In Dixie, Winning Is Our Only Option The South Carolina League Of The South Is Leading The Way

State, The (Columbia, SC)
July 1, 2005

THE CONFEDERATE FLAG: WHERE ARE THEY NOW?
Author: Jeff Stensland, Staff Writer

Edition: FINAL
Section: FRONT
Page: A12
Estimated printed pages: 2

Article Text:

Here is what became of some of the central figures in the state's struggle over the Confederate flag:

* Gov. Jim Hodges - In office when the flag was taken off the State House dome, the Democrat took heat from both sides of the issue as he tried to broker a compromise. After losing to Republican Mark Sanford, Hodges started a Columbia-based consulting firm.

* Sen. Glenn McConnell - The ultimate Confederate buff and Charleston Republican owns a gallery where he sells Confederate-based art and memorabilia. He was influential in crafting the compromise that ultimately lowered the flag. He serves as Senate president pro tem and has focused much of his energy on preserving the Confederate submarine H.L. Hunley.

* S.C. NAACP president James Gallman - As head of the state's most prominent civil rights group, Gallman was instrumental in rallying opposition to the flag. He also pushed for the group's statewide tourism boycott, with mixed! results. Gallman retired from the NAACP earlier this year.

* Citadel cadets - One of the most enduring memories of the Confederate flag saga was when two unidentified Citadel cadets - one black, one white - lowered the Confederate flag from the State House dome for the last time. School officials still won't reveal the cadets' identities, but they say both are on active duty - one in the Navy, the other in the Air Force.

* Charleston Mayor Joe Riley - The Democrat led a 120-mile anti-flag march from Charleston to Columbia that garnered national headlines. Since the flag's move, Riley has marked his 30th year as mayor and was named Governing magazine's 2003 public official of the year.

* Sen. Arthur Ravenel - The Charleston Republican stoked the flames of the flag debate by calling the NAACP the "National Association of Retarded People." Ravenel retired from the Senate in 2003. The 78-year-old suffered a mild stroke in June.

* Emmett Eddy Jr. -Be! tter known by his alias "Rev. E. Slave," Eddy made headlines in 2002. While wearing a black Santa Claus suit, he threw a ladder over the iron fence surrounding the Confederate flag at the Confederate Soldier monument and climbed to the top. He ignited the flag before police surrounded him. He died in February.

-Jeff Stensland

Caption:
1. Gov. Jim Hodges

2. Sen. Glenn McConnell

3. S.C. NAACP president James Gallman

4. Charleston Mayor Joe Riley

5. Sen. Arthur Ravenel

6. Emmett Eddy Jr.PHOTO: BW

Memo:
THE CONFEDERATE FLAG: FIVE YEARS LATER

Founder formerly led League of the South

Lake High says he left the group pushing secession years ago.

By ALLISON ASKINS

Staff Writer

S.C. Department of Agriculture employees working with today’s Carolina Q Cup World Barbeque Championship say they didn’t know the founder of the event is a former state chairman of the League of the South, a secessionist organization.

The Carolina Q Cup — which organizers hope will become a world-class barbecue event — began Friday night and concludes this afternoon. The event, taking place at the State Farmer’s Market, features 48 cookers from South Carolina, North Carolina, Florida and Tennessee.

Lake High, the event’s founder, said he parted ways with the League of the South three or four years ago over leadership issues. He said he sees no problem with his former affiliation with the group. Good barbecue can be enjoyed by all, he said.

“Barbecue is neutral — I don’t give a hoot,” High said. He describes the League of the South as an organization that believed all Southerners should secede, “and that included black Southerners and white Southerners, Jewish Southerners and Catholic Southerners.”

When he began planning the event last year, High said, he approached former Agriculture Department Commissioner Charles Sharpe about the idea.

“I knew Charles Sharpe and I said ... ‘This would be big for S.C. agriculture,”’ High said.

Gov. Mark Sanford suspended Sharpe in July from his position as commissioner of agriculture. Sharpe goes on trial in January on charges of money laundering, extortion and lying to investigators about a cockfighting operation.

Hugh Weathers, whom Sanford appointed interim commissioner in September, was touring state farmlands with a group of visitors from Maine on Friday and could not be reached for comment.

High said his dream for the festival is to showcase South Carolina’s tomato-based, mustard-based and vinegar-based barbecue varieties. He wants the Carolina Q Cup to be on par with other national barbecue events, such as Memphis in May, a three-day annual barbecue festival that is touted as “the Super Bowl of Swine.” Some 90,000 visitors from around the world are expected to attend that event next year, according to its Web site, memphisinmay.org.

