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Abbeville Institute

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Secession and Reconciliation

Modern activist historians think "reconciliation" is a pejorative, but for most Americans in the early 20th century, it was a necessary part of healing. This included histories written by Southerners. We discuss one of those books on this episode of The Essential Southern Podcast. https://youtu.be/ZMkmCr8u7V8
Abbeville Institute
November 1, 2024
BlogMedia Posts

The Confederate Constitution of 1861

The Confederate Constitution of 1861 is a misunderstood document that made improvements on the United States Constitution. What were they? Professors Donald Livingston and Marshall DeRosa discuss the Constitution and its currency in modern America. https://youtu.be/9TSGgOIiyPE
Abbeville Institute
October 11, 2024
BlogMedia Posts

Reconstruction

Reconstruction is one of the most important topics in American history. It used to be a complex story, and as one historian called it a "tragic era." Historians now call it an "unfinished revolution." What changed? Only interpretation. https://youtu.be/KRbQjvano1s
Abbeville Institute
September 20, 2024
Blog

Ghosts of Grandeur

Historic Southern antebellum homes are disappearing, and those that still remain are being reinterpreted by activist historians. Author Mike Kitchens joins us to talk about his book "Ghosts of Grandeur" and the current woke assault on Southern home museums and historic sites. https://youtu.be/7WE9RdCkFY8
Abbeville Institute
August 21, 2024
Blog

From the Archives–Is America Too Big?

In 2010, the Abbeville Institute asked the question, "Is America Too Big?" This project was intended to be a multi-part series that pondered the future of the United States. Due to funding, we were only able to produce Part I, shown below, but we were ahead of the curve on the issue. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCNd7h0fsdE  
Abbeville Institute
August 16, 2024
Blog

From the Archives–What Secession Is

The Institute was founded in 2002 around a conference table at the University of Virginia. We held our first Summer School in 2003. Here, President Emeritus Donald Livingston discusses "What Secession Is" at this first summer event. It's a worthy topic in our current political climate. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kZSU8NJIzY
Abbeville Institute
August 1, 2024
Blog

From the Archives–Livingston v. Guelzo

In September 2010, the University of Virginia hosted a debate between Abbeville Institute founder Don Livingston and Professor Allen Guelzo, recognized to be one of the foremost Lincolnian scholars in the United States, on the topic "Is Nullification Constitutional?" Guelzo is as committed to the Lincolnian position of an "indestructible Union" as Livingston is to the compact fact of the…
Abbeville Institute
July 30, 2024
Blog

Spencer Roane, Part 2

Continued from Part 1. When the Democrats came into power, the need of a Democratic paper was felt in Virginia. The newspaper had now become one of the most important methods of political warfare. Each party maintained one at Washington, in which articles advocating the one and maligning the other were published. These were read throughout the country, and in…
Abbeville Institute
July 26, 2024
Blog

Spencer Roane, Part 1

Written by Edwin J. Smith in 1905 and published in the John P. Branch Historical Papers of Randolph-Macon College. The formative period of our national existence is the one which, more than any other, produced great men. Great issues arose which had to be settled. Great battles were fought and won in the arena of public life-battles on which depended…
Abbeville Institute
July 25, 2024
Blog

An Old Confederate Story of Irish Wit

From the Confederate Veteran, February, 1916: Tommy Logan was a typical son of the Emerald Isle, who entered the Confederate army at the first call for troops 11 tn Mississippi. He joined the company to which I belonged, which was formed of young planters, all or nearly all the sons of wealthy planters of Hinds and Madison Counties. Tommy was…
Abbeville Institute
July 11, 2024
Blog

John Tyler, Son of Virginia

From the Confederate Veteran, January 1916: John Tyler, distinguished Virginian and tenth President of the United States, has received fitting, though long-deferred, honor from the country he served. Fifty-three years after his death the United States government has erected a handsome monument at his last resting place, in the shades of beautiful Hollywood Cemetery, at Richmond, Va., that sacred and…
Abbeville Institute
July 3, 2024
Blog

The Original Meaning of the 14th Amendment

On Friday, March 15, the Abbeville Institute hosted a webinar on the legal scholar Raoul Berger and the original meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment. Brion McClanahan hosted legal scholars Allen Mendenhall, William Watkins, and Jesse Meriam for a round table discussion on the Berger, the amendment, and Reconstruction. If you want to learn more about the fraudulent "ratification" of the…
Abbeville Institute
March 20, 2024
BlogPodcast

Ep. 8: Remembering “Stonewall”

