League of the South

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League of the South

LEADER: J. Michael Hill

YEAR ESTABLISHED OR BECAME ACTIVE: 1994

ESTIMATED SIZE: 10,000

USUAL AREA OF OPERATION: United States

OVERVIEW

Founded in 1994 by a group of southern academics led by Michael Hill, the League of the South is a self-described southern nationalist organization dedicated to the establishment of an independent republic somewhere within the current boundaries of the southern United States. Membership is estimated at 10,000, with chapters in 20 states. Recognizing that southern secession is very unlikely to become a viable political movement in the foreseeable future, the current focus of the group is in the defense of southern culture against what is perceived as a concerted attack from "cultural elites" in Washington, Hollywood, and the Ivy League.

HISTORY

The League of the South was founded in Tuskaloosa, Alabama, in 1994 by Michael Hill, then a professor of British history at Stillman College, a historically black institution. Other founding members included academics and journalists from throughout the southern United States. The group considers this focus on leadership by intellectuals and academics as its major strength.

The impetus for the group's founding was what Hill perceived as the denigration and rejection of southern heritage and values by the larger, majority U.S. culture. The League's manifesto gives voice to this theme, noting that in a time when all cultures are celebrated and protected and considerable social pressure is brought to bear on anything that resembles racism, southerners are still routinely portrayed as "rednecks" or "crackers" in movies and on television, and it is still socially acceptable to refer to them as such.

The group originally called itself the Southern League, but in 1997 changed its name to the League of the South in order to avoid legal conflict with a minor league baseball association with an established prior claim to the same name.

The League of the South quickly came to the forefront of the larger so-called southern heritage movement, growing from its initial membership of about 40 in 1994 to 4,000 in 1998, to an estimated 10,000 today. Its stated purpose is to "advance the cultural, social, economic, and political well being and independence of the southern people by all honorable means." By all accounts, these means have been limited to the political and intellectual spheres, and no violent actions have ever been attributed to the group's members. Nevertheless, the Southern Poverty Law Center, a civil rights group that has itself been the subject of controversy, denounced the League of the South as a hate group in its quarterly publication, The Intelligence Report.

Unquestionably, the League of the South does stake out a number of philosophical positions that place it well outside the cultural mainstream. It is intensely critical of the U.S. federal government, which it refers to as the American Empire. In Hill's view, the southern secession of 1860–1861 was a legal termination of a voluntary contract between the states and Lincoln's maniacal determination to preserve the union by force created a tyrannical, illegitimate federal government that would have appalled the framers of the constitution.

The group aims to reclaim the symbols of the Confederacy from their current negative associations with bigotry and racial violence, and to restore Christianity as a dominant force in society. Hill urges his followers to "de-legitimate" all institutions controlled by the federal government, including public schools. He calls on members to secede from American popular culture, eschew its institutions, and replace them with what he considers uniquely southern cultural inventions, such as home schooling.

In the twenty-first century the League of the South continues to expand, with local chapters springing up throughout the southern United States. The group has established an educational arm, the League of the South Institute for the Study of Southern Culture and History, which has its own operating budget and board of directors. The group hosts an annual conference, which is attended by hundreds of core members and large donors.

Despite the fact that Hill continually reminds members that cultural revival must precede political efforts, the League of the South has become increasingly politically active. It has worked to defeat candidates who are deemed disloyal to the South, usually because they supported the removal of the Confederate battle flag from state facilities. The group claims responsibility, for example, for helping defeat then South Carolina Governor David Beasely in 1996, after he went on record as supporting the removal of the battle flag from the statehouse. In 2004, the group called for an economic boycott of Georgia after voters elected to remove all traces of the Confederate emblem from the state flag. That same year, the group campaigned heavily for Tom Parker, who was ultimately elected to the Alabama supreme court.

The League of the South has had a profound impact on other southern heritage movements. Groups like the Council of Conservative Citizens have adopted much of the League's "unreconstructed" southern history as doctrine. One such doctrine is the idea of the Celtic nature of the South, reflected in the League's insistence on Oxford rather than U.S. spelling conventions in all its publications.

PHILOSOPHY AND TACTICS

At the center of the League of the South is a small group of academics who teach at major universities like Emory and the University of Virginia. They are historians and philosophers and teachers of religion whose views have been progressively abandoned by the mainstream since feminism and multiculturalism took root and became the dominant forces in academia, transforming the liberal arts curriculum.

The founders of the League of the South are unhappy because they feel that the culture and heritage of the South has been unfairly marginalized, ridiculed, and condemned within U.S. culture as a whole. From their perspective, Huckleberry Finn has been removed from the lists of great books, Thomas Jefferson knocked from his lofty perch in the American pantheon, and the history of the Civil War refocused on the suffering caused by the South's economic dependence on slave labor. The League of the South was created to fight against this trend, and takes this war of words and ideas very seriously. As Clyde Wilson (University of South Carolina professor of history and editor of the papers of the great antebellum leader John C. Calhoun) put it at League seminar in April 2005: "Those who want to wipe out our memories want to wipe us out as well."

As de facto President for life, Hill has been very clear about the organization's objectives. These are to defend and promote the culture of the old South though educational efforts and political activism; to establish a chapter in every county of every southern state; and to eventually lead the South to secession from the United States and the establishment of an independent southern republic.

