Readers of the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Chronicle of Higher Education were deeply disturbed by reports of a community college course which seemed to promote long-discredited, indeed racist, ideas about the Civil War and Southern history. According to these newspapers, the course claimed that African Americans were contented in their roles as slaves and that tens of thousands of them served voluntarily in the Confederate army.
The noncredit, one-night-a-week continuing education course, “North Carolina History: Our Part in the War for Southern Independence” was taught at a satellite campus of Randolph County Community College by Jack Perdue, a local real estate inspector. Perdue, although not a professional historian, is a respected amateur authority on North Carolina in the Civil War. He attempted to balance his own, admittedly Southern, bias by inviting other speakers to his class including two local university professors. For the most part, his students—all ten of them—enrolled in the course to learn more about the oft-neglected role of their native state in the nation’s defining conflict. Perdue planned to donate a portion of the course tuition towards an eighth-grade essay contest sponsored by the Sons of Confederate Veterans, a Southern heritage organization.
According to Perdue, Ethan Feinsilver of the Greensboro (N.C.) News and Record dropped in on his class only long enough to jot down a few notes that, after journalistic enhancements, he later presented to local civil rights leaders and selected historians. The results made up the nationally circulated news story, Since Feinsilver’s article appeared in the November 15 issue of the News and Record, it has been quoted endlessly in the media both here and abroad. His original headline, “Course Reopens War’s Old Wounds,” has since proven self-fulfilling.
The uproar immediately following Feinsilver’s article ultimately prompted college officials to cancel the final session of the course. According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, members of the state and local chapters of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People met college officials to express their dismay with the content of the course. Rev, George Allison, the executive director of the North Carolina chapter of the NAACP stated, according to the Chronicle, that they discussed the concerns they had about the distortions of history invoked in the teaching of the course and the fact that the course was offensive. The Chronicle also reported that Larry K. Linker, the president of the college, declared in a written statement, “We would never intentionally set up any class that is offensive to anyone in our community. Obviously this class has done that. Therefore we are going to step back and take a close look at it and at our process of approving courses.” However, from the available reports, the president appears to have canceled the course without a full investigation of the content of the course-perhaps to avoid further controversy.
A civil rights investigation and a lawsuit by the Sons of Confederate Veterans ma)u be in the offing. The controversy should be easily settled; according to Perdue, there are videotapes of all class sessions. A rational, close viewing of the tapes may ultimately provide the objectivity needed to resolve the debate.
This report is partly based on a communication from Dr. Jeff Kinard who teaches at lite Guilford Technical Community College, Jamestown, N.C.
