC) might happen to divine from their reading of the tea leaves or the Ouija board they keep on hand for interpreting ‘Constitutional Law’ (which everyone knows is rooted in case law, partisan politics, and a lot of b.s. they just made-up on the fly, depending on who was in power and which way the wind was blowing).

Like most of American history and jurisprudence, things are the mirror opposite of what they appear and purport to be.

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

Regardless, it can be said without equivocation and with ample documentary evidence—from the journals of the participants of the ‘Constitutional Convention’ in 1787, to the printed defences of or opposition to the document, to the actual ratification debates in the several States—that the States acceded to a Federal and not a national model of government. Even James Madison, the ‘father’ of THE constitution, makes this clear in the popular, but in most cases irrelevant, collection of essays called The Federalist.

Maybe that’s not what some of the ‘framers’ wanted, but that’s what the people approved through their representatives in the State conventions—the only place legitimacy resides in a federated republic of republics.


Of course, none of the States were obliged to ratify the new constitution and could have rejected it had they wanted to, but as it turned out—for better or for worse—they did, although some States took longer to do so than others.

They were most certainly not part of a nation dedicated to a proposition created in 1776 (or any other date) and from which there was no escape—never ever—regardless of the reason.

Who would sign up, dear reader, for such a horror without a gun in their mouth or bayonet at their breast?

Even a Marital union—which is perpetual by its very nature (i.e., a lifetime commitment based on a series of vows or promises)—ceases to be perpetual in the case of abuse, abandonment, or infidelity. What some folks are now calling—a ‘national divorce’—was certainly appropriate (and legal) in the 1860s and may even be more desirable and justifiable today.

The USS Titanic is sinking, and no one has even considered the 50 lifeboats currently available—but in poor shape after decades and decades of neglect and abuse—to break free. I can think of no reason to go down with the ship if there is an alternative way forward.

Given the foregoing, we are led to the obvious and irrefutable conclusion (and this is the point of all that mess above) that since there was no nation in 1776, 1781 or 1788, there was no ‘nation’ when Lincoln’s speech was delivered in 1863 (or today, for that matter, at least not legally).


There certainly had been a voluntary union of States created by the Second American Constitution, but by 1861 this political arrangement—like the union created by the Articles of Confederation (which explicitly states that it was ‘perpetual’)--had been terminated by the solemn conventions of no less than eleven sovereign States in the South—some of these conventions were illegally broken-up by the ‘national authority.’

The only thing that had occurred ‘four score and seven years’ before Lincoln’s address was that thirteen independent political societies formally and publicly declared their reasons for seceding from a government that they viewed as hostile to their inherited way of life and traditionally recognised rights.

Nothing more.

The story told by Lincoln regarding ‘the birth of a nation’ was false then and it is false now.

I know some of you are trying to find a way around this, but ask yourself why you are compelled to do so.

Just take a deep breath and let’s do some more exploring… There’s nothing to lose other than a false understanding of historical events which can only make things worse (as more falsehoods are piled on this particular falsehood).

Sorry! One more thing:​

In case you are tempted to say that maybe the 13 original States that ratified the Constitution, thereby creating a new federal government, might have a case for pursuing a form of government outside the old Union, but the newer States (14-50), as a creation of Congress, certainly do/did not… Let me stop you there!


Congress did not and does not now have the authority to create a State; they can only admit an existing State into the Union.

States are created by the sovereign act of the people in a given territory by the adoption of a constitution. Once they apply for and receive admittance into the American Union, the State or States so applying are on ‘an equal footing with all the original States in every respect whatsoever…’

Every reserved right belonging to the original thirteen States in ratification of the Second American Constitution is theirs as well—no exceptions given.

If they are on an equal footing with all the original States and if any of those States reserved the right to leave the union in their ratification document upon adopting the Second American Constitution (such as was explicitly done by Virginia, New York, and Rhode Island), they have, by implication, that same reserved right.


Senator John C. Calhoun of South Carolina explains the principles at work here:

The original 13, and newer States, such as Michigan, are under the authority of the general government in only certain enumerated cases, because the people of the States, through their representatives and by their own authority, chose to be.



In what way did this choice suggest that they gave up the right to voluntarily leave the Union if they perceived it to be a threat to their liberties and reserved rights?

They didn’t.

They didn’t have to.

