An Open Letter / The State of Southern Black Folks / Robbed of Heritage
From: HK Edgerton [mailto:hk@csaweb.org]
Sent: Tuesday, July 08, 2008
The Honorable Rev. R.L. Dabney from Prince Edward County Virginia in his now famous letter to Union General Howard of the Freedmen’s Bureau in June of 1865 clearly defined the parameters for the North not to take that would put the Southern African behind the social eight ball in the body politic of American life. Not only did General Howard and the Northern Federal Government not adhere to this elephantine exposition that Rev. Dabney expostulated, but began in earnest a modus operandi designed to divide , separate and create an atmosphere of hate, fear and mistrust between the supposed free African and the Southern White man.
When we as ancestors of those Southern Africans take a look back and try to figure out how and why we find ourselves engulfed in a perpetual cess pool of hate and bigotry because of the color of our skin. It is important to understand that in lieu of the economic institution of Southern slavery, we were clearly on course for social vertical mobility under the guidance of the Southern White man unparalleled in the annals of mankind. Only to have this moment derailed by the greed of a European King and that of a man from the northern region of America whose pogrom of Southern people caught up in an unconstitutional war and the aftermath of so called “Reconstruction” for a period of twelve years as he pitted the newly freed African against the Southern White man and carried out his despoliation that left all the Southern people, Red, Yellow, Black and White in a state of complete despondency.
As we entered the 21st century, Southern folk, Red, Yellow, Black and White who had inculcated in their thinking processes the revisionist and oft times decorous history taught in the public school system that painted our ancestors in the utmost of derogatory terms possible were once again asked to carry out the acts of vengeance for those of the North whose plan was to come among amongst us and lay claim on our homeland and social systems , The best way to accomplish this was to attack the one symbol that identifies us most as being Southern; the Christian Cross of St. Andrew and the form that it took as our soldiers defended our homeland that had been invaded. Furthermore, just as during the period of so called” Reconstruction” the best way to accomplish this was to use the unwitting African because it was hypothesized that he knew less about himself and the history of the epoch of the great war; just say slavery and he could be led in any direction against the Southern white populous.
What about the complicity of the whole civilized world in the economic institution of slavery, to include that of the African Kings ? What about the Stars and Stripes and its role in the economic institution of slavery ? What about the place of honor and dignity that the Southern African earned under the Southern Cross ? What about the period of so called Reconstruction in the South? What about the total war policies of Lincoln and his generals ? When will this nation let the African people of the South reclaim that place of love that it earned beside a man that he not only called Master, but family and friend ? Cadit quaestio ! ( the question drops: the argument collapses ) No brutumfulmen (a futile threat or display of force ) can make a loyal Southerner give up his love of region or symbol, be he Red, Yellow, Black or White !
