The South Was Right!

Rating:
Summary: A Lesson Of Cultural Genocide
Review: As I read this book I was reminded of the stories of "The War" that were talked about among my grand parents and great-grandparents. Stories that reflect a South not so full of hate as it seems today. Black folks and white folks living their lives together doing the best they could with what they had. Lincoln's War destroyed that hard-fought original southern culture and replaced it with the money-hungry, fast-paced society that has ruined the North and its people. What dignity the Southerner has retained is strengthend by this book. Not to promote racial upheaval, but to remind us of a time when honor ruled the day.

Rating:
Summary: This book must have been shot out of a cannon from the past!
Review: I enjoyed every minute of this book someone finally serves justice to the Old South that has been put down in every form known to man.

Rating:
Summary: Nope
Review: This book asserts that the South had every right to secede from the Union in 1860 and that the Civil War(or the War for Southern Independence)was nothing more than a war of Northern aggression. While the Kennedys have a point(keeping the Southern states in the nation by force was exactly what Great Britain tried to do in 1776)and present a lot of history that gets ignored(insofar as it deals with what today would be called war crimes by the "good guys"), this book fails for several reasons. Slavery, as the Kennedy brothers assert, may not have been as bad as all that. But, pleasant as it may have been, human beings still owned other human beings. The Kennedys resent Northern stereotyping of Southerners. But they believe they know exactly how "Yankees" think and act in just about every situation. And their criticisms of Northern business and cultural hegemony ring a bit hollow these days, given that Arkansan Bill Clinton is President, Tennessean Al Gore is Vice-President, Kentuckian Harland Sanders helped pioneer the idea of fast food, Arkansan Sam Walton has decimated small towns from one end of this country to the other, and Georgian Ted Turner has been Ted Turner

Rating:
Summary: Vindicated-the South WAS right
Review: This book belongs on the shelves of all US public libraries, colleges and universities. It might be grouped alongside "Lies My Teacher Taught Me" as exposing many time-dishonoured lies about the American Civil War or, as they call it, the War for Southern Independence. The PC vision of Northerners, clad in resplendant holy robes going South to save the poor suffering slaves,is straight out of an Abolitionist pamphlet and comes from reading too much "Uncle Tom's Cabin".It also ignores that there were slaves in the North,too, and the Emancipation Proclamation did not emancipate them.One other point not generally recognized is that some Indians were sold into slavery by the North during the Indian Wars. There were few Simon Legrees in the Deep South;in most cases slave owners and slaves had a good, even a loving relationship. In fact, some ex-slaves had slaves themselves.The slaves were better off in the South than in the Africa where they came from.They were usually not oppressed: that is why they fought in the war on the side of the Confederacy. The fact that Southern slavery was relatively benign is confirmed by some other books, notably "Time On The Cross" by R.W.Fogel and Engerman. The Kennedys suggest a partial motive for the war: the need to milk the South as a "milch cow" to maintain Northern tariffs. They imply a clash between Federalism and States' Rights as the underlying motive but emphasis the need to preserve the South. Much more needs to be said,but this is a good start,and a book that every American should study.

Rating:
Summary: Refreshing to read a book that tells it like it really was.
Review: I find myself sitting before this monitor writing a review of a book that I read years ago. Before the days of Amazon.com, when to obtain the 24 copies I purchased for friends of mine I had to meet the Author at a Hospital that was familuar to both of us. I am glad to see that the book has made it to states in the north as well as down here. I thought the book was well written and would have been reviewed with kinder words if the authors had chosen a different tone in writing, but the facts presented were right on. If many would read this tome and check references on sited facts, I think that they would be surprized to see that the authors DID do extensive research into the subject before venturing into the wide world of publishing. I should hope at that time they would come back and reconsider their reviews that viewed the book is a less than favorable light.

Rating:
Summary: High on Rhetoric and Low on Logic
Review: This book is high on rhetoric and low on logic. The Kennedys blame the North for the slave trade and for everything from causing the poor conditions in many Southern states today to brainwashing Southerners into being happy that the United States is once again one nation. As a reenactor and student of the Civil War (a term that the authors avoid in favor of "War for Southern Independence"), I am aware of the atrocities that northern soldiers committed upon African-American women. Yet, the Kennedys fail to mention the equally pernicious (and well-documented) war crimes committed by the invading Rebel army in Pennsylvania, specifically kidnapping African-Americans (both escaped slaves and free-born) and selling them into slavery in the South. The authors also ignore most of the quarter-century leading up to the war in the examination of its causes. Their diatribe against Yankee participation in the slave trade, for example, stops in the early nineteenth century, as it must -- finding New Englanders in favor of resumption of the slave trade in 1850 was almost an impossibility, but it was not difficult to find Charlestonians with such views at that time. The book also expresses the hope that, someday, the South will secede and reestablish its government. I don't see how this is possible, if the citizens of that region are as deluded by the wicked Yankees as the authors claim! Save your money, and buy Tony Horwitz's "Confederates in the Attic," instead. You will learn about the views of people today who believe themselves citizens of the Confederate States of America without losing your temper at those who take advantage of the First Amendment to slam the very government that protects its citizens' free speech rights.

Rating:
Summary: An important tool for setting the record straight
Review: Kin Hubbard said "'Tain't what a man don't know that hurts him; it's what he does know that just ain't so." Much of what we Americans "know" about the causes, conduct, and consequences of the Civil War "just ain't so." The Kennedy brothers make a strong case that the real reasons for, and results of, the War Between the States have been buried under the myth of Father Abraham and his blue-clad saints marching south to save the Union and free the slaves. Sure, the tone is polemical. But the "enlightened" elements of American opinion have been engaging in a polemic against the South and its people for more than 150 years. It's a cop-out to criticise the tone, or call the authors names, and ignore the historical record. There's a lot in here to make the Unreconstructed Southron give a rebel yell. But more than that, this book is a powerful reminder that facts are still facts, regardless of how many decades of whitewash are slathered on top of them.

Rating:
Summary: Thought provoking and well worth reading
Review: This book by the Kennedys is a true eye-opener in its selection of information presented. After reading this book I have fundamentally changed my view of the War for Southern Independence and my respect for the Confederates who fought for their country has reached new heights. The powerful intellectual arguments presented in favor of Southern independence are diminished by the sometimes regrettable labels used by the authors. This book seems to cause an emotional response by some readers since it presents information they would rather not deal with and causes them to reconsider long-held, cherished notions about that period of U.S. history. If you want to expose yourself to historical facts and documentation that is contrary to the popular revisionist historical version this is the book for you.

Rating:
Summary: Honey, get my GUN!
Review: As a Texan with proud Confederate roots, I will gladly pass on my copy to help spread the gospel. We live in an era not so different than that which first faced our Confederate ancestors, A federal government that wishes to control all aspects of our lives from birth to death. This book is well researched and footnoted for all skeptics to do their own research should they so choose. "The principle for which we contend is bound to reassert itself, though it may be at another time and in another form" President Jefferson Davis

Rating:
Summary: Pseudo-intellectual version of Gone with the Wind
Review: Victors write history, but losers write fables. A fable, if it's PC enough to make people feel good about themselves and their predjudices, and it's repeated enough times gets the credibility of history.