After the Civil War, the former Confederate States of America faced challenges as a defeated nation. Prominent Southerners created a public relations campaign detailing the New South as a region that no longer embraced the plantation and slave labor mentality of the Old South. However, segregation between blacks and whites was still an active practice, and claims of a successful conversion of the New South rang especially hollow during the civil rights movement. The southern region has indeed managed to develop an industry and manufacturing industry that rivals its northern neighbors, and race relations have improved significantly in recent years.
After the disastrous outcome of the Civil War, the former Confederate States of America (CSA) faced even more challenges as a defeated nation. The federal occupation and forced reconciliations like the “Battleship Oath” have had a severe demoralizing effect on many Southern residents. In an effort to project a renewed allegiance to the Union, prominent Southerners like the publisher of the Atlanta Constitution have created a public relations campaign detailing the New South.
Before the Civil War, Northern states typically focused their economy on manufacturing, while Southern states focused primarily on the production of raw materials. A northern factory would make cloth from cotton supplied by southern plantations, for example. Because the antebellum South used slave labor to supply these raw commodities, however, the region was generally seen as a repressive agrarian culture with little regard for human equality.
After the Civil War, prominent white Southerners wanted to portray the New South as a region that no longer embraced the plantation and slave labor mentality of the Old South. The region had the same ability to develop manufacturing and industry of the North. Indeed, the lack of union representation and the availability of large and cheap commercial land parcels should have made the area even more attractive to industry leaders.
This idea of the New South caught on in various Southern cities and towns, but it wasn’t quite the public relations miracle many elite Southerners hoped it would be. While many Southern states began to distance themselves from the prejudices and inequalities of the Old South, there were still a number of issues that continued to cloud perceptions of a truly New South. Segregation between blacks and whites was still an active practice, for example.
During the tumultuous years of the civil rights movement, claims of a successful conversion of the New South rang especially hollow. Only after the passage of the Civil Rights Act did many examples of sanctioned segregation fall by the wayside in some southern states. Some critics viewed any application of the idea by Southern politicians as a coded message to certain voters, just as the phrase “States Rights” has become a secret shorthand for continued apartheid efforts.
The southern region has indeed managed to develop an industry and manufacturing industry that rivals its northern neighbors. Race relations have improved significantly in recent years, and many former residents of the Rust Belt and other troubled regions have migrated to the South to find work and a lower cost of living. While the New South idea may have largely been retired, the True South has largely succeeded in achieving many of its original goals and aspirations.
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