Why “Scalawag”?
In post-Civil War Reconstruction period, two pejorative slang terms were popular in the former Confederacy: carpetbagger and scalawag. Carpetbaggers were Northerners who traveled to the Union-occupied South for economic and political gain, or to help former slaves (or both). The defeated Southerners viewed them as opportunistic leeches. Scalawags were Southern natives who either suddenly felt…