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Article: The Gospel of Disunion: Religion and Separatism in the Antebellum South.
- Article from:
- The Historian
- Article date:
- March 22, 1995
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1995 Phi Alpha Theta, History Honor Society, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Mitchell Snay has crafted an insightful and informative study of the critical role that Southern religion played in formatting a distinctive sectional identity during the three decades before the Civil War. Snay's thesis is that "[Southern religion] invested the sectional controversy over slavery with moral and religions meaning, strengthening those elements in Southern political culture that made secession possible" (2).
The author effectively examines Southern religion in the contexts of sectional politics, slavery, and separatism. In the first instance, Snay demonstrates how Southern clergymen defined the relationship between religion and sectional politics, ...