1916. Dixon's earlier works including The Clansman, which was made into the movie, Birth of A Nation, made his reputation as the anti-black novelist for the Jim Crow south. In The Fall of a Nation Dixon writes: This novel is not a rehash of the idea of a foreign conquest of America based on the accidents of war. It is a study of the origin, meaning and destiny of American Democracy by one who believes that the time is ripe in this country for a revival of the principles on which our Republic was founded.