The United Daughters of the Confederacy: Using “Lost Cause History” to Shape America’s Future
Above Image: Small group of original founding members of the UDC
Since George Floyd’s untimely death, the American population has finally addressed the years of oppression and racial inconsistencies embedded into this country’s history and influential institutions sparking outrage around the world. One of the hubs of resistance for the Black Lives Matter Movement in the United States is set in what once was the beating heart and capital of the confederacy, Richmond, Virginia. Throughout the movement, the Virginia state capital has seen constant protesting, counterprotesting, and citizen demands for the removal of confederate statues and monuments prevalent around the city. These monuments along with heavily biased and distorted accounts of Civil War history began to make an influence on southern education, voting, and attitude after the confederate defeat in 1865. This movement was known as the “Lost Cause” and was led by numerous self proclaimed southern historians and organizations using their personal perception and relationship with Civil War history and the confederacy as a vehicle to shape the many years and minds to come.
Above Image: Current members of the UDC
One of the leading and most frightening organizations to be born in this period of American history is known as The United Daughters of the Confederacy. Established in 1894 in Nashville, Tennessee, the organization’s current headquarters are located in none other than Richmond, Virginia. Without the power to vote or run in any government elections, these women used their social expertise and fundraising skills along with their hand in elementary education and political lobbying as their way of personally rewriting the wrongs of their fathers and husbands. To push their message of “real” southern Civil War history, the UDC lobbied for and funded many of these monuments and statues littered across the southern landscape today with the overall goal of “educating” future generations of their ancestors “heroic” acts. However, the United Daughters of the Confederacy took their efforts a step further with their influence over southern children. As a new generation of southern adolescents grew after the Civil War period, the UDC closely monitored the production and contents of textbooks and material read and taught in southern schools as well as established an auxiliary group, the Children of the Confederacy, to take these efforts beyond the classroom. In a process in many ways similar to organizations such as Hitler Youth, children were rewarded and empowered for memorizing and reciting “Lost Cause” historical content such as “the confederate fight was heroic” and “slavery was not the root cause of the war.” Not only did these influential actions made by these women lead to widespread acceptance and pride in false Southern Civil War history, they also allowed for the continuation of normalizing white supremacy and organizations like the Ku Klux Klan, who are alive and deeply embedded in our country and government today.
Above Image: Chapter example of Children of the Confederacy
Now with over a century of influence under their belt, the damage by the education, lobbying, and political pursuits of the United Daughters of the Confederacy has clearly already been done. Fast forward several generations later, we are currently seeing the effects of personalizing the “Lost Cause” agenda and how these ideas have acted as a catalyst for the counter protests against the Black Lives Matter Movement and the protesters have not forgotten. As many monuments continue to come down around the world and awareness of racial injustice bleeds into political and social action, it is vital that we look back and see exactly why people are scared of change in the South.