The leaders of the League seem to be modeling their strategy after more developed, successful secessionist movements in other countries. A connection to the Northern League of Italy is tacitly acknowledged in the League of the South's foundational documents. The politically successful Quebec sovereignty movement no doubt provides some inspiration as well.

LEADERSHIP

J. Michael Hill

Before founding the largest and most influential southern heritage organization in the United States, Michael Hill was a professor of British history at Stillman College, a historically black institution. One biographer alleges that he was always an oddity at the school, with his openly pro-Confederate views and affectations, though his career lasted for decades there.

Hill began developing his views about southern sovereignty and the Celtic nature of the Old South in the 1970s, studying under Grady McWhiney. In the early 1990s, Hill published two books on Celtic history, expounding on his mentor's views. In 1994, he and 40 others established the League of the South. Hill left his position at Stillman in 1998 to focus full time on League activities.

Applying these models to their own cause, Hill and the other leaders have chosen to focus first and foremost on cultural revitalization and recruitment. Detailed instructions for forming country chapters are found on the group's web site, along with a voluminous listing of activities that new members should engage in. These include the display of the Confederate flag, support for locally owned businesses, involvement in local politics, and pamphleteering and otherwise actively promoting the League at the grassroots level. Members are encouraged to run for local office, and particularly the office of county sheriff. Networking and cross-membership with other southern heritage organizations like the Council of Conservative Citizens is encouraged as well, as is involvement in conservative causes like the anti-abortion movement.

Members are urged to withdraw their children from the public school system to protect them from assimilating to the majority U.S. culture. Home schooling or, for those that can afford it, private Christian education are the prescribed alternatives. The League's Institute provides recommendations for instructional materials, speakers for local conferences and seminars, and is in the process of developing a home schooling curriculum.

On a personal level, the group calls on its members to attend their local churches, live Christian lives, care for their local needy families, and to be good stewards of their own private property.

At the state level, the group has claimed some success in helping to defeat unsympathetic gubernatorial candidates and campaigning for politicians who support their causes. The most prominent examples are the defeat of South Carolina governor David Beasely in 1996, and the successful campaign to elect Tom Parker to the Alabama supreme court in 2004.

On a national level, the group seems to be fighting a losing battle in well publicized campaigns to keep the Confederate flag flying on public property. Despite the efforts of the League and other heritage groups, only Mississippi still incorporates the Confederate emblem in its state flag. An extended series of protests by the NAACP and others in South Carolina resulted in the removal of the Confederate battle flag from atop the statehouse to a monument on the Capitol lawn, a solution that has proven to be unsatisfactory to both sides of the debate. Today, the NAACP continues its economic boycott of South Carolina.

For candidates running for national office, personal association with any southern heritage or neo-Confederate group remains tantamount to political suicide. This was dramatically illustrated in December 2002 when Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott was forced to step down after it was revealed he had a longtime association with the Council of Conservative Citizens.

OTHER PERSPECTIVES

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a Montgomery, Alabama, civil rights group, has been consistent in its vocal opposition to the League of the South, first naming the latter as a hate group in the summer, 2000 edition of its quarterly Intelligence Report. As evidence for this charge, the SPLC quotes semi-anonymous postings on various neo-Confederate web sites by former and current League of the South members, along with excerpts from a few of Hill's speeches that the SPLC sees as thinly veiled racism. Most of the quotes attributed to Hill are taken from speeches in which he attempts to defend slavery in the old South.

Other watchdog groups like the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) have not included the League of the South in their lists of hate groups, though the ADL does list the annual League of the South conference on their calendar of extremist events.

KEY EVENTS

1996:: The League campaigns vigorously against South Carolina Governor David Beasely, who is defeated.
1998:: Hill leaves his position at Stillman College.
2003:: Hill and others establish the Southern Party as a national third political party.
2004:: The League campaigns successfully for the election of Tom Parker to the Alabama supreme court.

Supporters of the League dispute the claim that they are a racist or hate group. They point to the fact that the group's official materials are rife with statements denouncing racism—although they are marked by defensive complaints about "anti-southern bigotry." No articles denigrating any other culture or race can be found on the group's web site. No member of the group has ever been accused of violent or illegal activities, and the group's materials stress that members should conduct themselves in an honorable, law-abiding manner.

With that said, it may be inevitable that a group that so proudly trumpets the glories of the white antebellum South and that has defended slavery as being a relatively benign—more like the portrayal in Gone with the Wind than in Uncle Tom's Cabin—would be charged with promoting racist ideas, and might indeed attract some racists among its 10,000 members.

SUMMARY

Founded by a group of southern academics led by Michael Hill, the League of the South has grown from forty members at its inception in 1994 to an estimated 10,000 members in 2005. Despite the unrealistical nature of its goals (which include secession from the United States), and the eccentric views of its leaders, the League of the South is the fastest growing, most influential group in the larger southern heritage movement.

To spearhead its educational efforts, the group has established the League of the South Institute for the Study of Southern Culture and History in Killen, Alabama. The Institute has its own operating budget and board of directors. The Institute hosts an annual national conference, provides speakers for state chapter events, and provides recommendations for home schooling.

Members are encouraged to be active in local politics and conservative causes, while living civically responsible lives. At the same time, members are urged to withdraw from the majority U.S. culture and its institutions, including the public school system. Recruitment and promoting southern culture are the primary focus of the group's activities.