The original 13 States (each new State being on equal footing with them) were the ones who voluntarily made the Federal Union and, thus, could reverse or rescind their membership with the very same authority. The States made the Federal Government, the Federal Government did not make the States.

The confusion about the nature of the States and their relationship to the federal government came about when unscrupulous people, like Abraham Lincoln (and others), argued that these United States had a national form of government (which is total b.s., as we have seen), although we have been forced to live in this world of falsehood where it is difficult, if not impossible in many cases, to mentally escape.


Over one hundred and fifty years of myth making has made most of us unwilling (including myself for a long time) to take a second look at this deal which does not seem to be beneficial to anyone unconnected with Washington and/or those who do its bidding.

Perhaps too much is at stake.

Perhaps we are too comfortable.

Maybe we don’t want to say anything about the way we are being treated.

Maybe we are scared.

All I know is this: there was a time in this country when there was a people that said, ‘ENOUGH!’ and every time the usual suspects (left and right) removes or allows to be removed, a Confederate flag, plaque, monument, or some other reminder of the true constitutionalist who valiantly and bravely stood against the anti-constitutional usurpers in Washington, the harder it will be to set the record straight. These were the same States that created or voluntarily joined the Union whether under the First and/or Second American Constitution.

Who had the authority to tell them that they couldn’t leave?

There is no such authority.

The creature cannot command the creator—even if they think that they can or should. Their existence depends 100% on the actions taken by the States comprising the Union.

You may disagree with the Southern States’ reasons for leaving.

You may think that they would have been safer and happier in the old Union if they ‘got with the programme.’

You may even think their reasons for withdrawing their membership from that union were wrong, immoral, or even repulsive, but that call is not yours and it wasn’t Lincoln’s either.

That determination belongs to the people of the States acting in their sovereign capacity ALONE, just as it was with the Articles of Confederation, the Constitution of 1787, and the termination of association between the Union known as the United States and most of the Southern States. Each State acting on their own volition manifested through a solemn convention of the people—the only way this kind of thing can be done.

Maybe it doesn’t matter, after all these years, that we have been living a lie. I mean, what are they (the usurpers) going to do? Spy on us? Devalue the currency through spending money they don’t have? Rule that a marriage is something other than what it is? Send their subjects to die in foreign lands for the business interests of our overlords and their friends around the world? Start wars without declaration? Stop a legitimate candidate running for president by tying him up in the courts? Allowing untold millions of criminal invaders to cross our borders without impunity and paying them to stay? Cheering on thugs as they burn down cities? (I could do this all day, but let this suffice for the time being.)

Naw! They’d never do that!

I’m pretty damn sure it matters and ‘things’ can never be properly addressed, much less fixed unless we face what brought us to this horror.​

From the beginning of my brief tenure [as SCV Chief of Heritage Operations, 2024-2026] I have tried to focus on the fact that the Confederate soldier, whose name we are to protect and whose cause we are to vindicate were and are family members. The word “Sons” in our organisation's name means something. It does not mean the offspring of a ancient “birthing parent” or progeny of persons who “identify” as one of the many genders our betters invented out of thin air. We have real fathers and mothers, real brothers and sisters, and real sons and daughters for generations untold. Our families predate both the War for American Independence and the War for Southern Independence, although those generations have a special place in our hearts. Being sons of Confederate veterans is not how we “identify,” it is who we are—not in some abstract neo-Marxist fantasy, but in flesh and blood reality.

Confederates, each and every one of them, was someone from somewhere and knew who they were, where they came from, and what they were doing. That knowledge was their superpower. I have no other explanation for their four year struggle against such overwhelming odds. We need that superpower if we are going to weather the storms that are gathering about us. Knowing who we are, where we come from, and what we are doing gives us roots—the deeper the roots, the more stability. Lose the roots and people sooner or later fall for the falsehoods regarding America in general and the South in particular. Our “betters” want our roots torn from the ground. Why else attack reminders of our dead? They know that we cannot be controlled easily if we know our history.


It appears that far too many Americans have forgotten, and the South is not far behind. Our colonial fathers did not forget their roots when the British Parliament began testing their resolve which eventually evolved into the first war for American Independence. The sons of those veterans of the heroes of the so-called “revolution,” at least in the South, were Confederates. Davis and Lee, for example, were both sons of patriots who fought for American independence. Confederates, like their fathers, would not simply submit to an all-powerful, top-down government which was the exact opposite of the federal union of sovereign States established by the consent of the people of the States openly and honestly.

