And once again, rather than seeing clearly that Confederate monuments stand at the very center of the white-supremacist imagination, too many people are clouding the issue. San Angelo. Share on Facebook. Gettysburg: National Military Park … This is why communities across the region have a moral obligation to take up the cause of removing them. And let’s not forget President Trump’s favorite president, Old Hickory—Andrew Jackson. Support for removing Confederate statues is heavily split by party, based on the poll. Keep them so that we can have a constructive dialogue at places like Montpelier (the home of President James Madison, who is considered the father of the Constitution). And … : Kathy Griffin). They were placed there by locals and the local community will decide whether to move them. Opinion // Outlook Opinion: Houston’s Confederate monuments are coming down, build new ones for civil rights By Abbie Kamin June 11, 2020 Updated: June 11, 2020 5:17 p.m. And it has fully embraced the imagery of Nazism, from Adolf Hitler to swastika flags to the Nazi salute. Get my point? Mitch Landrieu explains why he’s against Confederate monuments and shares a message about race that thinks everyone needs to hear. President Trump on Tuesday criticized efforts to take them down. Confederate monuments have always been symbols of white supremacy. Guest Editorial - December 1, 2019. I don’t fear 150-year-old statues of old dead white men. Aug 18, 2020 And now only 44% of us support keeping Confederate monuments against a growing 32% who want to take ‘em down. Opinions were less clear about whether the monuments glorify for what the Confederacy fought for, with 49 percent saying they agree with that, 29 percent saying they disagree, and 22 percent saying they neither agree … We think of the words Never Forget and we instantly remember 9-11 or the Holocaust. Opinion Interpretation of the news based on evidence, including data, as well as anticipating how events might unfold based on past events Debating the Confederate monuments Add to list Confederate apologists in the South and around the country have rallied behind such monuments since they first went up in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Whites (66 percent), Republicans (84 percent) and Americans over age 65 (71 percent) are especially likely to say that Confederate monuments represent pride rather than supremacy. Truly patriotic Americans, of all colors and creeds, can and should stand up to them as they did this past weekend. Remembering is powerful. Share via Email. But here is my point: In America, we pride ourselves on free thought. Freedom of thought. Opinion: Don't Take Down Confederate Monuments. Keep the statues where they are so that people can explain history to their kids. We learn. America is different because we value freedom. By. The symbol was used by Dylan Roof to stoke his murderous rage one night after a Bible study where he killed nine God-fearing black church members. Another slave-holding Indian-killing president of our nation. But the Charlottesville march, with its hundreds of neo-Nazis and white nationalists coming out to defend the memory of General Lee, puts the lie to the notion that, as the apologists say, these monuments are about “heritage, not hate.”. Just as we cannot tell people not to buy Nazi paraphernalia or collect it in their homes (no matter how abhorrent we may find it), we likewise cannot tell people they are not allowed to honor family members who fought for the confederacy or that their forbears could not raise monuments to southern heroes like Robert E. Lee or Stonewall Jackson—both of whom were decorated and beloved West Point graduates and union officers before the south seceded from the union in rebellion. They honored racial prejudice. Freedom to associate with groups and have ideas that may differ from each other, even if they are the “wrong” ideas. If we start taking statues down, well, we better go for old Thomas Jefferson (master of a slave who was his mistress and mother of at least four of his children). As monuments went up, so did the bodies of black men, women and children during a long rash of lynching. This does not bode well for their cause. Is Removing Confederate Monuments Like Erasing History. Truer words were never spoken than those offered at the grand opening of the National Museum of African American History and Culture last September, by the man who signed the legislation authorizing the Museum, George W. Bush. As always, it is racist. Opinions mixed on removal of Confederate monuments. For the most part, protesters are taking down confederate monuments because civic leaders have failed to do so proactively. Freedom to worship as we believe. What I fear is the hatred we are seeing in real time in 2017 on social media, on our college campuses, in our workplaces and in our political rhetoric (i.e. Opinion: On Confederate monuments, be deliberate. Photo by James Milliken. We had racial threats made against us as the largest black class of law students in the schools storied history, (which I wrote about in a 1998 Washington Post article entitled, “A Black Law Students First Trials”). The path for the rise of the Southern Democratic Party, known as the “White Man’s Party,” was paved with racial violence. He held that African Americans could not be considered citizens — an opinion that has no