Memorials and the radical right: the descendants of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest seek to honor their forefather’s violent racism. So now the battle over memory of the American Civil War has come to this: The descendants of the Ku Klux Klan’s first national leader have filed a lawsuit complaining that removing his statue from… Continue reading “In Memphis, A Battle Over The First KKK Leader’s Statue”
Tom Watson promoted himself as a leading voice of Southern white supremacy, nostalgically evoking images of the “Old South” that drew legitimacy from its grounding in a combination of Jeffersonian political theory and cultural agrarianism. In 2012, I had the opportunity to spend a few weeks in Georgia, the most southern of the original colonial states.… Continue reading “A Populist’s Path: From Advocate of the People to Inspiration for the KKK”
The American radical right has almost always been fractured, riven by red-hot splits over ideology, raw power, and an unrelieved series of petty fights revolving around sex, drugs, money, and over-inflated egos. A neo-Nazi leader sneers at the “freaks and weaklings” who inhabit other hate groups. One Klansman shoots another over the theft of a… Continue reading “Recent Splits & Spills in the American Radical Right”
University of Chicago historian Kathleen Belew’s new book, Bring the War Home: The White Power Movement and Paramilitary America, claims to be the first complete history of the contemporary American radical right. And while that claim is certainly exaggerated, it is a serious book that gets much right. As the title suggests, the book links… Continue reading “Book Review: ‘Bring the War Home’ by Kathleen Belew”