“I want this thing to ... put Columbia on the map,” High said.

Becky Walton, Agriculture Department spokeswoman, said High leased the Farmer’s Market from the Ag Department. About half a dozen department employees have been involved with planning the event, but no public money is being spent, she said.

“We are not sponsoring it, but we are hosting it in our facility and they are leasing the space,” Walton said. “This is a Lake High thing.”

Walton said she did not know of High’s former League of the South affiliation until asked by The State.

Department employees’ time working on the event is considered part of their job as promoters of South Carolina agriculture, she said.

Walton said she did not know how many hours employees had spent on the event. If employees work more than 40 hours, they receive comp time for the additional hours, she said.

Other expenses, such as mailings, are being logged by the department and will be reimbursed by High, she said.

“We are hosting the event at the Columbia State Farmers’ Market to promote the fall and pork,” Walton said. “It’s just a win-win situation out there for everybody.”

High said he expects to spend about $20,000 putting on the event and hopes to take in about $24,000 — “if I’m lucky.”

Each cooker paid a $195 entry fee, which includes the cost of the hog they barbecued. The hogs were purchased through the South Carolina Pork Board for $120 each, High said.

The top 12 cooking teams will receive cash prizes of between $75 and $1,500. The grand champion will receive a silver Carolina Q Cup.

Roy Copelan, director of international trade for the Ag Department, has been managing the event for the department. While he wishes he had known of High’s former affiliation with the League of the South, Copelan said, he had not seen signs of the event being exclusive in any way.

“I can truthfully say (High’s) previous works or relationship has not had any bearing on our plans for this activity to be a successful pork promotion,” Copelan said.

He said he did not know if any African-American cookers were taking part because that information was not on the applications.

Copelan also said he had personally delivered applications to two African-American barbecue establishments encouraging their participation, though they did not sign up to participate. He said he did not know why.

David Golden, owner of the Farrow Terrace Drive-In on Farrow Road, was one of the cookers Copelan approached. Because his is a new business, he said, he could not afford to participate. Politics did not play a role in that decision, he said.

Golden plans to take a look at the event today and hopes to compete next year.

Reach Askins at (803) 771-8614 or aaskins@thestate.com.

What is the League of the South?

The league is a states’ rights political group that advocates secession. The Southern Poverty Law Center has labeled the league a “neo-confederate hate group.” The group rejects that label.

Robert Hayes, the league’s state director, said recently that the league opposed removing the Confederate flag from the State House dome in 2000, opposes state funding for education, and opposes affirmative action. Hayes said the group supports secession as an option for protecting states’ rights.

To find out more, see www.sclos.org (S.C. League of the South) or www.splcenter.org (Southern Poverty Law Center).

Southern independence group behind new Southern Congress

By PHILLIP RAWLS
The Associated Press
7/24/2004, 11:36 a.m. CT

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — The city that served as the first Capitol of the Confederacy is scheduled to become the birthplace for an organization of Southerners who feel disenfranchised by today's political system.

The Southern National Congress has scheduled its first meeting March 4-5 in Montgomery and hopes to bring together as many as 1,000 people to create "a permanent forum for the expression of distinct Southern interests, Southern grievances, and Southern solutions."

The League of the South, a Southern independence group that is viewed as marginal and extremist by critics, is organizing the event, but "this is much broader than the League of the South," President Michael Hill said.

Hill said his goal is to bring together people from a variety of groups to "speak out for the disenfranchised people of the South. We see a lot of Southerners — particularly middle-class Southerners — being without a voice."

In Hill's view, the Democratic and Republican parties have hurt the South, and that's why the League of the South has endorsed Constitution Party candidate Michael Peroutka for president. Even though the Southern National Congress will meet after the presidential election, Hill said it will likely take stands on NAFTA, outsourcing and other economic issues that have affected Southerners' jobs.

Earl Black, a political scientist at Rice University who specializes in Southern politics, dismisses Hill and his group as "the die-hards of the die-hards of the Confederate mentality. They cannot find a home in the American two-party system."

Black sees the Southern National Congress doing little more than letting like-minded people spend a weekend together.

"It's going to amount to nothing," he said.

For the Montgomery meeting, some delegates will be elected through Internet voting to represent their states. Groups that honor and revere the South are also being invited to send representatives.

