Talk:Scalawag

"However, it is clear that greed, the sentiment which drives government and economy, was at the chief motive for most scalawags and carpetbaggers"

Biased article
Your text is biased because you use the derogatory term throughout without making clear that the term is a slur on the people your are discussing. I added "derogatory" at the beginning to warn readers, but the rest of the text needs to be cleaned up. An analogy to clarify my complaint: it reads as if, in the Wikipedia entry for "nigger," you were to launch into a history of African Americans and employ the slur instead of Negro, Colored, black. The fact that some historians like to use the term throughout their discussion of Reconstruction simply reflects their bad judgment. It is no excuse for doing so here.

Wow
Yeah, this whole thing is ridiculous... Please someone else rewrite... This doesn't actually say anything at all...
 * Which is why I've rewritten most of it. It still needs work, however.  Someone else want to take over?--dogcanteen
 * Not sure when these comments were written, but article looks pretty good now. "Nice Job" to whomever. --Satori Son 13:46, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

The etymology of the word
Does anybody know where this strange word comes from?

etymology
It's easy to research such things on the Internet, at or perhaps.

dino 03:38, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for your help. Perhaps it would be a good idea to add just a few words (maybe a footnote?) in the voice. Don't you think so?

Anybody know what this means?
This paragraph cries out for conversion to plain English. It is terrible writing and not understandable by ordinary readers. If someone wants to rewrite it in plain English, please do so. Otherwise, it will be safe on this page.


 * Baggett (2003) shows that Scalawags were for the most part long-time doubters or opponents of the Confederacy. He explains that along the continuum of "an 1860 antisecessionist Breckinridge supporter/1860 Bell or Douglas supporter/ 1860 antisecessionist / passive wartime unionist / peace party advocate / active wartime unionist / postwar Union party supporter" the farther an individual moved along this line the greater his chances of becoming a Republican (p. 271).

Skywriter 02:12, 16 May 2006 (UTC)


 * it seems clear enough to me: Baggett looked at hundreds of people and gave eash a score:

The higher the score the more likely the person was a Republican (that is a Scalawag). Rjensen 02:25, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
 * score = 1 an 1860 antisecessionist Breckinridge supporter
 * 2 1860 Bell or Douglas supporter
 * 3 1860 antisecessionist
 * 4 passive wartime unionist
 * 5 peace party advocate
 * 6 active wartime unionist
 * 7 postwar Union party supporter

Aside from setting a record for awkward writing, that paragraph and the list assumes reader knows who is Breckinridge, Bell and Douglas. Skywriter 13:07, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
 * it's true that people who are ignorant of basic history will either have to click and learn or forever be ignorant of the 7 factors that led to Scalawagism. On the other hand people who are interested in one of the basic questions of Reconstruction just may learn something from Baggett's extraordinary research. Rjensen 13:37, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Bagget's research may indeed be extraordinary but there is no reason to force readers to guess. The article fails to provide basic information, such as full names and links to Breckinridge, Bell and Douglas. Skywriter 13:50, 16 May 2006 (UTC) Im like totally bored,

Woolfolk
Woolfolk is heavily quoted in this article yet there is no information about the book. Skywriter 20:48, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

moving section to talk page
In Alabama, white southerners dominated the Republican party. (Woolfolk, 131ff) One hundred seventeen Republicans were nominated, elected, or appointed to the most lucrative and important positions (state executive and judicial offices and federal legislative and judicial offices) between 1868 and 1881. They included 76 white southerners, 35 northerners. Included were six African Americans. In state offices during Reconstruction, white southerners were even more predominant, as 51 won nominations, compared to 11 carpetbaggers and one black. Twenty-seven scalawags won state executive nominations (75%), 24 won state judicial nominations (89%), and 101 were elected to the legislature (39%). However, fewer scalawags won nominations to federal offices: 15 were nominated or elected to Congress (48%) compared to 11 carpetbaggers and 5 blacks. Forty-eight scalawags were members of the 1867 constitutional convention (49.5% of the Republican membership); and seven scalawags were members of the 1875 constitutional convention (58% of the miniscule Republican membership).

