Dollars for Dixie Business and the Transformation of Conservatism in the Twentieth Century Cambridge Studies on the American South Series

Organized in 1933, the Southern States Industrial Council's (SSIC) adherence to the South as a unique political and economic entity limited its members' ability to forge political coalitions against the New Deal. The SSIC's commitment to regional preferences, however, transformed and incorporated conservative thought in the post-World War II era, ultimately complementing the emerging conservative movement in the 1940s and 1950s. In response to New Dealers' attempts to remake the southern economy, the New South industrialists - heirs of C. Vann Woodward's 'new men' of the New South - effectively fused cultural traditionalism and free market economics into a brand of southern free enterprise that shaped the region's reputation and political culture. Dollars for Dixie demonstrates how the South emerged from this refashioning and became a key player in the modern conservative movement, with new ideas regarding free market capitalism, conservative fiscal policy, and limited bureaucracy.

Introduction. The New South and the New Deal; Part I. Working within the New Deal: 1. The New South and the NRA; 2. Southern industry and the Southern region; 3. Confronting the 'Wagner monstrosity'; Part II. Free Enterprise and the South: 4. Creating the nation's economic 'opportunity' no. 1; 5. Rates, war, and the turn to free enterprise; 6. The South as the 'bulwark of democracy'; 7. Downplaying Dixie; Conclusion. The politics of free enterprise.

Katherine Rye Jewell is Assistant Professor of History at Fitchburg State University, Massachusetts.