place in today’s America. Keep Confederate monuments, but put their horrific history on center stage While Trump is far from right, he is not totally wrong. Share on Facebook. Sophia A. Nelson, Esq., is the award-winning author of three non-fiction books and a "Corporate Diversity Champion" (2012) award winner for her work in corporate diversity strategies and training for the Fortune 100. During the presidential campaign, and now from the seat of power in the White House, Mr. Trump’s talk of building a wall, his denigration of women, his ban on transgender soldiers and his circle of nationalist advisers embolden the very people who showed up in Charlottesville chanting, “Jews will not replace us.” Us, of course, are the dispossessed white, heterosexual men who long for a return to an imagined patriarchy where they have a seat at the head of the table, even though, in reality, those seats are reserved for white elites. He’s a white Southerner and the mayor of New Orleans. More powerfully, South Carolinians taught us all a profound lesson of love, compassion and reconciliation as tens of thousands of them marched together on the famed Arthur J. Ravenel Bridge. In July 2015 when former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, now UN Ambassador Haley, ordered confederate flags down after the horrific shootings of nine black church members in the historic AME church in downtown Charleston, she was 100% correct. We do not learn when we run from our wrongs. And hopefully, with a little faith, self-discovery and humility we grow into better, more loving human beings. One of the more controversial issues of our time is the question of what should be done … She has worked in the Congress, at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and at one of the nation's largest law firms in public/government Affairs. This provides an opposite perspective, opposite my opinion, to the subject. Mount Vernon has done something similar with its new slave exhibit as of last year. The president of the United States has unleashed a new generation of domestic terrorists. Opinions Live with Eugene Robinson: Remove all Confederate monuments Jun 23, 2020 Columnist Eugene Robinson will be online every Tuesday at 1 p.m. Eastern for Eugene Robinson Live, where he'll talk about the latest political and cultural developments. In THIS article, people argue against the destruction of the monuments. Although I agree with the powerful words and sentiments expressed by Mayor Landrieu of New Orleans last week about why he thinks Confederate statutes and symbols should come down, I do not think it reflects the great first amendment freedoms America was founded upon. This is why I, as a black woman, who is a direct lineal descendant of African slaves in my maternal family tree (my grandmother “Viney” was brought to America in the hull of a slave ship in the early 1800s, around 1803 we believe from Africa and was sold to the Henry plantation in Georgia), am opposed to the removal of Confederate statues in the south whether it be here in Richmond, Virginia or deeper south in Alabama. But at what cost? We learn when we face them. And teach them, so that they do not repeat our mistakes. Prosecutor offers opinion on Confederate monument. Workers prepare to take down a Jefferson Davis statue in New Orleans early on Thursday. An overwhelming 85 percent of Democrats back the move, and just 11 percent are against it. Related: Is Removing Confederate Monuments Like Erasing History? ... One of at least 18 confederate monuments on public property throughout Arkansas, the two-story pedestal and Confederate soldier statue on the courthouse lawn was erected in 1903 by the Varina Jefferson Davis Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. They harbored cultural bias. I attended Washington & Lee University in Lexington Virginia as a first-year law student. They didn’t like having black classmates because they had racist hearts. They recast Confederate soldiers as heroes fighting not for the institution of slavery but for the “Lost Cause,” the mythology of the Confederacy as a grand patriarchal civilization. “Dismantling Confederate monuments and ridding sports teams and brands of racist imagery is not enough,” Marcos Martinez, the owner of the blog, www.themenwhobrunch.com, wrote in an email. Monticello announced earlier this year a new wing about Sally Hemings and of course, the new National Museum of African American History and Culture (which was the victim of yet another hateful racial act yesterday) is the place that every American family should go and take their kids, and their grandkids. Should the confederate monuments be torn down? MASON CITY, Iowa - The statue in Mason City's Central Park won't be coming down anytime soon, … We look. Old letters from Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee reveal the commander of the confederate army during the American Civil War opposed symbols, such as the monuments to Confederate … This debate has been going on for years. This is true even after widespread protests engulfed Confederate monuments following the murder of George Floyd in … IE 11 is not supported. Here's Why. And we won’t do it by hiding from our racist, slave owning, segregated past. “This week, it is Robert E. Lee. But this time, local and state officials from law enforcement and state agencies like the Sovereignty