Socialists in the Confederate United States?

[Creative Destruction]

I am vaguely aware that not everyone who supported the confederacy did it necessarily to support slavery, but rather out of some strange reaction that southerners, by that time, had toward a federalized government (a sentiment which still exists a lot in the south today.) It was almost nationalism except there was no nation until after.

With that said, does anyone know if there were any socialists or socialist movements in the confederacy? I'm not looking for whether they were pro- or against the confederacy, just if there was some existence of a movement there. By the time of the American Civil War, I'd figure if anything got here, it would have been the utopian socialists, but I don't think Marxism got here, in any substantial sense, until much later.

[tachosomoza]

Some plantation owners followed aspects of utopian socialism and allowed slaves to decide punishments for other slaves, govern themselves, taught them to read and write, and encouraged them to develop new things for the plantation to make life easier/helped them patent inventions. One of them was Joseph Emory Davis, Jefferson Davis' brother. He met Robert Owen and applied some of his ideas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davis_Bend,_Mississippi

That being said, they were the exception, not the rule.

[Red_Banner]

Most of the commies and other socialists in the US Civil War were 48ers on the Union side.

I haven't heard of commies on the Confederate side though.

[Creative Destruction]

Wow. That kind of makes my head spin.

[Creative Destruction]

Most of the commies and other socialists in the US Civil War were 48ers on the Union side.

I haven't heard of commies on the Confederate side though.

Yeah, that's the impression I generally get.

[Red Commissar]

It was hard enough to find progressive minded people in the South at the time (at best the anti-slavery argument among their ranks was that slavery was not economically productive, not that it was necessarily bad), this was made worse

The only case I can think of a socialist Confederate (very loosely speaking) comes after the Civil War in the form of Albert Parsons (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Parsons). Parsons joined a Confederate unit as a youth but he came to the conclusion the war was only in the interest of the slave-owners as the war went on (his original reasons for joining appeared to be a combination of youthful idealism, southern identity, and vague anti-government sentiments). After the civil war he returned home and became a rare case of someone who supported reconstruction eagerly in the South and later became a labor agitator. He was among the four who ended up being hanged after the Haymarket Affair, and is probably more well-known in left circles (at least back then) for that reason.

His wife, Lucy Parsons, was a former slave and outlived Parsons into the 1940s. She was also a radical agitator. Their interracial marriage was one of the reasons why they ended up leaving the south and settled in Chicago where it was *relatively* easier to have such a relationship than it was in the south, especially after the reactionary backlash that erupted against Reconstruction policies (like Jim Crow Laws).

The problem is that, at least as the US was concerned, the proto-socialist movement was helped along by a combination of immigration from Europe- in particular 48ers fleeing Germany- and labor. The South did not have much of an industrial base like the North was developing did and there was no ground for a labor union to grow.

Some exceptions would be among some utopian communes like the Fourier-inspired La Reunion which failed and folded into the young town of Dallas. There were also Germans of Marxist persuasion living in Texas like Adolph Douai (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Carl_Adolph_Douai) (who was also known as a pioneer of Kindergarten in the US), but like their more moderate 48er kin they were intimidated after the Nueces Massacre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nueces_massacre) and kept to themselves during the duration of the war.

[erupt]

Seeing as how the Confederates in the South relied much more heavily on agriculture, I'd figure it's not surprising that anyone of any laborer-oriented political party joined the Union. The Union had much, much more industry, which means it had more working class sentiment than the South. If Maoism existed at the time, it may have turned out slightly different, obviously due its reliance and predominance of the peasantry.

[goalkeeper]

Seeing as how the Confederates in the South relied much more heavily on agriculture, I'd figure it's not surprising that anyone of any laborer-oriented political party joined the Union. The Union had much, much more industry, which means it had more working class sentiment than the South. If Maoism existed at the time, it may have turned out slightly different, obviously due its reliance and predominance of the peasantry.

I think this first part is perhaps an important point. In the 20th century the ideas of socialism etc. spread to non-industrial societies but my (perhaps wrong) impression is that in the mid 19th century due to (perhaps) less sophisticated means of communication and the still general novelty and immaturity of ideas of socialism, it was largely restricted to industrial areas.

[erupt]

I think this first part is perhaps an important point. In the 20th century the ideas of socialism etc. spread to non-industrial societies but my (perhaps wrong) impression is that in the mid 19th century due to (perhaps) less sophisticated means of communication and the still general novelty and immaturity of ideas of socialism, it was largely restricted to industrial areas.