In this clown world, Southerners are punished for being Southern in the South. The issues in Virginia being the latest of a long train of abuses. To “those people” we have always been and will always be “less than,” or in the words of Dr. Clyde Wilson, “America’s redheaded stepchild.”

Unlike many of our people today, our fathers who participated in both wars for independence knew their inherited rights, how they came about, and paid a great price in blood and treasure to defend them. They had no intention to sign-on voluntarily to some new arrangement that was (to paraphrase the Declaration) foreign to their constitutions, and unacknowledged by their laws without serious resistance.

In the case of the colonist, it was the abuse of power by the King, but more especially the parliament who were in their estimation a foreign governing body in which they were not represented and to whom they never gave their allegiance.

For the Confederates, it was the election of a man who they believe (and believed correctly) would use the reins of government to trample the terms of the constitutional compact to which their fathers gave consent. It is a bitter pill to swallow, but the South was the defender of the Constitution as ratified, not the Lincoln regime. They were not interested in a revolution designed to destroy the Federal Union and out of its ruins create a centralized regime—one and indivisible—as Lincoln and the Republicans did. This form of government was rejected by the union of States when they adopted the Articles of Confederation in 1781 and then the Constitution of 1787.

We are not, nor have we ever been a nation—at least a legal one. We were, however, made one by force if that counts.

In the case regarding the two wars for independence, the participants were not fighting for some new form of government. No sir. They fought to preserve the rights and privileges as well as the burdens and benefits of self-government—something they had long enjoyed before and after British America’s separation from the mother country.

Our Confederate forefathers saw the consolidation of the American States in a similar fashion, but they remembered. They knew what they were and where they came from and had no intention of allowing the creation of a consolidated governing apparatus without firm and principled opposition. Such a government went against everything they agreed to when signing on to the aforementioned compacts.

We have the original documents, easily available, that tell the truth about what the States were (and still are—legally speaking), what they agreed to and what they emphatically did not.

Those who remember will see the fraud for what it is. Those who forget will fall prey to it. It’s just that simple.

“Those people” want us to forget. They need us to forget. They have been trying to strip us of what is left of our traditional and cultural institutions and “Constitutionally protected” rights for over a century and a half. I can’t help but believe that these people are in the process of creating a new kind of government, a government, once again, foreign to our constitutions (both State and federal), and unacknowledged by our laws. They call it progress. I call it usurpation.

We are not engaged in an academic exercise or an argument where there are winners and losers, ours is the history of a real people—human beings that existed just as truly and fully as we do today—that are still constantly demonized and persecuted, even as they lay in their graves.

This is not coming from people who know, but people who don’t. This does not come from people with roots, but from people who lack them. Their hatred for our Confederate fathers is not because they were guilty of some great evil. Rather, it is an attempt to make us forget our forebearers who knew how to say “NO!” when their hard won independence was threatened from within.

I don’t care (and neither should you) what governments, media outlets, mobs on social media, or (even worse) “experts” who cannot tell the truth and keep their jobs think or say about our Confederate fathers. They are on a shaky foundation based on blatant falsehoods which cannot maintain their position forever. The truth, sooner or later, always surfaces. That could ruin their plans for us. Hence, remove the reminders, the markers, and the monuments.

We should do all in our power to help Americans, but especially Southerners, remember who they are. Help them remember where they came from, and why it matters. I once heard it put this way: “If they know, we will grow.” This includes not only growth as an organization, but as a true counterweight to the enemies of the Constitution as ratified by the people of the several States, and defend it against all enemies both foreign and domestic.

The stakes are high, compatriots. Higher than most of us can currently imagine. We must, therefore, remember and see that future generations have the ability to do the same.  

Consider this: In order for you to have been born, even if we only go back 12 generations (an arbitrary cut-off), it required 4,094 people: parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, great-great-grandparents, and so forth and so on. There are legions of people with legions of stories of love, joy, pain, deprivation, passion, sorrows, triumph, and tragedy—in short, real lives of real people whose real actions, brought about your very existence.


That we are here at all is a miracle.

That we are descended from Confederate soldiers in this march of the generations, along with those who came before and those that came after, provides us with a rare insight into our place in the historical drama played out during our sojourn in the Americas.