To be a participant, a person must agree that "the Southern people are a distinct people" and believe in "the right of recognition for the South and her people."

Hill said Montgomery was chosen for the first meeting because it is centrally located in the South and "it's where the Confederacy began."

The Montgomery-based Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremist groups, classifies the League of the South as a "hate group."

Mark Potok, the center's Intelligence Project director, calls the Southern National Congress "a Mike Hill deal."

He said that in 1998, Hill and other league members developed the Southern Party to try to advance their political views in the region. It failed, and now they are making a new effort to exert influence, Potok said.

"He's trying to build a movement for secession," Potok said.

Hill disputes the law center's portrayal of his organization as a hate group and its characterization of the Southern National Congress.

"The Southern Poverty Law Center won't be getting an invitation, even though they have Southern in their name," Hill said.

On the Net:

Southern National Congress at http://www.southernnationalcongress.org

Posted on Mon, Aug. 18, 2003--

'State' just doesn't understand South
By LOURIE SALLEY III
Guest columnist

A trip through the employee parking lot of The State says it all: license plates from Massachusetts, New York, Michigan and Wisconsin. Talking with your newsroom's editor -- from Detroit -- I realized that your top people have no knowledge of the history and culture of South Carolina and no respect for our people. John Monk cannot write an article on anything Southern without mentioning racism and slavery.

You have maligned the League of the South as a "hate group" in several articles. The League of the South is a political and cultural movement that has always denounced hate and violence and conducts all its activities peacefully and in public. It has produced dozens of pamphlets, Internet articles, audio and videotapes and music CDs and held educational events in every Southern state.

The league's members include novelists, poets, painters, sculptors, composers, cinema artists, entrepreneurs, students, clergymen of many denominations, scholars from well over 25 institutions of higher learning (in literature, political science, history, religion, philosophy, etc.) and many other folks who are concerned about the ongoing deionization of the South and the loss of its many admirable qualities -- and about the too-powerful and too-intrusive and too-irresponsible federal government that has overgrown the Constitution and anything previous generations would have recognized as a government of the people.

Unlike our critics, we are not obsessed with race or with the past.

We are interested in the future of Southerners, black and white, in a state where "development" means enriching a few people and giving all the good jobs to outsiders who, on arrival, find fault with all they see. If the South is so bad, why are so many people headed this way and so few in the other direction?

Southern black and white people are not enemies. They share Christianity and conservative cultural values that are disappearing in other parts of the country. They also share the oppression of making only 75 percent of the wages workers get for the same jobs in the rest of the United States -- when they can find a job that hasn't been taken by illegal aliens. The league wants Southern people to have more control over our own future. If we had more control over our own fate, would South Carolina be the dumping ground for outsiders' nuclear waste?

Today, segregation and racial hostility are more prevalent in the states where the top people at The State come from than in the South. But instead of letting us move on, vested interests want to keep on beating up on the South. The South is about a lot more than race.

In fact, the South is the source of many of the best "American" qualities. The time has come for black and white South Carolinians to engage in a mutually respectful dialogue and to assert our inalienable right to self-determination, which means to be ourselves and to pass on to our descendants the things we value. The State needs to get over its knee-jerk slander of "racism" at every thing Southern and see what is actually happening.

Mr. Salley, a lawyer in Lexington, is a member of the board of directors of the S.C. League of the South.

-Posted on Sun, May. 18, 2003--

-Old attitudes linger at League of South
League officials defend books, videos, viewpoints that some people find racist
By JOSEPH S. STROUD
Staff Writer

Abbeville Copies of "Little Black Sambo" and the tales of Uncle Remus adorn the shelves of the League of the South building in downtown Abbeville, the unofficial headquarters for the Southern nationalist organization in South Carolina.

A videotaped copy of "Song of the South," the Disney film based on the Uncle Remus tales, is on sale, too. Civil rights groups objected to the characterization of blacks in the film, which was never released to home video in the United States.

A book entitled "The Negro: The Southerner's Problem," by Thomas Nelson Page, a writer who romanticized antebellum Southern life in novels and essays, occupies a shelf not far from "Roots" by Alex Haley.

Robert Hayes, who runs the store and serves as the League's South Carolina director, said materials sold in the store represent a broad assortment of views and do not demonstrate racism on the part of the League.

"We don't ban books," he said.

More than books can be found here. Near the front of the long, narrow store, facing the doorway, is a drawing of the U.S. Capitol building with a Confederate flag flying over it and the words "League of the South" emblazoned across the building. Above, the caption reads, "I Have a Dream."