Commission in Mississippi joined them in their effort. White supremacists aren’t the only defenders of these monuments. However, I am not opposed to people wearing the confederate flag on their hats or flying it in their yards. Charlotte, N.C. — Activists in Durham, N.C., tired of waiting for local leaders to decide what to do about a statue of a Confederate soldier downtown, on Monday literally took matters into their own hands, yanking it off its pedestal and then kicking it, as if trying to beat it into submission. Workers prepare to take down a Jefferson Davis statue in New Orleans early on Thursday. Once again, they rallied under the banner of the Confederate battle flag. You have to want it, work at it, and trust that it ultimately works for us all. This is hardly new. What I fear is the hatred we see in real time in 2017 on social media and in our political rhetoric. At the end of the day, I don’t want statutes of Robert E. Lee to come down. More familiar than the Lee monument in Charlottesville is the one on Monument Avenue in Richmond, Va. Less familiar is the monument to Lee in the United States Capitol. Confederate monuments don't preserve "our history," like some falsely argue. White elites showed their thanks by erecting Confederate monuments. The people who hated having black classmates at their school didn’t hate us because there were statues of Robert E. Lee or George Washington (our nation’s first President and a slave owner) on campus. Freedom to speak our minds without terrorizing or harassing others (hate speech is not free speech as defined by the US Supreme Court). I don’t fear 150-year-old statues of old dead white men. The heyday of monument building, between 1890 and 1920, was also a time of extreme racial violence, as Southern whites pushed back against what little progress had been made by African-Americans in the decades after the Civil War. Confederate “heritage,” as a unifying theme for the white South, also obscures the way that white elites use the white working class to do their bidding by pitting them against those with whom they have more in common economically than those in power. It is nativist, anti-feminist and anti-Semitic. This is the real tragedy … not that protesters are tearing down statues, but that for years our country’s leaders have not had the courage to what is right — take down all monuments linked to the inherent white supremacy of the confederate cause. Tweet on Twitter. In the summer of 2017, support polls placed support for keeping Confederate memorials at anywhere from 62% (when asked as a choice between letting statues “remain as a historical symbol” and removing them “because they are offensive to some people”) to just 26% (when the choice was between keeping monuments on government property or relocating them “to museums or other historic sites where they can be viewed in proper historical context.”) Opinion: Leave them standing: Confederate monuments must remain at Gettysburg to help interpret Civil War causes, consequences Columns. Confederate monuments are intensely local objects. Gerald Herbert / AP. It wasn’t because of a Gen. Stonewall Jackson monument VMI or downtown. In the civil rights era, segregationists again sought to push back any attempt to challenge white male supremacy. We endured. Monuments to Confederate leaders are also glorifying white supremacy. “For there to be racial progress, there need to be drastic improvements in failing schools in minority communities,” Martinez exclaimed. People, including a man wearing a confederate flag, hug after taking part in a prayer circle after a Black Lives Matter protest following the multiple police shootings in Dallas, Texas, on July 10, 2016. The survey also asked for opinions about a range of Confederate monuments and symbols. Remembering, forces us to become wiser. Once again, we’re having a national debate about the hundreds of Confederate monuments that stand across the South — inspired, this time, by last weekend’s march in Charlottesville, Va., when white supremacists protested the city’s plan to move a statue of Robert E. Lee. As in Germany, all Confederate monuments should be removed. Some of my fellow historians have naïvely suggested that we need to keep them to teach us the darker lessons of Southern history. It is also homophobic. On one hand you have the Confederate monuments, which have a very checkered history as many of them were created as instruments of racial terror, instruments to support Jim Crow to oppress Black people in the south," Kimble said. Lee's underlying rationale behind opposing the … A North Carolina law passed in 2015 prohibits the removal of these monuments, yet the prospect of being prosecuted for doing just that was not a deterrent. In class, we watched a… 0. “I wonder, is it George Washington next week?” Some say they are about heritage and history, not racism; others say we need to keep them in place to remind us of our dark past. Of Speech. What the events of this past weekend have made clear is that for several generations, the Lee monument and others like it have assisted the cause of white supremacy and the deadly violence that has accompanied it. After the Civil War, Lee repeatedly voiced his objection to statues or monuments that honor the Confederacy. Residents were much more likely to say that Confederate monuments help people understand an important chapter