We are not rootless people. We may not be able to easily go back 12 generations, but we can understand that one’s identity—even if someone picks up another to replace it, which is mere self-deceit—is determined by our forefathers (and mothers) and the choices that they made for the sake of their children and their children’s children, as their own father’s and mother’s had done before them. Reflecting on this reality gives us a sense of being someone from somewhere—more than a mere individual sloshing about in a sea of other individuals. We came from somewhere and are keenly aware of it—unlike the rootless, present-tense, modern man who has been robbed of his identity and seems to be proud of it!

It is because he has no identity, no context, no people, that modern man is easily swayed by every strange doctrine or ideology that seems to give his life some kind of purpose. Among these purposes over the last 150+ years has been for the rootless man to make us like him. Equally miserable, equally lost, equally fettered to the foolish notion that it is the individual acting out his “own truth,” free from the forces of history. This poor soul, bless him, cannot understand why we will not give up the “tyranny of history” and “bitterly cling” to the traditions, folk-ways, religion, manners, values, principles, and so forth, of the past. Things that make us a recognisable people, all those things that make each of us somebody, from somewhere, with a story to tell—the story of his people.

We, on the other hand, know that the truth of history—who we are and where we came from—liberates us and does not bind. We are a people with a shared history and we are not interested in any of their new ideas that have brought about this clownish world where everyone makes-up their own identity, freeing themselves from the evils of the past by throwing their people under the proverbial bus.

We Southerners are not having it, but have, nevertheless been overwhelmed by the seemingly endless attacks on our patrimony. This began with flags and plaques honouring the bravery and sacrifice of our Confederate fathers, then moving their sights to monuments, and even disinterring the dead. What kind of barbarians are we dealing with?

Our duty to defend the good name of the Confederate soldier, vindicate the cause for which they fought, and to make sure that the true history of the South is transmitted to future generations is not the same thing as winning lawsuits and opposing the removal of flags, monuments, etc. It is bigger than that. In fact, I am quite confident that our ancestors did not erect those monuments so that we would have to spend our time and resources begging courts to not remove the memorials to our valiant dead. They would not have scraped and bowed before the Yankee empire and their enablers at every level of government. They did not confuse the symbol for the thing symbolized. They erected these monuments so that their generation would not be forgotten. To remind us of who we are and where we came from; to remind us of those that gave their all for us so we—their offspring—would not have to live under the boot of an all-powerful “federal” government that through arms and then through their courts (and perhaps at some later date by arms again) make heroes into villains and villains into saints.


While we may not be able to accomplish much in the arena of politics to stop the destruction of our monuments in many, far too many cases, we can still do much to fulfill the charge by becoming living monuments. Living reminders of our Confederate ancestors, what they stood for, and what we stand for today as their sons.

While our fathers did their best to reconcile with the new indivisible nation (not the federated union of their fathers), and be “good, patriotic Americans,” it was not enough to satisfy their desire for our ultimate annihilation. No matter how much Southern blood was shed and will be shed in their endless wars of conquest and occupation, they felt it proper to rename military bases that once honoured our fathers. In the name of reconciliation with people who know little about themselves and even less about us, they thought it proper, indeed a moral act, to remove the reconciliation monument from Arlington cemetery—the largest military cemetery in America and conveniently established, as you know, on the stolen property of Mr. & Mrs. Robert E. Lee.


If the former Confederate or Southern States are no longer welcomed, indeed, are so repulsive to the country that they have no qualms with removing a reconciliation monument which held the peace for generations, what are we?

I don’t know who they think we are, but I’m pretty damn sure that if they rename every road or school with Confederate links, take down every one of our fathers’ flags, remove every monument so lovingly erected by our women (primarily) in the poverty of the post-war South, and even dig-up every Confederate soldier so as to not “pollute” their military cemeteries, we will not have lost that which is most important, our Southern identity and deep, deep roots of our family tree, lovingly planted in the fertile soil of the South. This cannot be taken and will not be taken, except by our own consent. We can carry on their legacy of their love of liberty, fidelity to kith and kin, the value of one’s word, and our manners, to name only a few.

We can shoulder this, we must shoulder this, if we are to be a living monument—more numerous and effective than any carved in stone or cast in bronze—by taking back what was stolen and is being stolen from us now.

It is time to think outside of the box, utilize new methods of engagement, and take the moral high ground by living honourably and caring for those permanent things of value encapsulated in our monuments, flags, and memorials. Then and only then will we occupy the moral high ground and position ourselves for victory.

