The Great Divide

The American nation has traditionally treated the Lost Cause as a singular phenomenon, a reactionary ideology built from the American South’s perceived victimhood following the Civil War. However, in the myth of the Lost Cause, generations of American far-right individuals and groups have found an ideological and practical model. This book makes two interconnected arguments. First, it argues that there is evidence of modern Confederate and Southern nationalist groups evolving and incorporating more targets into their grievance infrastructures—always in the language of victimhood. These targets progress as the status quo changes, keeping the perceived victimhood of the groups relevant as time passes and more traditionally marginalized communities contest for rights in the American experiment. The second argument is that through the politics and rhetoric of victimhood that find common cause with Trumpism, the Lost Cause remains relevant to conversations about the right’s perceived victimhood focused on a lost status quo ante—up to and including the two mythologies riding into battle together in defense of an electorally defeated president on January 6, 2021.