audiobook Manliness and Its Discontents: The Black Middle Class and the Transformation of Masculinity; 1900-1930 (Gender and American Culture) by Martin Summers in History

Description

Although much has been written about the ways in which Confederate politics affected the course of the Civil War; George Rable is the first historian to investigate Confederate political culture in its own right. Focusing on the assumptions; values; and beliefs that formed the foundation of Confederate political ideology; Rable reveals how southerners attempted to purify the political process and avoid what they saw as the evils of parties and partisanship. According to Rable; secession marked the beginning of a revolution against politics; in which the Confederacy's founding fathers saw themselves as the true heirs of the American Revolution. Nevertheless; factionalism developed as the war dragged on; with Confederate nationalists emphasizing political unity and support for President Jefferson Davis's administration and libertarian dissenters warning of the dangers of a centralized Confederate government. Both sides claimed to be the legitimate defenders of a genuine southern republicanism and of Confederate nationalism; and the conflict between them carried over from the strictly political sphere to matters of military strategy; civil religion; and education. Rable concludes that despite the war's outcome; the Confederacy's antipolitical legacy had a profound impact on southern politics.