Offsite Post: ‘Reconsidering Regionalism in the United States’

The existential questions regarding the future of the present American union continue to grow more complex and more dire:

What comes after liberalism?

Can nationalism restore unity and purpose?

At the heart of these questions and others like them is a problem that has plagued the States since their independence in 1776:  the belief that a political ideology is enough to create a homogonous cultural identity.  Early on, Thomas Jefferson was writing about an ‘extensive’ ‘empire of liberty’; John Adams, about America as mankind’s second chance at the paradise of Eden.  These strands of political mysticism merged into a messianic melody sung into existence by Abraham Lincoln in his Gettysburg Address in which the cause of union and its preservation became a sacred act that all future generations of Americans must to take part in if representative government is to remain and ‘not perish from the face of the earth.’

Our eyes have been full of the stars of these philosophical dreams for many years.  Until lately – when the weakness of a political creed as a foundation for a lasting culture is being exposed.  But this is to our benefit as we can now place the emphasis where it should have been all along:  on the various regional cultures that exist within the United States.  These have a lasting character; it is on these that we should build our future.

Certain books are foundational for beginning this process of rebuilding, as they reveal the origins and the durable characteristics of those who settled the various regions (reviews of some of these books are linked):

Albion’s Seed by David H. Fischer;

The Nine Nations of North America by Joel Garreau;

American Nations by Colin Woodard; and

Regionalism and Nationalism in the United States: The Attack on Leviathan by Donald Davidson, which made Dr Russell Kirk’s list of ten essential conservative books – high praise indeed.

Through works like these we can begin to see the main cultural materials with which we can build:  for New England, the traditions of the east of England (Essex, East Anglia); for the South, the traditions of southwest England (Wessex, etc.), the borderlands of Scotland and England, northern Ireland, and parts of Africa, France, and Spain; for the Great Plains, the German and Scandinavian cultures; for the desert Southwest, Spanish is a major influence; Hawai’i carries the traditions of the native Pacific islanders; and on from there.

A unified culture is what gives rise to a unified nation, tribe, society, etc.  This is what the regions possess, but it is precisely what the United States taken together have always lacked.  To the extent that there is such a thing, it is, as Dr Clark Carlton once said in one of his Faith and Philosophy podcasts (which sadly seem to have disappeared into the cyberspace ether), merely the vapid secular consumerism that overtook all the States after New England and her northern children won the victory in the War between the States.  If we add to this the political mysticism mentioned above, we will be very close to the definition of that sad little creature called ‘American culture’.

The idea of separating the current union into smaller, regional confederations is not new.  Below is a list of some past proposals to that end provided by Mr Terry Hulsey:

 . . .

The rest is at http://thesaker.is/reconsidering-regionalism-in-the-united-states/.

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!