The Integrality Of Jefferson Davis To Southern Identity

Southern Identity Has No Vitality Apart From Jefferson Davis

It is recommended to read 1 Kings 11:1-13, 26-40 as well as 1 Kings 12:1-24, which are a prototypical American narrative, before reading this article. A synopsis of those passages will be given below:

In the Bible, King Solomon turned away from God and so God split the Kingdom of Israel. He gave one portion to Rehoboam, Solomon’s son, and another to Jeroboam, a very notable Bible character for all Americans. Jeroboam is first introduced as someone who rose against the king, the son of a widow, and a hard worker. These traits were rewarded by God when he gave a portion of the kingdom to Jeroboam and He promised, “I will build you a dynasty as enduring as the one I built for David and will give Israel to you[,]” as long as he remained obedient to God. After King Solomon died, the kingdom went to his son Rehoboam, however, during this time the people of Israel, along with Jeroboam, asked for relief from tyrannical practices. King Rehoboam declined their request and the ten northern tribes of Israel followed up by declaring their independence and seceding. King Rehoboam attempted to send an officer to restore his rule, but the officer was stoned to death. He gathered an army and began preparations for war when a prophet advised him not to go to war, so everyone went home, and the two kingdoms lived alongside each other. Unfortunately, God’s promise to create a lasting dynasty for Jeroboam was never fulfilled because Jeroboam did not remain obedient to God. He created idols and instructed Israel to worship them.

It goes without saying that this is a familiar story to Americans, and especially Southerners. One major difference of course being that instead of remaining at peace like Rehoboam, Lincoln decided to wage war. And the other major difference being that Jefferson Davis, unlike Jeroboam, did remain loyal to God. He never wavered in his courage and defense of truth.

At a Barnes and Noble in Florida some months ago, I decided to look through the “civil war” section. There were a million books on Lincoln, and a handful of books on Lee, but not one book on Jefferson Davis. After what may have been a couple hours of searching, I could only find one book that even mentioned Davis, on the back cover. It deeply saddens me to see that even among those sympathetic to the South and the Southern Cause, Jefferson Davis so often gets sidelined in favor of Lee or any number of other Southern characters. I respect Lee, and I am sure there are many Southern characters worth noting, but I believe Davis is the true representative of the Southern Cause.

To illustrate this, I will present some statements from both men, Lee and Davis.

From Lee, on secession, 1861: "Mr. Blair, I look upon secession as anarchy. If I owned the four millions of slaves in the South, I would sacrifice them all to the Union; but how can I draw my sword upon Virginia, my native State?"

From Davis, on secession, 1861: "Secession belongs to a different class of remedies. It is to be justified upon the basis that the States are sovereign. There was a time when none denied it. I hope the time may come again when a better comprehension of the theory of our Government, and the inalienable rights of the people of the States, will prevent any one from denying that each State is a sovereign, and thus may reclaim the grants which it has made to any agent whomsoever."

Lee based his support of Virginia, and thereby the Confederacy, on allegiance to his home state. Davis based his support of Mississippi, and thereby the Confederacy, on allegiance to his home state as well as on the sovereignty of the states. If secession is anarchy, like Lee believed, then what justification would a yankee have to cease their aggression? In fact, they would have a moral and constitutional obligation to quell anarchy wherever it arose in the union in order to ensure a republican form of government to the states.

From Lee, on black people, June 1865: "In talking with Colonel Carter about the situation of farmers at that time in the South, and of their prospects for the future, [Lee] urged him to get rid of the negroes left on the farm—some ninety-odd in number, principally women and children, with a few old men—saying the government would provide for them, and advised him to secure white labour. The Colonel told him he had to use, for immediate needs, such force as he had, being unable at that time to get whites. Whereupon General Lee remarked:

'I have always observed that wherever you find the negro, everything is going down around him, and wherever you find a white man, you see everything around him improving.'"

From Davis, on black people, referencing former slaves used as soldiers by the union, 1881: "The forefathers of these negro soldiers were gathered from the torrid plains and malarial swamps of inhospitable Africa. Generally they were born the slaves of barbarian masters, untaught in all the useful arts and occupations, reared in heathen darkness, and, sold by heathen masters, they were transferred to shores enlightened by the rays of Christianity. There, put to servitude, they were trained in the gentle arts of peace and order and civilization; they increased from a few unprofitable savages to millions of efficient Christian laborers. Their servile instincts rendered them contented with their lot, and their patient toil blessed the land of their abode with unmeasured riches. Their strong local and personal attachment secured faithful service to those to whom their service or labor was due. A strong mutual affection was the natural result of this life-long relation, a feeling best if not only understood by those who have grown from childhood under its influence. Never was there happier dependence of labor and capital on each other."

