Why the South doth prevail (and why to some extent it didn't)

A 1957 essay by William F. Buckley, Why the South Must Prevail, was making the rounds on Twitter last night (thanks to Erik Kleefeld). In it, Buckley pretends to some regard for the ultimate welfare of Southern "negroes" but asserts that Southern whites have the right to preserve their cultural superiority by denying their black neighbors the right to vote --because  "the claims of civilization supersede those of universal suffrage."

That is, southern whites don't want to integrate and so pollute their...culture, so they have the right to keep "negroes" from voting to force them to do.  How can a minority claim to speak for "civilization"? "[T]he White community is so entitled because, for the time being, it is the advanced race."

People well-versed in Buckley's oeuvre and career, and in the legislative civil rights battles of the of the late 50s, will doubtless weigh in with appropriate context and analysis. Lacking more than passing familiarity with the latter and interest in the former, I still think it's worthwhile to note a couple of points that struck me, coming to this cold.