Preserving Southern Identity

"[Post- Civil War] The issues at home were pressing and demanded Dabney's energies. While the North had gained the upper hand politically through the force of arms, Dabney sought to maintain a distinctive Southern civilization . . . by strengthening the Southern institutions that remained. . . . It was primarily in the PCUS [Presbyterian Church in the United States, i.e. the Southern Presbyterian Church], not in monuments or Confederate Day speeches, that Dabney sought to preserve Southern identity" (Sean Michael Lucas, Robert Lewis Dabney, 134-135).