A former schoolteacher in St. George with gray hair and a mustache that converges into a goatee, Hayes said racism is "a matter of perspective." He said acknowledging blacks make better basketball players isn't racist. Asked whether he believes whites are superior at academic pursuits, Hayes replied: "Obviously, there is a difference. That's why you have these set-asides."

He was referring to affirmative action programs that give preferential treatment to minorities.

League officials say there is no place for racism in the Southern nationalist organization.

"I won't say that there haven't been some members who have stood up and said something wrong," said USC history professor Clyde Wilson, one of the League's charter members, who remains on its board. "And they have been kicked out immediately."

In the League, Wilson said, "There's not preaching against anybody or any group."

Mark Potok, editor of the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Report, said the League of the South is trying to rewrite history to justify modern-day racism. The report labeled the League a racist hate group three years ago.

"It's not merely a justification of Confederate forebears for these people," Potok said. "It's a justification of present-day racist attitudes."

Asked specifically whether he thinks white people are superior to blacks, Michael Hill, the League's founder and president, replied: "I certainly know this. I can't play basketball like Michael Jordan, and he's a black man and I'm a white man. I think Michael Jordan's a better basketball player than I am."

He added: "I don't think that any one person or group of people is inherently better than any other -- because I'm a Christian."

Asked whether he was saying that blacks as a group are better at basketball, Hill said: "Are you denying that? Anybody that turned on the TV to watch college or NBA games might get the sense that they were. I think different people have a penchant for doing different things."

For example, he added, "The Japanese seem to be better at mathematics than anybody else."-

-Posted on Sun, May. 18, 2003--

-Fighting a losing battle
Message of neo-Confederate groups lost on many since Sept. 11 attacks
JOSEPH S. STROUD
Staff Writer

A surge of patriotism after Sept. 11, 2001, dampened enthusiasm for neo-Confederate causes, ending or at least diminishing growth that occurred after the Confederate flag fight in South Carolina three years ago.

"It just took all the wind out of the sails of all of the men who want to sit around and talk about Robert E. Lee's horse," said Lake High of Edgefield, former state chairman of the League of the South, a group dedicated to self-government for the region.

Disagreements persist among neo-Confederate groups and law enforcement officials over how big they are, how much influence they have, and to what extent a patriotic backlash that followed the terrorist attacks and continued through the war in Iraq slowed their growth. Still, many within the heritage community agree that interest waned, at least briefly.

"I just think that people were in shock, and they just kind of suspended their lives for awhile," J. Michael Hill, the League's founder and president, said from the organization's new national headquarters near Florence, Ala.

Hill and other Southern heritage group leaders say membership has grown dramatically nationwide since the S.C. flag fight, especially in the Palmetto State. Law enforcement officials say the evidence available publicly suggests otherwise.

"Other than some rallies and protests and demonstrations there's been very little activity," said S.C. Law Enforcement Division Chief Robert Stewart. "Based on the limited public activities they've had, we've had no problems. I can't think of an arrest."

Stewart declined to speculate on why public activity has diminished or whether interest in such causes has truly waned. But he said attendance at public events provides the best barometer.

Up to a dozen League members have appeared at Greenville County Council meetings to protest a move to create a holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr. They have argued that county employees should have the right to decide for themselves whether they want the day off.

Two weeks ago, on May 3, the Sons of Confederate Veterans held its annual Confederate Memorial Day march from Elmwood Cemetery to the S.C. State House. By the group's own estimate, the event drew 700 people -- far short of the thousands who gathered on numerous occasions while the flag still flew over the dome.

Activities by some of the more notorious groups have diminished significantly in South Carolina. For example, the Ku Klux Klan, battered by civil and criminal litigation for the last decade, has fewer than 100 members in South Carolina, Stewart said.

Most of the groups that remain pose more of a political than a physical threat.

"These aren't people who are going to go out and blow up anybody's house or burn a cross on anyone's lawn," said Mark Potok, editor of the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Report.

SHADES OF GRAY

In South Carolina, neo-Confederate or Southern heritage groups range in shades of gray from organizations concerned with historic preservation and battle re-enactments to groups that seek political power and promote secession. Many of the groups united during the flag fight, but their paths have diverged ever since. They include:

• The Sons of Confederate Veterans, recently embroiled in controversy over claims by some that its leaders have become too extremist and too political

• The United Daughters of the Confederacy, a women's group devoted mostly to preserving historic sites

• The Council of Conservative Citizens, regarded by some observers as one of the more extreme neo-Confederate groups

• The League of the South, formed in 1994 by a group of university professors concerned about federal infringement on states' rights and the erosion of white Southern culture

• The Southern Party, a coalition of the League of the South and others interested in separate nationhood for the region.