​We ought to continue to erect our own monuments and raise our own flags, but imagine the effect of tens of thousands of living monuments rising up from their couches, their TVs and especially their smartphones and begin living like the men we can and must be—openly, honestly, and unashamed.

It seemed like just another day at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse, for the vice chancellor of student affairs, Paula Knudson, until the phone calls, student visitors, and official “hate and bias” reports began to pour in.

A truck—a semi-tractor trailer truck to be exact—had somehow breached the invisible line that marked the school’s safe space and, without any apparent consideration for the students’ feelings, was right there on the construction site at the student centre with a Confederate flag grill cover.

Shock waves spread as iPhones, Androids, and other electronic devises lit-up across campus warning fellow students of the hateful display.

After receiving the message loud and clear, “this is hurtful,” the Vice Chancellor called for action. Executive Director of Facilities Douglas Pearson was quickly dispatched to the construction site to get to the bottom of this blatant disregard for the emotional well-being of the school’s young scholars. Pearson spoke with the site supervisor, who in turn spoke to the truck driver, who in turn moved his truck “without complaint.”

Among those who were affected by the offending truck was physics senior Matthew Dreis, who saw the flag on his way to class that morning.

“That’s very inappropriate,” Dreis said. “I think we have problems with institutionalized racism at our school and when we see it at the construction site of the physical building where students are getting their education it solidifies that there’s a problem with our campus atmosphere.”

It apparently never occurred to the future physicist that the truck had nothing to do with the school or, perhaps, that the trucker didn’t view the flag in such terms. In fact, no thought seems to have been made of the trucker by anyone at the university—how he was affected by their hostility, in-hospitality, and general lack of good manners.

In an email sent to students later that afternoon, the Vice Chancellor apologized for “the fear and angst caused by (the flag’s) presence.” She further assured the shaken students that the flag-bespangled truck had been removed from campus.
 
* * *

A “furious storm of confusion” rained down on the Indiana University campus at Bloomington when a TWEET went out on what was otherwise an unremarkable spring evening. A man in white robes had been spotted—it appeared that a Klansman was on campus … and he was carrying a whip!

“iu students be careful,” reported one tweet, “there’s someone walking around in kkk gear with a whip.”

It took less than one minute for a concerned student to re-tweet the disturbing news to the entire campus:

“there’s a man walking around campus in a KKK hood carrying a whip and there’s NOTHING you can do to make the students feel safe?”

Ethan Gill, being mindful of his responsibility as a resident assistant, sent out a Facebook post to the young scholars for whom he was responsible.  He was cautious, citing the First Amendment rights of Klansmen, but urged vigilance:

“…Please PLEASE PLEASE”—pleaded young Mr. Gill—“be careful out there tonight, always be with someone and if you have no dire reason to be out of the building, I would recommend staying indoors if you’re alone. If you feel unsafe, please contact me…”

The feeling of safety was dwindling quickly, and panic had begun to take hold …
In an unrelated event on the campus of Bowling Green State University in Ohio, there was another Klan sighting reported. Unlike the sighting at Indiana University the hooded miscreant — or miscreants — were not simply roaming the grounds, they were inside—apparently having a “Klan Rally” in one of the university’s laboratories.

The student who happened upon the rally quickly took some video and sent it out via Twitter, taking special aim at University President Mary Ellen Mazey:
“There’s been an ACTIVE KKK group in Bowling Green, OH since 1922. [President Mazy] soo, how does this promote diversity &a (sic) inclusion??”

President Mazey, sensing the urgency of the matter, quickly dispatched a university contingency to the scene. After a thorough investigation, the case was cracked.

Exercising a restraint that I would have found most difficult, if not impossible; the president issued a response via her own tweet:

“Thanks for sharing … We looked into this. We discovered it’s a cover on a piece of lab equipment…”

Alas, no Klansmen on campus … just some lab equipment, some protective covering, and a little student hysteria.

THE CONFEDERAPHOBE, unlike other people who suffer from phobias, does not view his thoughts, actions, and/or behaviour as being abnormal.

People with arachnophobia, for example, certainly hate and fear spiders, but they do not blame the spider for their malady. They know the phobia is the problem; that they, and not spiders or people who like (or at least tolerate) spiders, are “out of whack.” It is for this reason they often seek treatment and not the genocide of spiders.

Imagine if they did blame spiders, advocated for the extermination of spiders, and were able to lobby public and private institutions or agitate in other ways to forward some kind of anti-spider agenda.