1. this is not sourced 2. it is unclear, and ignores that African Americans were among the carpetbaggers, or Northerners who participated in government in the South during Reconstruction.
 * this is sourced in the very first line (Woolfolk pages 131 ff-- full title is in references. This article is about white southern Republicans = Scalawags. It has very precise details about them. Rjensen 01:49, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

do not delete scholarship
please do not delete summaries of scholarly books and articles. Please do not slip in POV (like "promises" that somebody made when to whom?) Rjensen 01:45, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

scholarship not deleted, error discovered
I believe the misunderstanding is due to your incorrectly entering the author's name in the text. You confuse Woolfolk when it should be Wiggins. Woolfolk is not findable by looking at the first words in the bibliography, and Woolfolk is not the author's surname in any search of book publishing records. And yet, the referenced text in this article is to Woolfolk. In short, this is a reader's nightmare. Skywriter 05:46, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Party membership not required for scalawag label
The sourced definition of scalawag in current version is an accurate description. White Southerners were taunted for pledging that they had not furthered the aims of the Confederacy, not for party membership, as was mistakenly added. I do not see the other edits as friendly. If you wish to discuss them one by one, please do so here. As with every Wikipedia article, it is useful to be able to verify sourced claims. Without the use of citations, various edits fall into a nether land of not being verifiable.Skywriter 16:48, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

The following was removed because it is vague and unsourced. "The majority of Southern whites were unable to take the oath and (for a while) they were not allowed to vote." What is "for a while"? What is the evidence for "majority". Lincoln and Johnson were both quite lenient, and both had the goal of re-integrating white Southerners as quickly and painlessly as possible. Jefferson Davis was not re-integrated, despite his plea to President Johnson. Skywriter 17:14, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

The following sourced fact was changed to remove the text and substituted with "scalawags." - 	They were white Southerners who "refused to have any part in the Confederate cause"  (John Hope Franklin, Reconstruction after the Civil War, 99) This is not a helpful edit that sheds light. There is too much labeling and not enough precise definition in all of the pages related to Reconstruction. My effort is directed toward replacing unsourced generalities with specific sourced data. I hope you will join in that effort. Skywriter 17:18, 7 June 2006 (UTC)
 * let's not mix up wartime Unionist (which has its own entry) with Scalawag, which was only used after the war. Baggett has much more complex and useful definition than in Franklin's olfd book, which misses the scholarship of last 45 years. Rjensen 19:41, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

The following was added, is contentious, and yet there is no citation. It is not verifiable.

Scalawags (see also Unionist) were Southern whites who joined(page number?) the Republican party in the South during Reconstruction, forming a coalition with Freedmen (African Americans) and Carpetbaggers (whites who came from the North) to take political control of their states. They were defeated by conservative Democrats called Redeemers by 1877. Because they had not been Confederate officials they were able to swear the "ironclad oath, required by federal law affirming that they had not taken part in the regime of the Confederacy. The majority(page number?)of Southern whites were unable to take the oath and (for a while) they were not allowed to vote. (page number?)

On the other hand, the material by Franklin is clear, precise and verifiable. Skywriter 23:00, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Both of two reviews of Baggett's book observe that his focus is scalawag elites, the office holders, not ordinary white Southerners who took the oath that Johnson required.

http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/ahr/109.2/br_65.html

http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/jah/90.4/br_43.html

The focus of this article is not the elites. It is the much larger group that is the focus of this article. (WE could have another article called Scalawag Elites, and what you'd like to add could fit there.) But this article concerns those who signed the oath in returning to the United States. Therefore, what Franklin wrote continues to be accurate so far as it goes. It is doubtful that the majority of people called 'scalawags' joined any party. It is doubtful that even a significant minority joined one or the another party. Even today, Americans tend not to be party joiners, regardless of how they may vote. Party membership is not an accurate ore realistic definition. It compartmentalizes where inappropriate.

Skywriter 00:34, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

What is the specific basis (citation and direct quote) upon which the following claim is made?

The majority of Southern whites were unable to take the oath and (for a while) they were not allowed to vote. Thanks. Skywriter 02:00, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
 * How mny people and for what time period?

