Ellis Merton Coulter (1890–1981) was a American historian and founding member of the Southern Historical Association. He was a professor at the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia and the author of several books. Among historians today, his views are considered controversial. 1890 (MDCCCXC) was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar). ... 1981 (MCMLXXXI) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... The University of Georgia, is located approximately 70 miles north-east of Atlanta in Athens, Georgia and is the largest institution of higher learning and research in the State of Georgia. ... Athens or Athens-Clarke County is a city in Clarke County, Georgia, U.S., in the northeastern part of the state, just off of Georgia 316. ...

Both of Coulter's grandfathers served in the army of the Southern Confederacy. One of them survived the war but was indicted for Ku Klux Klan-related violence and acquitted by an all-black jury.[1] Motto: Deo Vindice (Latin: With God As Our Vindicator) Anthem: God Save the South (unofficial) Dixie (popular) Capital Montgomery, Alabama February 4, 1861–May 29, 1861 Richmond, Virginia May 29, 1861–April 9, 1865 Danville, Virginia April 3–April 10, 1865 Largest city New Orleans February 4, 1861–May 1... Members of the second Ku Klux Klan at a rally during the 1920s. ...

He was a member of the Dunning School of historians, a generation of white historians hostile to civil rights for African Americans. According to the New Georgia Encyclopedia, "Coulter emerged as a leader of that generation of white southern historians who viewed the South's past with pride and defended its racist policies and practices. He framed his literary corpus to praise the Old South, glorify Confederate heroes, vilify northerners, and denigrate southern blacks."[2] The Dunning School was from 1900 to 1960 the dominant school of historiography regarding the Reconstruction period in American history, 1865-1877. ... Civil rights or positive rights are those legal rights retained by citizens and protected by the government. ... African Americans, also known as Afro-Americans or black Americans, are an ethnic group in the United States of America whose ancestors, usually in predominant part, were indigenous to Sub-Saharan and West Africa. ...

His books are considered by historians "to be historical apologies justifying southern secession, defending the Confederate cause, and condemning Reconstruction" as did his teacher, J. G. de Roulhac Hamilton. Coulter's books were used in the mid-20th century as a basis for maintaining Jim Crow segregation and opposing civil rights reform. Jim Crow laws were state and local laws enacted in the Southern and border states of the United States and in force between 1876 and 1964 that required racial segregation, especially of African-Americans, in all public facilities. ... Civil rights or positive rights are those legal rights retained by citizens and protected by the government. ...

In the introduction to Freedom's Lawmakers historian Eric Foner wrote: "Anti-Reconstruction scholars faithfully echoed Democratic propaganda of the post-Civil War years. "The Negroes," wrote E. Merton Coulter in 1947, "were fearfully unprepared to occupy positions of rulership," and black officeholding was "the most spectacular and exotic development in government in the history of white civilization...(and the) longest to be remembered, shuddered at, and execrated."

Foner also noted that as late as 1968, Coulter, "The last wholly antagonistic scholar of the era, described Georgia's most prominent Reconstruction black officials as swindlers and "scamps," and suggested that whatever positive qualities they possessed were inherited from white ancestors." [Freedom's Lawmakers, xii, and E. Merton Coulter, The South during Reconstruction, 1865-1877 (Baton Rouge, 1947), 141-44; Coulter, Black Legislators, 119-20, 180.]

Books

• A Short History of Georgia (1933, 1947, and 1960)
• History of Georgia (1954) a junior high school textbook
• The South During Reconstruction (1947)
• Confederate States of America (1952)

External link

• New Georgia Encyclopedia: E. Merton Coulter (1890-1981)

References

Fred A. Bailey, "E. Merton Coulter," in Reading Southern History: Essays on Interpreters and Interpretations, ed. Glenn Feldman (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2001).

"A Few Words about E. Merton Coulter," Georgia Historical Quarterly 58 (spring 1974): 6-24.

• Foner, Eric. Freedom's Lawmakers: A Directory Of Black Officeholders During Reconstruction, New York: Oxford University Press, 1993, Revised, 1996, LSU Press.