I was somewhat struck though upon reflection not shocked by Governor DeSantis strident and angry tone in North Carolina on Friday, seeking to restore the name of Fort Bragg. The name has been changed by the Biden Administration to Fort Liberty.

General Braxton Bragg as I am sure most of you know was a Confederate General – though not necessarily one I would rate as a better general as an armchair Civil War historian, but someone who was from North Carolina.

DeSantis has flirted near the area of Confederate “lost cause” narratives before but never really embraced it. But the Governor is getting all the more desperate as his main calling card – the cultural war, must be ramped up because at the moment former President Trump is continuing to have a big lead among the sort of white working class voters, the elitist DeSantis with his donor class backers, and Ivy League-driven talking points cannot reach.

But truthfully, given DeSantis considers himself a Constitutional “originalist” advocacy of secession and the Confederacy fits his ideology. For once DeSantis isn’t being driven by the money class and is actually showing some consistency!

In the Winter of 1860/61, as Republican Abraham Lincoln had jolted the south with his election, secession was in the air.

Secessionists and other southerners who were what we’d call “Constitutional Unionists” spoke of an “Old Union,” formed in 1787 where the Constitution and structure of political leadership allowed North and South to remain fairly equal in terms of power, prestige and economical relevance. The emergence of industry and free labor in the rapidly urbanizing North tipped the balance, while the south’s economy with a plantation system based on slavery and rural agrarian/Jeffersonian values resembled a pre-industrial economy misplaced in an emerging global economic superpower.

It was in fact the south’s fault they did not modernize their economy or diversify it or allow free labor to replace slave labor. But much of the southern narrative was about the original meaning of the constitution and how it meant for a harmonious relationship between regions which was upset by furor of northern abolitionists.

Constitutional originalism which DeSantis is an adherent to is exactly what the Confederacy was built on in its constitutional language. One of the striking things about the CSA constitution is how similarly framed it was to the US Constitution without the Bill of Rights (10 amendments). There are little differences, that do merit a discussion on substance but by and large it was a stripping back of the US Constitution to 1787 without the 1789 Bill of Rights or subsequent amendments.

So perhaps Constitutional Originalists and Federalist Society types are in fact sympathetic with the Confederacy? DeSantis just jumped into that territory far more overtly than before on FRiday, and it will be interesting to see if he continues in this direction.