The Essential Southern Podcast is back for 2024. Our first episode of the year, "Remembering Stonewall" is out now on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts. Subscribe, like, comment, and leave a review where you can. In 1895, "Stonewall" Jackson's widow, Mary Anna Jackson, penned her "Memoirs of Stonewall Jackson" as a tribute her her late husband. This selection is a…
Abbeville Institute
January 27, 2024
Blog

South Carolina Debates the Union

Editor's Note: This 1830 speech from Whitemarsh B. Seabrook shows that South Carolina's commitment to the original Constitution was not solely based on arguments against slavery. Mr. Chairman—I am not aware that I ever attempted to address you with feelings like those which now influence me. The momentous character of the controversy between this state and the federal government, the…
Abbeville Institute
December 19, 2023
Blog

No to War

Editor's Note: On 5 April 1917, Representative Claude Kitchin of North Carolina rose and delivered a manly speech in opposition to Woodrow Wilson's call for a declaration of war against Germany. He was one of five Southern members of Congress who opposed the war resolution. Kitchin prophetically predicted that if she became involved in the war, America would be forced…
Abbeville Institute
November 13, 2023
Blog

David Blight, Neo-Confederate

Editor's Note: On May 9, 2023, Art History Professor Erin Thompson published a piece at The Nation gleefully announcing that Arlington Cemetery will finally be rid of its "racist" Confederate monument. The piece is indicative of the current level of scholarship by modern mainstream academics. Most of it centers on Tweets that attacked her public joy--also through a Tweet--at the…
Abbeville Institute
May 15, 2023
BlogMedia Posts

The Arlington Confederate Monument

The Naming Commission has recommended the removal of the Arlington Confederate Monument. This would not only be a historical travesty and a barbaric leveling of art, it would lay waste to the very message the monument was intended to convey: fraternity, healing, and reconciliation. Tell your Representative you want to stop this heinous act of cultural destruction. https://youtu.be/IwST0QslHLs
Abbeville Institute
November 9, 2022
Blog

Shermanized

Editor's Note: This poem was delivered by Miss Lucy Powell Harris at a concert give by the pupils at the Houston Street Female High School in Atlanta, Georgia, May, 1st, 1866. It was originally written by L. Virginia French, the daughter of a prosperous Virginia family. She relocated to Tennessee and became a teacher after her mother died and her…
Abbeville Institute
October 21, 2022
BlogMedia Posts

The Southern Constitutional Tradition

Brion McClanahan discusses the Southern constitutional tradition, from the 2022 Abbeville Institute Summer School at Seabrook Island, SC, July 5-8, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TCufOUlq_4 Note: The views expressed on abbevilleinstitute.org are not necessarily those of the Abbeville Institute.
Abbeville Institute
September 20, 2022
Blog

Old State Rights

From Thomas Ritchie: A Study in Virginia Politics by Charles Henry Ambler Ritchie was not a genius. Either of the others of the great "Democratic Triumvirate" of political editors, Francis P. Blair of the Washington Globe, or Edwin Croswell of the Albany Argus, was his equal in natural ability. Possibly John Hampden Pleasants, Duff Green, and even others surpassed him…
Abbeville Institute
September 6, 2022
Blog

Jefferson Davis on Robert E. Lee

Remarks of President Davis at the Meeting of the Confederate Soldiers and Sailors held at the First Presbyterian Church, Richmond, Virginia, November 3, 1870, for the purpose of organizing the Lee Monument Association, as reported in the Richmond Dispatch for Nov. 4, 1870. Robert E. Lee was my associate and friend in the military academy, and we were friends until…
Abbeville Institute
August 30, 2022
Blog

McCulloch v. Maryland

Editor's Note: This essay was written by Spencer Roane under the pseudonym Amphictyon in 1819. I. To the Editor of the Enquirer : SIR: I have read with considerable attention the opinion pronounced by the Chief Justice of the U. S. in the case of McCulloch against the State of Maryland. In that opinion we are informed, First, That it…
Abbeville Institute
August 29, 2022
Blog

“His Richest Legacy to Posterity”

From Gustavus Pinckney, Life of John C. Calhoun. The attentive reader will not have forgotten that in the letter of Mr. Calhoun in reference to his acceptance of the Secretaryship of State he made mention of a project which he had in mind for leisure hours in the home routine to which at that time he looked forward. The home…
Abbeville Institute
August 26, 2022
Blog

For the Fairfax County Confederate Dead

Editor's note: Delivered by Congressman John Warwick Daniel at the dedication to the Confederate monument at the Fairfax County, Virginia courthouse October 1, 1890. The monument stood on the courthouse square "upon Fairfax soil" on a lot purchased so the "grassy mound at the base of this monument now covers the remains of two hundred heroes." Funds were collected in…
Abbeville Institute
August 24, 2022
Blog