That's true, as well. Think, for example, how hard it would be to acquire books in the rural South at the time. Even the rural areas in the Union had very low literacy if I'm not mistaken. Plus, some of the people living in rural areas coming from continental Europe may have only spoken/read German, Dutch, etc., and foreign literature would have been harder to come by yet.

[Hrafn]

This is very interesting.

(I might add that Maoist-esque insurgency in the Confederacy sounds like a fantastic alternate history story, erupt.)

[tachosomoza]

This is very interesting.

(I might add that Maoist-esque insurgency in the Confederacy sounds like a fantastic alternate history story, erupt.)

John Brown was pretty much the closest thing we had to a Mao figure at the time.

[The Garbage Disposal Unit]

John Brown was pretty much the closest thing we had to a Mao figure at the time.

The closest white person, maybe.

I highly recommend Butch Lee's Jailbreak Out of History: The Rebiography of Harriet Tubman (http://kersplebedeb.com/mystuff/books/jailbreak.html). I think popular history really sanitizes the Underground Railroad, which, after all, if you think about it, was an armed, illegal organization taking direct action against the planter class. Actually, the number of slave revolts, maroon communities, etc. in the South was pretty significant. When we talk about the civil war and the confederacy, we really need to get away from narratives that posit as a war between a white people thing, and recenter the discussion on black and indigenous communities whose participation was arguably decisive.

[Rafiq]

Some plantation owners followed aspects of utopian socialism and allowed slaves to decide punishments for other slaves, govern themselves, taught them to read and write, and encouraged them to develop new things for the plantation to make life easier/helped them patent inventions. One of them was Joseph Emory Davis, Jefferson Davis' brother. He met Robert Owen and applied some of his ideas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davis_Bend,_Mississippi

That being said, they were the exception, not the rule.

Sickening. Just fucking sickening. These weren't socialists. Utopians have nothing to do with our history.

[Popular Front of Judea]

I think this first part is perhaps an important point. In the 20th century the ideas of socialism etc. spread to non-industrial societies but my (perhaps wrong) impression is that in the mid 19th century due to (perhaps) less sophisticated means of communication and the still general novelty and immaturity of ideas of socialism, it was largely restricted to industrial areas.

Maybe that was because classic Marxist socialism had bugger all to say about revolution in rural societies.

[ed miliband]

Sickening. Just fucking sickening. These weren't socialists. Utopians have nothing to do with our history.

to be fair, there was one utopian who would probably agree with you* ;)


The proper aim is to try and reconstruct society on such a basis that poverty will be impossible. And the altruistic virtues have really prevented the carrying out of this aim. Just as the worst slave-owners were those who were kind to their slaves, and so prevented the horror of the system being realised by those who suffered from it, and understood by those who contemplated it, so, in the present state of things in England, the people who do most harm are the people who try to do most good; and at last we have had the spectacle of men who have really studied the problem and know the life – educated men who live in the East End – coming forward and imploring the community to restrain its altruistic impulses of charity, benevolence, and the like. They do so on the ground that such charity degrades and demoralises. They are perfectly right. Charity creates a multitude of sins.

*and me, i should add, the idea of kindly, democratic slave owners is sickening...

[blake 3:17]

In Towards the Abolition of Whiteness, Dave Roediger has an essay about a Wobbly who was a Southern nationalist. It's an oddball position, but the essay is extremely detailed.

Edited to add: The guy's name was Covington Hall. Here's a review of his writings as collected by Roediger: http://www.solidarity-us.org/site/node/621

[Lenina Rosenweg]

The Young Patriot Organization, a radical leftist group organizing poor whites from Appalachia in Chicago and the Pacific Northwest in the 70s, and highly influenced by the BPP, used the Confederate battle flag as their symbol.I don't know what their take on the "rebel flag" was.

I have read (don't ask me where) that there was a worker's demonstration in Richmond, Va, a few years before the Civil War, made up mostly of German immigrants, which used socialist slogans.Missouri, a border state had a large German settlment with a socialist tradition.

[Creative Destruction]

The Young Patriot Organization, a radical leftist group organizing poor whites from Appalachia in Chicago and the Pacific Northwest in the 70s, and highly influenced by the BPP, used the Confederate battle flag as their symbol.I don't know what their take on the "rebel flag" was.

I have read (don't ask me where) that there was a worker's demonstration in Richmond, Va, a few years before the Civil War, made up mostly of German immigrants, which used socialist slogans.Missouri, a border state had a large German settlment with a socialist tradition.