While its membership figures remain private, the League of the South's course since the flag controversy seems representative of other neo-Confederate groups.

Hill said the upheaval over the flag -- which was removed from the S.C. State House dome on July 1, 2000, as a similar banner was raised on the State House lawn -- sparked renewed interest in the League. He said subsequent flag controversies in Mississippi and Georgia -- both of which debated whether to keep Confederate symbols on the official state flag -- didn't hurt, either.

"In the states where we have those kinds of things happening, our membership has exploded over the last two to three years," Hill said.

Interest "slowed a little bit" after the terrorist attacks, he said, then resumed after about six months. He declined to provide membership figures, though he said estimates by the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors neo-Confederate organizations, were "fairly accurate."

The law center, based in Montgomery, Ala., recently placed League membership at about 9,000 nationwide.

Potok, the Intelligence Report editor, said the League lost members after the Sept. 11 attacks, though he did not know how many. He said Hill offended some people with a news release the next day -- on Sept. 12, 2001 -- in which he called the attacks "the natural fruits of a regime committed to multiculturalism and diversity, hallmarks of empire rather than of nation."

Potok, whose organization has labeled the League a "racist hate group" over various activities and communications since its founding in 1994, said blaming U.S. government policies for the attacks did not go over well.

"We know of a number of instances of people who left, and some of them were over that quote," he said.

Hill said the League didn't lose members. "What happened was that recruitment really slowed," he said.

Hill stood by the multiculturalism quote, and said he believed lax immigration policies contributed to the attacks.

"If you have a country that is going to allow people to come in pretty much unchecked and bring all of those different cultures and religions, many of which are hostile to the culture and religion of the people who founded this country, this is pretty much what you can expect," he said.

Hill said the League should thrive during a time of patriotic fervor because its mission involves defending the nation's founding principles -- like self-government by the states.

"We hope there will be a true resurgence of patriotism, meaning we get back to some of the founding ideals of the Republic that were given to us in the first place," he said.

He denied that the League is racist or a hate group (see related article).

The events of Sept. 11 "diverted attention for awhile," said Clyde Wilson, a USC history professor and another of the League's founding members. "But you know, as far as membership growth was concerned, that was just a blip."

Wilson said League officials do not track membership closely. But he said it might be as high as 15,000 nationally and growing.

High, the former S.C. League chairman, broke with the organization more than a year ago during a feud with his successor over a Web site domain name and suspicions about the allegiances of other leaders.

High said the League routinely fudged its membership numbers while he was involved.

"The membership was never over 1,200," he said. "Now, I know that they got out and said it was 6,000 and 8,000 and 12,000."

Wilson acknowledged the League may have exaggerated its numbers early on. But he insisted that interest is surging now.

"We get new members by the week, and every time there is an incident of unfavorable publicity we get more members," he said.

Although High has no involvement with the League now, he said the Sept. 11 attacks forced a pause in activity among groups promoting Southern nationalism.

"While everybody's waving the American flag you're not going to get anywhere," he said. "You might as well take a break."

"After the patriotism wears off," he added, "then the fact that the government can tap your phone for 14 days without a court order doesn't look so hot."

He was referring to a provision in domestic security legislation under consideration by the Bush administration that would loosen legal restrictions on government surveillance powers if enacted. The provision in question would apply during wartime.

High said he used to see sport utility vehicles bearing Confederate flags but now finds the banners accompanied by a second emblem of allegiance. "I have not seen a single Confederate flag on an SUV without it also having an American flag."

THE LOCUS OF ACTIVITY

Although the din of patriotism slowed the League's growth, the law center's Potok said the group's center of gravity has shifted toward South Carolina since the flag fight.

"They've got 31 chapters there, which is far more than any other place," he said. "The kind of locus of activity used to be the Florida panhandle and up into Southern Alabama. It's now clearly in South Carolina."

The flag fight in South Carolina provided a catalyst for growth, Potok said.

"The whole sort of Southern nationalist movement really began around the South Carolina flag fight," he said. "That's what helped move the League from a sort of cultural defense group to what we're really calling an out-and-out hate group."