Jefferson Davis: American Statesman

Most people don't know anything about Jefferson Davis other than he was the President of the Confederate States of America. His great-great grandson, Bertram Hayes-Davis, explains why Davis should be highly regarded among all Americans today. https://youtu.be/RAKw8U_PBAc
Abbeville Institute
June 3, 2022
Blog

The Achievements of M.E. Bradford

By Forrest McDonald and Clyde Wilson. These essays were originally published in the Fall 1982 issue of Southern Partisan. A review of M.E. Bradford, A Worthy Company: Brief Lives of the Framers of the United States Constitution. Marlborough, NH: Plymouth Rock Foundation, 1982 and M.E. Bradford, A Better Guide Than Reason: Studies in the American Revolution. La Salle, Ill.: Sherwood…
Abbeville Institute
February 3, 2022
Blog

Democracy and Universal Suffrage

Edmund Ruffin, from his Diary: hen the mob bears the sway in elections, it knows little, & cares not at all, for the superior fitness or honesty of candidates. Each of the lowest voters gives his vote, or the direction of his vote, to some one the nearest in qualities to himself, or by whose favor the voter expects to…
Abbeville Institute
January 13, 2022
Blog

American Monuments

Editor's Note: Former Abbeville Institute summer school student Jon Harris and his Last Stand Studios produced this original documentary about American monuments and the ongoing American iconoclasm. It features Abbeville Institute scholars Donald Livingston, Brion McClanahan, Bill Wilson, Philip Leigh, and Kirkpatrick Sale. From the website: "Our next project, American Monument, will explore the good, true, and beautiful qualities represented…
Abbeville Institute
November 8, 2021
Blog

A Defense of Lee

Three years ago, Woke General Ty Seidule of West Point addressed the students and faculty at Washington and Lee University on the life and character of Robert E. Lee. He aimed to tarnish Lee's reputation and primacy at the institution and insisted that Lee's name and legacy be removed from the campus. Some responded that Seidule was "speaking truth to…
Abbeville Institute
April 5, 2021
Blog

A Southern Poetry Sampler

The Soiling of Old Glory by Stanley Forman When I See That Flag Flying by John Parker When I see that flag flying I see my people dying Defending their land From its invasion. When I see that flag waving I feel my people's craving For the short-lived Independence which That flag took away. When I see that flag blowing…
Abbeville Institute
October 25, 2019
Blog

Nationally Acclaimed, Locally Detested

The Tricentennial celebration of New Orleans has stirred much interest into different facets of the city’s history. The search for the quintessential old New Orleans novel yields few results. The rich culture of New Orleans makes it one of America’s great cities. The Crescent City has served as muse for a litany of writers, accomplished and rising, yet it remains a near impossible place…
Abbeville Institute
July 23, 2018
Blog

A Poetry Sampler

Editor's note: Three recent poetry submissions, the first two by Walt Garlington, the third by Stephen Borthwick. The Patriarch’s Clan The patriarch’s clan By the lake is gathered To honor again Their common father: The matriarch with Her circle of friends, Cousins, with new wives' and husbands' And newer children, The bond of kinship Strengthened in their meeting. Traditions are…
Abbeville Institute
July 17, 2017
Review Posts

Listening in Autumn: “Thin Time” in North Louisiana

Two Poems by Robert Peters and David Middleton Who Will Hear? From distant ridge to distant ridge hunting horns serenading with stories before great fires; Bobbing over hill and into hollow the fox hounds’ course voices; The pitch of the pack rising with the tiring of the stag; Watery break singing with a million mosquitoes; Chip marrying the widow with…
Abbeville Institute
February 7, 2017
Review Posts

Two Aristocracies

Editor's note: This piece was originally printed as an unsigned piece in DeBow's Review in 1866. The author had already recognized that the deal struck between Midwestern farmers and Northeastern merchants would in short order ruin agriculture and by default a more Jeffersonian economy in the "farm belt" of America. His call for Southern and Midwestern farmers to unite against…
Abbeville Institute
October 5, 2016
Blog

John Tyler Son of Virginia

From the Confederate Veteran Magazine, Volume 4, 1916, pages 4-5. John Tyler, distinguished Virginian and tenth President of the United States, has received fitting, though long-deferred, honor from the country he served. Fifty-three years after his death the United States government has erected a handsome monument at his last resting place, in the shades of beautiful Hollywood Cemetery, at Richmond,…
Abbeville Institute
April 2, 2015