The Young Patriots tried re-purposing the Confederate flag in a way that would be a useful identity tool for them, but, obviously, it never went that far. When they first came to Chicago, they had to do a lot to explain themselves and the use of their flag. I can't remember the name of the Panther who recruited them into the Rainbow Coalition, but he made it clear to the YPOs that it could be extremely counterproductive for them... and it was for them at first. They went forth with it anyway and had to get that Panther to vouch for them on numerous occasions.

Presumably, it helped them for where they came from (though not sure about that. When they went back to the Carolinas, they had death threats hurled at them quite often) but it was an obstacle in Chicago.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I am vaguely aware that not everyone who supported the confederacy did it necessarily to support slavery, but rather out of some strange reaction that southerners, by that time, had toward a federalized government (a sentiment which still exists a lot in the south today.) It was almost nationalism except there was no nation until after.

With that said, does anyone know if there were any socialists or socialist movements in the confederacy? I'm not looking for whether they were pro- or against the confederacy, just if there was some existence of a movement there. By the time of the American Civil War, I'd figure if anything got here, it would have been the utopian socialists, but I don't think Marxism got here, in any substantial sense, until much later.

I strongly doubt it. I'm not 100% on this, but I had the impression that at the time, it was pretty well understood that to support the confederacy would be to support the big slave-owners (even if the position on the war had nothing directly or explicitly to do with supporting Slavery). "State's Rights" in that context ment the autonomy of the already existing rulers in the south (who would have had much much more control over and impact on southern people than the federal government). Pro or anti or indifferent attitudes about slavery would have more or less seen it that way: a war for the existing Southern ruling class to not be politically trumped by the federal government.

Many people from outlying areas that didn't own slaves (or at most had one or two as basically extra hands) resented the war and the big plantation owners. Hillbillies was the term for poor hill people in the south who sided with the billies - the union.

Ironically some prolitarians in the North supported the South because of reactionary arguments about an influx of cheap black labor if the South lost and because of resentment towards the rich in the North.

[Red Commissar]

*and me, i should add, the idea of kindly, democratic slave owners is sickening...

Even outside this scatterbrained attempt, slave owners often tried to paint themselves as enlightened, religious inspired people who were trying to uplift their slaves into good, "civilized (christian) people", rather than merely just exploiting them. This is also a common theme in people presenting a rosy view of the antebellum south, sometimes referred to as "lost cause" history.

Apologetics for slavery usually fall back on this paternalistic view of slaves and typically add on references to black soldiers who fought on the side of the Confederacy (who existed but were far, far less than those who went to the North or stayed out all together), or the slaves who stayed on their plantations even after they were freed.

If anyone ever has a lot of time to burn, a pretty good, compressed version of this is "Gone with the Wind", which presents slave-owning south as some lost idyllic paradise that the north ruined, plus the favorite narrative of loyal blacks to their former slave masters.

It's a common defense too when Thomas Jefferson or some other American founding father is brought up as to why he didn't release his slaves until his death. It comes down mainly to both his expressed views as well as his supporters (and I'm talking about today) that he was concerned about their well-being and wanted to make sure they were ready for the world. Jefferson making a living off them was completely irrelevant of course.

[Popular Front of Judea]

I strongly doubt it. I'm not 100% on this, but I had the impression that at the time, it was pretty well understood that to support the confederacy would be to support the big slave-owners (even if the position on the war had nothing directly or explicitly to do with supporting Slavery). "State's Rights" in that context ment the autonomy of the already existing rulers in the south (who would have had much much more control over and impact on southern people than the federal government). Pro or anti or indifferent attitudes about slavery would have more or less seen it that way: a war for the existing Southern ruling class to not be politically trumped by the federal government.

Many people from outlying areas that didn't own slaves (or at most had one or two as basically extra hands) resented the war and the big plantation owners. Hillbillies was the term for poor hill people in the south who sided with the billies - the union..

One of the less discussed stories of the Civil War were the Deep South counties that essentially seceded from the Confederacy -- even in Mississippi. The solid South was anything but.

Here's a Wikipedia entry about Winston County, Alabama: Republic of Winston (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Republic_of_Winston&printable=yes)

[goalkeeper]

Maybe that was because classic Marxist socialism had bugger all to say about revolution in rural societies.

Of course, and classic Marxism never has, but it didnt stop a bunch of nationalist thugs in the 20th century building peasant armies draped in red flag and claiming to be socialist and marxist.

[LiamChe]

I seriously doubt that there were any socialists in the Confederacy. I do know that Marx supported the Union and that's pretty much the only side that would make sense for a socialist of that time period to support. It would be quite paradoxical for a socialist to support the confederacy.