in American history, and that they honor Confederate soldiers who passed away in the war. Of Heritage. That, my friends, is what we must work toward eradicating. He was, and remains, the most iconic of Confederate heroes. That’s called “free expression” and in America it is sacrosanct. An Opinion on Confederate Monuments & History. Browse Newsweek archives of photos, videos and articles on Confederate Monuments. I noticed that Stonewall Jackson is coming down,” he told a news conference. Was Robert E. Lee Opposed to Confederate Monuments? Paul Milliken, VOX Reporter October 15, 2017. Jump to Comments. All the latest breaking news on Confederate Monuments. Like the Confederate monuments being criticized or removed, the Latin cross in Bladensburg, Maryland — known as the “peace cross” — has stood in the same place for decades. Montpelier has a series called The Mere Distinction of Colour, a provocative new exhibition examining the institution of slavery and its legacy. 913. Those who gathered in the name of hatred and bigotry did so under the banners of defeated regimes. ... Opinion Policies. America is advanced citizenship. But our white classmates were as outraged as us, and the Dean reacted swiftly and firmly to handle the perpetrators. Across the country, monuments to Confederate leaders and even Christopher Columbus are being pulled down. A great Nation does not hide its history. We connect because we remember. His figure is also carved into Stone Mountain, alongside Stonewall Jackson and Jefferson Davis. Are they an accurate representation of what our American people have gone through? Confederate monuments have always been symbols of white supremacy. While what happened in Charlottesville is a stain on our nation, we should remain hopeful for the future. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. Nelson is a frequent guest on NBC News and MSNBC, as well as many other networks, and she has written for various outlets including Essence, Huffington Post, theGrio, Politico, Politico Magazine, CNN.com and Ebony. They instrumentalize the past to maintain a nostalgia for a white ethnostate in the public space. “A great nation does not hide its history, it faces its flaws and corrects them.”—President George W. Bush, Opening of the NMAAHC, September 24, 2016. On the question of erecting Civil War monuments, the former Confederate general wrote that he thought it … Jefferson Davis still stands in Richmond. Of celebration. Let that sink in for a moment. We must confront our past, not whitewash it. The words "Black Lives Matter" spray painted on a monument to former Confederate President Jefferson Davis in Richmond, Va. June 25, 2015. grand opening of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, powerful words and sentiments expressed by Mayor Landrieu, why he thinks Confederate statutes and symbols should come down, Full Interview: Mitch Landrieu on Removing Confederate Monuments, now UN Ambassador Haley, ordered confederate flags, as tens of thousands of them marched together, Opinion: Racial Hate Is Infecting College Kids in America, Protesters Denounce 'White Supremacist' Torchlit Rally at Robert E. Lee Statue. Lt. Col. Allen West warned Saturday that those Americans toppling Confederate statues or defacing infamous historic symbols were missing the point of that time in U.S. history. We discover. But we also need leadership at all levels of government to condemn not only their actions but also white supremacy itself. Artifacts of hate will be lost, but their history and meaning will not. This isn’t just a Southern problem. Let me be clear: I felt very differently about the Confederate flag because it was a waving symbol of hate, rebellion and division flying over modern day state capitols throughout the south. Sam’s Myth; Photo by Edu Bayer for The New York Times. Related: Opinion: Racial Hate Is Infecting College Kids in America. Sophia A. Nelson is an NBCBLK Contributor and author of the new book, “E Pluribus One: Reclaiming our Founders Vision for a United America.”, Follow NBCBLK on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. All Confederate monuments echo the same evil purpose of perpetuating slavery, thereby rendering their inscribed honors as hollow. It was an experience I will never forget. After that incident, the public sentiment shifted and the flag had to come down. In an op-ed published an op-ed in The Atlantic titled “Take the Confederate Names Off Our Army Bases,” General David Petraeus wrote, “As I have watched Confederate monuments being removed by state and local governments, and sometimes by the forceful will of the American people, the fact that 10 U.S. Army installations are named for Confederate officers has weighed on me.” Today, the battle for white male supremacy has expanded in scope. On Wednesday May 17, Tishaura O. Jones, the treasurer for St. Louis, Mo., launched a GoFundMe page seeking to raise $25,000 to remove a Confederate monument from that city's Forest OPINION: The Confederate Monuments. Free expression. Print. It’s why so many of them were put up in the first place. Many of the monuments celebrate figures like Lee, who even today is defended as a critic of slavery who only grudgingly joined the Confederacy. What we must confront our past, not whitewash it Christopher Columbus are being pulled.. 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