The very thought is silly… and absurd!

Unlike people people suffering from Confederaphobia, those suffering from this mental illness do not see their reaction to spiders as virtuous, but rather for what it is, namely, an irrational fear that can and should be overcome so that a normal, happy, and productive life can be pursued.

If successful, the arachnophobe can learn to manage his fears and find a way to live in a world where spiders exist. This will probably not include the adoption of a pet spider, or spending time watching spider documentaries on the National Geographic Channel, but he can certainly work towards finding a way to function and get along with the world as it is—spiders and all!

Confederaphobes could, if they choose to, learn to live in a world with self-identified Southerners and the traditional symbols, imagery, songs, etc., that they love. They could even learn to be friends with them. This cannot happen, however, if he fails to see that the problem is in his perception and not the persons or objects of offense that torment him. ​​

​SYMBOLS ARE UNIQUE. They point beyond themselves to something else. Of what that “something else” consists is a matter of interpretation.

A symbol’s meaning cannot be fixed by definition; it must be interpreted.

If it could be objectively defined, it would cease to be a symbol and become a sign.

A red octagon with the words “STOP” at an intersection is not open to interpretation, neither is it a matter of opinion. It is also not a product of one’s individual or collective experience. It means STOP. You may not want to stop. You may not like stopping. You may even choose not to stop, but you know what the sign means—not just you, but all drivers. It’s a sign.

The Confederate Battle Flag, Confederate monuments, and/or other Southern cultural expressions all can certainly be interpreted as symbols of hate … but so what? Such is the nature of symbols.

The question is not whether the same symbol can mean different things to different people—experience clearly shows that it both can and does—but whether one group should be able to dictate and fix the meaning of a symbol.

The problem, you see, is not the symbol—the “thing” itself—the problem is in the mind of the thinker. The object hasn’t the ability to offend, it merely exists. What one brings to the symbol determines how one interprets it; how it affects them. One has to be taught to interpret.

We bring the meaning to the symbol, alone it is nothing but an inanimate object.
One would not normally go to a rabbi, imam, or atheist to understand Christianity or Christian symbols. They certainly have opinions and beliefs, indeed, unique perspectives, about the Christian faith, but they are looking at it from the outside.

For them Christianity is not a living reality, but a topic of study. (This is an essential difference!)

Likewise, one might not get the best interpretation of the institution of marriage by visiting a women’s shelter. You will certainly lean about a certain kind of marriage and the awful effects it can have in people’s lives, but these are exceptional cases. Certainly not marriage as is it is for most people, or marriage as it is intended to be.

There are bad Christians. There are bad marriages. There are bad people, including Southern ones.

This reality is not universal reality, these are particular circumstances.

Southern symbols mean to the Southerner exactly what they say that they do.

​This does not mean that there cannot be alternative points of view, but rather that these explanations do not, cannot speak for those people for whom Southern identity is a living reality.

Those outside the fold are free to think and believe whatever they like but let us not pretend that their interpretation can be imposed upon the culture from which these symbols spring and the people they represent. Their views may be interesting, and in some cases informative, but they are not authoritative.
They are our symbols and let us not forget that. 

Being a self-identified Southerner, ladies and gentlemen, is not the problem. Being who and what you are is not the problem. The Confederate Battle Flag is not the problem. Southern people, places, or things currently being targeted and demonized are not the problem.
​
You, dear Southern man or woman, are not the problem.

The problem is one thing and one thing only: CONFEDERAPHOBIA!

Confederaphobes create divisiveness and discontent.

Confederaphobes persecute and harass.

Confederaphobes are the ones imposing their views.

Confederaphobes are the ones who hate.

Confederaphobes are the ones who fear that which they do not understand.

Extract Confederaphobia from the social equation and Confederate displays cease to be “controversial” or “divisive” and people can go on with their lives!

Unlike the Confederaphobe, self-identified Southerners have no interest in cultural genocide.

We are content to let the Confederaphobes live their lives as they see fit.

We just don’t want to be a part of it.

* * *

Why does it matter, some folks may ask? Why all the fuss over the dead?

Isn’t it time to pull down the flags, demolish the monuments, and plough up the markers? Isn’t it time to get with the program? Isn’t it time to go along to get along?

O that it were only that simple!

That fact is that our Southern identity, our family and communal ties, and the symbols of the South are all a part of the same interconnected reality in which we live.

