Monday, January 6, 2014

Northern Racism

While the South hasn’t got a spotless record on race, all too often viewing the black man as inferior to the white man, she nevertheless has recognized him as a brother, a fellow descendant of the first Adam and one capable of sharing in the Grace of God through Christ, the second Adam.  Thus in her better days she has tried to help him to reach maturity to the best of her misguided ability.

The North, on the other hand, has more often than not harbored a disgust of the black man, viewing him as something less than human.  In the Reverend Robert Lewis Dabney’s day, the attitude was expressed thusly by Northerners (the Northern view being denoted as ‘Black Republicanism’ by Rev Dabney):

In a word, Black Republicanism always means, that the African shall not exist at all on American soil. The uniform shibboleth of the party was the assertion, that this continent must belong exclusively to the white race. The proposal universally made by its demagogues to the agrarian hordes whom they deceived, was not: " Let us overthrow the institutions of the South, in order that you may share its industry with free negro competitors;" but, "Let us overthrow the institutions of the South, in order that you may exclude the negro from its industry, and take his place." If they were pointed to the wretched and waning caste of free blacks in the North, as proof that this race cannot thrive in competition with the whites, without the protection of domestic slavery, and asked what wag to be the destiny of the millions of Africans, when their policy of freesoil was everywhere established; the usual answer was a sardonic shrug, and the sneering declaration, that this was no concern of theirs. Others, more candid, pointed for answer, to the fate of the Indian tribes, who have wasted to nothing before the greater energies and crimes of the white race; and coolly said, that the Africans, deprived of the fostering shield of that southern slavery, under which they were now thriving so happily, must tend to extinction, under the pressure of their own miseries and degradation; and then the whole Union would be free, prosperous, and glorious, (?) belonging to the white man alone. Such was the hideous meaning of Black Republicanism, to oppress and enslave the humane master, in order to exterminate the contented and comfortable servant! (Dabney, Life and Campaigns of Lieut. Gen. T.J. (Stonewall) Jackson, Sprinkle, 1983 [1866], pgs. 164-5.  See Chapter V, ‘Secession’, available for free download here:  https://www.dropbox.com/sh/7lvsb1aafgtuw4x/_YtWxzRrgD/Books%20by%20Chapter/Life%20and%20Campaigns%20of%20Thos.%20J%20Jackson)

In the early 20th century this morphed into advocating abortion for blacks and others deemed unfit to live (including ‘antisocial whites of the South’):

At a March 1925 international birth control gathering in New York City, a speaker warned of the menace posed by the "black" and "yellow" peril. The man was not a Nazi or Klansman; he was Dr. S. Adolphus Knopf, a member of Margaret Sanger's American Birth Control League (ABCL), which along with other groups eventually became known as Planned Parenthood.

Sanger's other colleagues included avowed and sophisticated racists. One, Lothrop Stoddard, was a Harvard graduate and the author of The Rising Tide of Color against White Supremacy. Stoddard was something of a Nazi enthusiast who described the eugenic practices of the Third Reich as "scientific" and "humanitarian." And Dr. Harry Laughlin, another Sanger associate and board member for her group, spoke of purifying America's human "breeding stock" and purging America's "bad strains." These "strains" included the "shiftless, ignorant, and worthless class of antisocial whites of the South."


The abuse against blacks and others continued throughout the 20th century, abuse which included secret syphilis studies and harmful vaccines:


Sadly, some Southerners joined in this evil behavior:


But let it be known where it got its start:

Birth Control Leagues had already been formed in a number of larger American cities between 1916 and 1919 due to Sanger's lecture tours and the publication of the Birth Control Review. By 1924, the American Birth Control League had 27,500 members, with ten branches maintained in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Colorado, and British Columbia.


In all this, we see once more the consequences of the Pilgrim-Puritan-Yankee pride in considering themselves the Chosen Ones of God, appointed by Him to usher in a new era of righteousness and progress.  But more than this, it is a call for white Southerners to finally fulfil their duty toward their black brothers and sisters, a task that was interrupted by the War of Northern Aggression; to protect them from Yankee abuses; to help them reach their full potential as children of God, not through a government program or a scientific system, but through personal acts of love - the love of the Most Holy Trinity poured out upon us through His Orthodox Church - and through the sacraments and the teachings and lives of the saints.

So, then, do not be confused about where the real locus of racial hatred resides in this Union, and look ye askance at the Puritanism, whether religious or secular, of New England, which has ravaged nearly every state in the Union, and now many nations of the world.

1 comment:

  1. This is very important stuff. It's worth noting that Lothrop Stoddard had impeccable New England connections.

    Best

    ReplyDelete