Defending white democracy : the making of a segregationist movement and the remaking of racial politics, 1936-1965 / Jason Morgan Ward.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Ward, Jason Morgan.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Segregation--Southern States--History--20th century.

Segregation.

Segregation--Political aspects--Southern States--History--20th century.

White people--Southern States--Politics and government--20th century.

White people.

White people--Southern States--Attitudes--History--20th century.

African Americans--Segregation--Southern States--History.

African Americans.

Civil rights--Southern States--History--20th century.

Civil rights.

Government, Resistance to--Southern States--History--20th century.

Government, Resistance to.

Southern States--Race relations--History--20th century.

Southern States.

Southern States--Race relations--Political aspects--History--20th century.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (265 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Chapel Hill, N.C. : University of North Carolina Press, 2011.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

"After the Supreme Court ruled school segregation unconstitutional in 1954, southern white backlash seemed to explode overnight. Journalists profiled the rise of a segregationist movement committed to preserving the "southern way of life" through a campaign of massive resistance. In Defending White Democracy, Jason Morgan Ward reconsiders the origins of this white resistance, arguing that southern conservatives began mobilizing against civil rights some years earlier, in the era before World War II, when the New Deal politics of the mid-1930s threatened the monopoly on power that whites held in the South. As Ward shows, years before "segregationist" became a badge of honor for civil rights opponents, many white southerners resisted racial change at every turn--launching a preemptive campaign aimed at preserving a social order that they saw as under siege. By the time of the Brown decision, segregationists had amassed an arsenal of tested tactics and arguments to deploy against the civil rights movement in the coming battles. Connecting the racial controversies of the New Deal era to the more familiar confrontations of the 1950s and 1960s, Ward uncovers a parallel history of segregationist opposition that mirrors the new focus on the long civil rights movement and raises troubling questions about the enduring influence of segregation's defenders. "-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Agitating falsely the race problem

The white south's "double V"

From white supremacists to "segregationists"

Nationalizing race and southernizing freedom

The rhetoric of responsible resistance

The southern "minority" and the silent majority.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

979-88-908858-3-8

1-4696-1387-5

1-4696-0254-7

OCLC:

769265997