American POV
Still not got a NPOV - it's very American centric. For example many countries have "whites" and "Republican parties". All countries have a North and South. --08:33, June 22, 2006 (UTC)
 * I believe this has been addressed by Zocky's addition of "In the United States..." at the beginning. I don't think this was ever a POV issue, actually, but it is much clearer now either way. --Satori Son 13:57, 22 June 2006 (UTC)
 * A simple fix :^) It wasn't so much a POV issue as as implisit assumtion that terms refered to America

Party History
It is unclear whether the article refers to the old Democrats (who are now the Republicans) or the new Democrats (who then was the Republicans. 213.173.232.178 13:53, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
 * The Democratic and Republican parties of the 1860s are the same parties as today. Rjensen 15:03, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Which is why I'm editing out the bit about many from the hill country still being, or being again, Republican today. While it's true, it ignores a lot of changes over the last 100+ years, the impact of the New Deal, of Nixon's Southern Strategy, variation within the different areas listed in terms of how economic and demographic changes in that time have affected voting... It's irrelevant.

Etymology, please
Yes, I know it's easy to find out, but it would be nice to have it included in the article, so people don't have to go elsewhere.

Why does Southern Unionist redirect here rather than vice versa?
The lack of NPOV is clear in the fact that it is impossible to link to "Southern Unionist" in articles. Can these two threads be separated, or at least Scalawag subordinated as a subsection of Southern Unionist?--Kenmayer 18:20, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
 * as this article explains, scalawag was the postwar term and southern unionist was a wartime term. The two groups partly overlapped but were not identical. In 2007 all scholars use the term "Scalawag" for the postwar southern whites who supported the Republican party--it is not a POV. Rjensen 09:29, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Scallywag is being redirected to scalawag, is it just variations in old spelling? Here is a different option.
Scally wag is a term I and all my family for generations have used for a boy (or girl) who is a "cheeky rascal". The origin was thought to be northern England.

However, I had to work in The Shetland Islands for some time and found the term was used locally, even though now regarded as old fashioned. It referred to people from Scalloway. Scalloway is the Shetland port on the west of the Islands and was once the capital of the Shetlands. The term is mildly derogatory and everyone knew it but did not explain it. It seemed again to be "cheeky rascal" but they implied it was more than that. Shetlanders said it went back many centuries, i.e. long before the American references given in the main article. I am sure the American references are correct in themselves but the Shetland reference probably predates them and might, perhaps, be linked.

The only other point that may be relevant is that the style of speech in Shetland makes Scallywag and Scalawag sound almost the same.

Does this contribute usefully? Does anyone else have any more or better information?

Thanks - Mike Bruce - 10 Aug 2007 Dmmbruce 15:46, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Who is Baggett
Who is this? Introduced out of nowhere.

dino (talk) 04:45, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Text lost?
Something is missing from the beginning of the second of these paragraphs: By October 1868 a Mississippi newspaper was defining the expression scathingly in terms of Redemption politics.[3] The term continued to be used as a pejorative by conservative pro-segregationist southerners well into the 20th century.[4] But historians commonly use the term to refer to the group of historical actors with no pejorative meaning intended.[5]

''designed to bring the South back to normal as soon as possible, while the Radical Republicans used Congress to block the president, impose harsh terms, and upgrade the rights of the Freedmen (the ex-slaves). In the South, Black Freedmen and White Southerners with Republican sympathies joined forces with Northerners who had moved south (called "Carpetbaggers" by their southern opponents) to implement the policies of the Republican party.'' Koro Neil (talk) 11:17, 1 July 2016 (UTC)


 * It seems that an edit made on 25 March 2016 lost the heading "History" as well as part of a sentence. Robert McClenon (talk) 02:23, 26 September 2016 (UTC)


 * Fixed. Not sure that I agree with treating Lincoln and Johnson the same, but I have restored the previous text.  Robert McClenon (talk) 02:26, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

bad article that should be rewritten
The section labeled "history" should be removed from the article. The proper subject for the article is what the term means, who used the term and how they used it. The article makes the serious mistake of accepting the slur and then presenting a history of an invented group based on that slur. You can talk about who called who a scalawag and what they meant by using the word. But talking about "scalawags" if it were a political movement is wrong. 107.193.104.112 (talk) 01:28, 16 March 2019 (UTC)