League members dismiss the law center as a left-wing interest group that raises money for its agenda by stirring up controversy and throwing around labels. They say it has little access to real information.

"We know they are not reputable people," said Robert Hayes, current S.C. director for the League. "Everybody seems to think that they know who is a hate group and who isn't."

Still, Hayes agreed South Carolina has become a hotbed of League activity, though he also declined to be specific. He said there are League chapters in all but eight S.C. counties, meeting at least every other month.

Hayes said the S.C. delegation to national League meetings typically outnumbered those of other states. "Usually the only state to outrepresent South Carolina was the host state," he said.

He attributed the high level of interest here to "a long history of independent thinking."

Hayes said the South never rejoined the Union and, to this day, remains "occupied" by the federal government. But he said views on whether the South should secede now are mixed within the League's membership -- though there is broad agreement that federal mandates imposed on the states should be resisted.

For example, he said, "A very large percentage of the people of South Carolina consider abortion to be murder, and yet we in South Carolina cannot stop murder of unborn babies. The people of South Carolina should have the right to determine that."

POLITICAL POWER

Consolidating political power is central to the League's mission. Hayes said at least two S.C. legislators are also League members, though he declined to name them. The League's Web site maintains a running scorecard of "patriots" and "turncoats," claiming credit for 13 S.C. election victories last November alone, including the defeat of former Gov. Jim Hodges for his role in forging the flag compromise.

Most recently, the League has been involved with the Southern Party, a regional organization founded in 1999 to push for statewide referendums on whether to remain in the United States. The League hosted a Southern Party meeting in Abbeville last month aimed at patching up differences of opinion among the leadership.

Gray Banks of Branchville, director for the Southern Party, said it has amassed 12,000 signatures on a petition seeking inclusion on statewide election ballots. Although only 10,000 signatures are legally required, Banks said the party has not submitted its list to the state Election Commission because it wants "to be on the safe side" in case some of the signatures don't survive a challenge.

Potok said the Southern Party "imploded" more than a year ago in a dispute over local control.

"It's amusing, really, because what the leadership was accused of doing was violating principles of states' rights," he said.

Banks said the party has had some difficulties but still sparks interest.

"It's at least holding steady," he said. "And we feel like once we get on the ballot we can begin reaching out to people."

Banks said the "rule of law" established in the U.S. Constitution has been eroded by the federal government on a variety of issues, from the right to bear arms to affirmative action to the free speech rights of people like restaurateur Maurice Bessinger and former Atlanta Braves pitcher John Rocker -- both of whom came under fire in recent years for comments about minorities.

Banks said maintaining a white majority in South Carolina is a legitimate goal, though he said it was "politically incorrect."

"Why would anyone wish to become a minority in their own country?" he said. "That would be suicide and that would be insane."

Hill said politics isn't the primary area of emphasis these days.

"Right now, we're pursuing educational and cultural issues," he said. "We're trying to get people aware of the true history of America and the true history of the South."

Potok, of the Intelligence Project, said the underlying goal is more sinister.

"Rewriting the history of the Civil War so it was not about slavery and rewriting the history of segregation to say it wasn't that bad is a way of justifying present-day racist attitudes," he said.

Although crowds at public events tend to be on the small side, the Internet, the communication method of choice among neo-Confederate groups, continues to buzz with activity. One League member, Pat Baughman of Bamberg, has been working for nearly a year to establish a "Confederate colony," a gated community for people "with similar values."

Until about a month ago, Baughman was looking at property north of Abbeville. After the idea fell through, he turned his attention to some land near Lawrenceburg, Tenn.

"I wanted to make sure there was a place for people who enjoy the Confederate heritage, who are proud of it, to simply have a place to retire and be together and go to their SCV meetings and be together," Baughman said. "Our idea is to do what we can to maintain and keep the anti-Southern bias from killing our culture. We're in a situation where there's a cultural genocide going on, and the average person in the South doesn't have a clue."

Baughman said his colony idea has drawn a lot of interest. Whether it becomes a reality remains to be seen.

Given the climate of patriotism that began two years ago and persisted through the war with Iraq, League officials acknowledge the time may not be ideal to pursue a Southern nationalist agenda. But they continue to believe its time is coming.

"We don't place too much stock on watching short-term events," said Hill, the League president. "We're focused on the long term. And I think the long-term trend of the American empire is down.

"We just have to be patient."-

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Founder formerly led League of the South

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