Far from seeing the presence of black people on the North American continent as a destructive burden to be gotten rid of at the first opportunity, like Lee, or as a "wolf [held] by the ear", like Thomas Jefferson, Davis viewed black people in America as an unequivocal blessing. He made this absolutely clear in a speech he gave in Mississippi in 1857: "African slavery, as it exists in the United States, is a moral, a social, and a political blessing."

I will leave it to the reader to decide; which of these characters is more Southern, more representative of the Southern cause and the Southern people?

I want to be clear that I respect Lee and take no issue with him being regarded as a Southern hero. I agree with that approbation, but the source of Lee's honor in my view, is in his submission; to his state, as well as to a great man, Jefferson Davis. Lee was asked after the war his opinion on Davis' part in it and he replied:

“If my opinion is worth anything, you can ALWAYS say that few people could have done better than Mr. Davis. I knew of none that could have done as well.”

In 1881, the elderly Jefferson Davis published his book The Rise And Fall Of The Confederate Government. In a moving excerpt which I will share here, he writes:

“It must be manifest to every one that there has been a fatal subversion of the Constitution of the United States. In estimating the results of the war, this is one of the most deplorable; because it is self-evident that, when a constitutional Government once oversteps the limits fixed for the exercise of its powers, there is nothing beyond to check its further aggression, no place where it will voluntarily halt until it reaches the subjugation of all who resist the usurpation. This was the sole issue involved in the conflict of the United States Government with the Confederate States; and every other issue, whether pretended or real, partook of its nature, and was subordinate to this one. Let us repeat an illustration: In strict observance of their inalienable rights, in abundant caution reserved, when they formed the compact or Constitution—whichever the reader pleases to call it—of the United States, the Confederate States sought to withdraw from the Union they had assisted to create, and to form a new and independent one among themselves. Then the Government of the United States broke through all the limits fixed for the exercise of the powers with which it had been endowed, and, to accomplish its own will, assumed, under the plea of necessity, powers unwritten and unknown in the Constitution, that it might thereby proceed to the extremity of subjugation. Thus it will be perceived that the question still lives. Although the Confederate armies may have left the field, although the citizen soldiers may have retired to the pursuits of peaceful life, although the Confederate States may have renounced their new Union, they have proved their indestructibility by resuming their former places in the old one, where, by the organic law, they could only be admitted as republican, equal, and sovereign States of the Union. And, although the Confederacy as an organization may have ceased to exist as unquestionably as though it had never been formed, the fundamental principles, the eternal truths, uttered when our colonies in 1776 declared their independence, on which the Confederation of 1781 and the Union of 1788 were formed, and which animated and guided in the organization of the Confederacy of 1861, yet live, and will survive, however crushed they may be by despotic force, however deep they may be buried under the debris of crumbling States, however they may be disavowed by the time-serving and the fainthearted; yet I believe they have the eternity of truth, and that in God's appointed time and place they will prevail.

The contest is not over, the strife is not ended. It has only entered on a new and enlarged arena. The champions of constitutional liberty must spring to the struggle, like the armed men from the seminated dragon's teeth, until the Government of the United States is brought back to its constitutional limits, and the tyrant's plea of "necessity" is bound in chains strong as adamant:

"For Freedom's battle once begun, Bequeathed by bleeding sire to son, Though baffled oft, it ever won."

When the war closed, who were the victors? Perhaps it is too soon to answer that question. Nevertheless, every day, as time rolls on, we look with increasing pride upon the struggle our people made for constitutional liberty. The war was one in which fundamental principles were involved; and, as force decides no truth, hence the issue is still undetermined, as has been already shown. We have laid aside our swords; we have ceased our hostility; we have conceded the physical strength of the Northern States. But the question still lives, and all nations and peoples that adopt a confederated agent of government will become champions of our cause. While contemplating the Northern States—with their Federal Constitution gone, ruthlessly destroyed under the tyrant's plea of "necessity," their State sovereignty made a byword, and their people absorbed in an aggregated mass, no longer, as their fathers left them, protected by reserved rights against usurpation—the question naturally arises: On which side was the victory? Let the verdict of mankind decide.”

With Davis, the South can succeed in being revitalized and the promise of God towards Jeroboam which was thwarted in Biblical times, can be fulfilled in our time, and in our country. I firmly believe that God will build Jefferson Davis a dynasty as enduring as the one he built for King David and that if Southerners awaken to the richness of their tradition and the honor of their ancestors, that constitutional liberty and independence can be achieved. Jesus waged war against the world and won; the Founding Fathers waged war against Britain and won; Jefferson Davis waged war against the United States then lived the rest of his life free, and now he is in Paradise waiting for us to win.

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