Not long ago, a collegue of mine, knowing of my interest in the South, asked me if I was a re-enactor. I told her that I was not. She then asked me if I had period clothing. I told her that I did not. I proceeded to inquire why she asked. She said a friend of hers was having a family reunion and that they were looking for in re-enactor to read some family "Civil War" letters during the event. I thought it was a neat idea, but she went on to explain that they had tried to read the letters themselves and were unable to do so because of the strong emotions and tears. No one was able to get through them. They needed someone with a little distance to read them.

It is stories like this that help us understand why it is we cling to our history and our heritage. These are not textbooks stories, these are family stories. To strike at the symbols of the South is to strike at those things which are still held sacred and evoke the most tender responses. These are not symbols of ideas, these are reminders of people. Family members. People who we love despite the fact that we have never met.

These symbols are not a matter of ideology or politics, they are not a matter of left or right, they are personal.

They remind us that we are a people, not solitary creatures to whom family, faith, and community are incidental or accidental—they are fundamental to who and what we are!

They remind us that we did not spring forth ex nihilo--out of nothing—but are participants in a larger, unfolding human drama that began before we arrived and, God willing, will continue to unfold in its own unique way long after we are gone.

They remind us that while we are not perfect, we can and must press on—that our obligations extend beyond the present; that we have a duty to preserve and protect the traditions entrusted to our care and the responsibility to see that the true history of the South transmitted to future generations.

They remind us that we are descended from men and women who did not shrink from hardship, nor shirk responsibility when all seemed to be lost—that material ruin and political subjugation did not rob them of their humanity, but made them better appreciate the things that really matter—kith and kin, blood and soil, hearth stones, head stones, and the faith of their fathers.

They teach us that we can and must endure and overcome our own challenges, whatever they may be, with our dignity and honour intact just as they did.

They teach us to be better people. They give us an example to follow.

The sentinels, equestrians, and flags—in many cases at great cost and at great personal sacrifice—were erected to watch over us and help us remember who we are, where we came from, and what we can and should be—both as individuals and as a people.

Most of all—at least today—they remind us that we are a unique and recognizable people that have the right to exist; a right to be who and what we are without molestation, apology, or shame.

We are, of course, more than happy to live and let live and want nothing more than to live in peace with our neighbours and those who may not care for our peculiarities, but we are under no obligation to participate in our own destruction, or sit quietly while the memory of our kith and kin are slandered and insulted.

Of course, we are perfectly free to do nothing as well—hide in the shadows; stay in the closet; sell our birth right; to go gently into that dark, dark night …
That is certainly the path of least resistance, but it is also the path of death, decay, and destruction. Not only for us, but for all people everywhere who long to be free.

​Such a thing cannot be if decent people are beaten into submission, forced to live as colonial subjects, or denied their legitimate and lawful right to live openly as they are so long as they are willing to permit others to do the same.
In this regard, we are no different than other normal and healthy people. We just happen to do it with a Southern accent.

​I’d like to close my comments this evening by sharing the last chapter of my book. Confederaphobia. (Lucky for you, I write short chapters!)

*  *  *

If you are a victim of Confederaphobia, you are not alone. For most people, it takes time to truly come to understand who you are and where you come from.

It’s okay to be confused, or to be uncertain about whether (or how) you should come out and live openly and proudly as Southerner; to be who and what you are; to stand tall without apology or shame for your legitimate and praiseworthy history, heritage, and culture.

Education will be a vital part of your recovery as you move from victim to victor.

There are many lies your teachers told you, many falsehoods that need to be addressed. As you become more versed in the true history of the South, your confidence will increase and your fear will decrease.

There are many Southern-friendly resources and organisations out there that can help you along. 

There is an amazing journey waiting for you should you choose to begin the process of reclaiming your identity and, thereby, reclaiming your life!

When you are ready to step from the shadows of self-loathing and shame, and embrace your Southern identity, we’ll be waiting to receive you with open arms to join us in our struggle as we take our stand against those who insult us because they are insulted, hate us because they accuse us of hate, and deny us our God-given right to exist openly and without fear as a distinct people.

Be brave; be strong; and be true, dear Southerner …

YOU ARE NOT ALONE!

*  *  *
Thank you for inviting me to share this evening with you. Your kindness, generosity, and hospitality have been truly overwhelming, and I am humbled to be in your midst…

​May God bless you all and may He—and this is my deepest hope and most fervent prayer—save our South!