April is Southern History & Heritage Month - Commentary by Frank Gillispie

April is Southern History & Heritage Month – Commentary by Frank Gillispie

April is Southern History and Heritage month. But you would never know it if it were left up to the major media. Every other group that declares a month for their recognition gets news coverage, often extensive coverage. But not the great American South. Dixie is a unique part of this nation, with a unique history and culture. It has made major contributions to the nation and the world. Yet it is totally ignored by the media, and actually attacked by those who would destroy all evidence of its existence.

Southern History and Heritage needs a month to set the record straight. We need an opportunity to correct the massive distortions of history and the key elements of our culture that those in power try to mask. You see, Dixie is the one part of America that still supports the American Revolution. Most of the rest of the nation has abandoned our founding principles.

So, what are those founding principles? What kind of nation did our founders create? And, how did we lose them?

A key principle of this nation was that our rights were granted by our creator, not government. That is plainly stated in the Declaration of Independence. The only power the government has is what we choose to give them. That is the way it is supposed to be. But now, government assumes that it has all power and the only rights we have is what ever government says we have.

This nation was founded on the principle of personal responsibility. Americans were expected to be responsible for their own needs and the needs of their family. Government’s only role was to prevent anyone else from interfering with our ability to take care of ourselves. But today government assumes the responsibility to provide for our every need, and insist that we turn over our personal responsibility and control to the massive government bureaucracy.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;..." --U.S. Constitition, Amendment I

"That religion, or the duty which we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence; and therefore all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience . . ." --Virginia Declaration of Rights, 1776

Our founders Constitution declared our right to worship God as we see fit. It specifically said that the federal government is prohibited from interfering with that right. But today, if we as a community choose to have God as a part of our schools, the federal government denies us that right.

And speaking of schools, a part of our personal responsibility is to provide for the education of our children. But today government dictates every component of our children’s education, even to what will be taught in the history classes.

You see, the conflict from the beginning was over where the responsibility for our lives lies. Are we to be allowed to run our own lives as we see fit, or does government have the right take that responsibility away and dictate to us how we should live?

Today the all powerful government people have the upper hand. And they are determined to impose government control over everyone, especially those of us who still insist on personal freedom and personal responsibility.

The majority of the holdouts who still insist on personal freedom and responsibility are right here in Dixie. And if we are to preserve any degree of that personal freedom, it will be Southerners who lead the resistance.

So remember that April is Southern History and Heritage month. And if you still believe in the principles on which this nation was founded, join us here in Dixie in the effort to take our nation back!

"If the Constitution and the Union established by our forefathers were 'restored' then there will be no truer supporters of that union and that Constitution than the Southern people. Every brave people who considered their rights attacked and their Constitutional liberties invaded, would have done as we did. Our conduct was not caused by any insurrectionary spirit nor can it be termed rebellion, for our construction of the Constitution under which we lived and acted was the same from its adoption and for eighty years we have been taught and educated by the founders of the Republic and their written declaration which controlled our consciences and actions." --Robert E. Lee

"Whatever errors in policy they may have committed, either in inception of the difficulties or in their subsequent management, the real object of those who resorted to Secession, as well as those who sustained it, was not to overthrow the Government of the united States; but to perpetuate the principles upon which it was founded. The object in quitting the Union was not to destroy, but to save the principles of the Constitution. The form of Government therein embodied, I did think, and do still think, the best the world ever saw, and I fear the world will never see its like again." --Alexander Stephens

"A nation which does not remember what it was yesterday does not know where it is today." --Robert E. Lee

"Do not separate text from historical background. If you do, you will have perverted and subverted the Constitution, which can only end in a distorted, bastardized form of illegitimate government." --James Madison

"Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms [of government] those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny." --Thomas Jefferson