racially harmonious -- that developed in the three decades after the Civil War, and the transformation of that dream into widely accepted myths, shielding and perpetuating a conservative, racist society. Many young moderates of the period created a philosophy designed to enrich the region -- attempting to both restore the power and prestige and to lay the race question to rest. In spite of these men and their efforts, their dream of a "New South" joined the Antebellum illusion as a genuine social myth, with a controlling power over the way in which their followers, in both North and South, perceived reality.

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