• About

RealityChek

~ So Much Nonsense Out There, So Little Time….

Tag Archives: Confederacy

Following Up: Another Confederate Statue Mess

21 Sunday Jun 2020

Posted by Alan Tonelson in Following Up

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Albert Pike, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Clarence Williams, Confederacy, Confederate monuments, D.C., D.C. Police, District of Columbia, Following Up, George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush, history wars, National Park Service, peaceful protests, Perry Stein, Peter Hermann, protests, Trump, U.S. Park Police, vandalism, Washington Post

There is so much shameful behavior by various government and law enforcement authorities reported in this morning’s Washington Post account of the illegal takedown of a statue of a Confederate general (Albert Pike) in the District of Columbia (D.C.) that it’s hard to know where to begin.

But let’s begin on a positive note: There was nothing shameful in the Post‘s own account. Quite the contrary:  reporters Perry Stein, Clarence Williams, and Peter Hermann – and their editors – provided an unusual amount of useful information. Hopefully we’ll see much more journalism like that going forward.

In fact, the Post article taught me something that shows I made a significant mistake in a tweet yesterday. When I learned of the statue’s removal by a mob, I tweeted, “Let me get this straight: The #DC government is so #racist that #peacefulprotest-ers had no choice but to take the law into their own hands & tear down the #AlbertPike statue. Plus, DC cops stand by and watch. Totally disgraceful #vandalism & vandalism coddling. #murielbowser.” (Bowser is D.C.’s Mayor.)

The mistake has to do with jurisdiction. As the Post reported, the D.C. police noted that “The statue in question sits in a federal park and therefore is within the jurisdiction of National Park Service and the United States Park Police.” So the District’s government didn’t, as I implied, have the authority to remove the statue.

Yet although I apologize for the D.C. government reference, I still stand behind mob point (about the need always to follow lawful procedures for removing such monuments) and the D.C. police point. Unless everyone should applaud officers who stand by and do absolutely nothing when flagrant lawbreaking is not only within plain sight, but scarcely a block away? What if the D.C. police saw a murder being threatened in a federal park? (By the way, as a longtime District resident, I can tell you that the parks in which these monuments stand are mostly vestpocket-size parks, and aren’t watched or patrolled regularly by anyone at any time of day.)

Moreover, there’s evidence that the D.C. police were aware that something was wrong – and weren’t even positive that they lacked the authority to act. The Post  quoted a National Park Service spokesman as claiming that “D.C. police had called U.S. Park Police dispatch to ask about jurisdiction. He said in an email that when Park Police officers arrived, ‘the statue was already down and on fire.’ The toppling of the statue is under investigation, he said. Litterst [the spokesman] did not address whether the Park Service thinks D.C. police should have intervened.”

Finally, if you believe, as I do, that monuments to traitors like Confederate generals have no place on public grounds, it’s clear that the federal government has been brain-dead on this issue (to put it kindly). But the Post account also reveals that this disgraceful neglect long predates the presidency of Donald Trump (who continues to oppose any changes in these statues’ placement or even renaming U.S. military bases named after such treasonous figures).

Specifically, “District officials have been trying to get the statue removed for several years. The D.C. Council petitioned the federal government to remove the statue in 1992.”

From then until Mr. Trump’s inauguration, four Presidents have served – including recent liberal and Mainstream Media darlings George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, and Democrats Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Why didn’t they remove the statue? Why haven’t they even commented on the matter? And why haven’t they been called on the carpet for their records on this matter, and for their silence?

But let’s close on a positive note, too. One question raised by this statue controversy – what to do with it – is pretty easily answered. Either stick it in a museum (with a full description provided of this minor Confederate figure) or throw it in the city or some federal dump.

Advertisement

Im-Politic: How to Deal with the Confederate and Other Now-Controversial Monuments

19 Friday Jun 2020

Posted by Alan Tonelson in Im-Politic

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

A.P. Hill, Abraham Lincoln, Arlington National Cemetery, Aunt Jemima, Civil War, Confederacy, Confederate monuments, Constitution, cross-burning, Elizabeth Warren, First Amendment, Franklin D. Roosevelt, George C. Wallace, George Washington, Im-Politic, Ku Klux Klan, Mexican War, military bases, Pierre Beauregard, racism, Reconstruction, Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Theodore G. Bilbo, Thomas Jefferson, treason, Trump, Tucker Carlson, Woodrow Wilson

Not that anyone’s asked for it, but the Confederate and other allegedly racist monuments issue is back in the news, so here’s my handy dandy guide for figuring out which of these memorials should be taken down or removed, which should remain publicly displayed (and how), and which should be left alone. (This guide, which only covers the major controversies that have reappeared recently, will of course include naming decisions for public buildings and spaces like parks and squares and streets.)

Some major misconceptions need to be cleared up first. Right off the bat, everyone should agree that whatever actions are taken (removal or alteration), they must result from legal processes. Unauthorized teardowns and inflictions of damage are simple vandalism and should be punished as such. No private person or group has the right to take these matters into their own hands, precisely because no one’s voted for you. As for public officials, unless laws specifically empower them to act unilaterally, they should always work through legislation or established rule-making procedures.

In addition, let’s drop the dishonest nonsense about statues and plaques on public grounds, and choices of names for public buildings or military bases and spaces like parks and squares, being simple descriptions or illustrations of history. Nothing could be clearer than that they’re meant to express honor and pride.

Similarly, making changes (including removal) has nothing to do with “erasing history.” To take one example, if Robert E. Lee’s name is taken off a high school or highway or whatever, there’s no chance that Lee will be forgotten. Every American who takes a public school course in U.S. history will learn about his role as commander of the Confederate army during the Civil War. And if you happened to cut or sleep through that class, you can always access one of the upteen gazillion books about that conflict that have been written for the last roughly century-and-a-half since it ended.

It’s true that public school students may not encounter the names of lesser Confederate figures. To which the only adult reply is “Big deal.” The reason that folks like Generals A.P. Hill or even Stonewall Jackson may be overlooked is because, in the end, they weren’t such big deals.

Also a no-brainer: If Americans want to honor controversial or despicable figures or movements or ideas on their own property, that’s in virtually all cases their Constitutionally protected right. Ditto for private businesses. If your neighbor is flying a Confederate flag or has painted a swastika on his property, you’re free to shun him, and to urge others to do the same. If you’re offended by Aunt Jemima, switch your pancake syrup brand, ask the company to use a new image or character, or encourage boycotts and trust in the market and consumer choice to settle the issue. (Cross-burning on one’s own private property, a la the viciously racist and anti-semitic Ku Klux Klan, is legally treated somewhat – but only somewhat – differently.)

More complicated is the question of which level of government should be making which decisions where public property is concerned. For instance, should a federal ban be enacted on using Confederate names on any public grounds, including state and local? I can see an argument for that proposition (as indicated below, it provides encouragement for treason, a Constitutionally designated crime or, alternatively, creates a discriminatory environment). But I can also understand the case for leaving the decision to the states and localities – and ultimately letting the market decide (mainly in the form of privately organized boycotts of the type that has pushed several states to drop anti-LGBT measures).

So having cleared away this intellectual brush, here’s the guide – at least for some of the major cases:

>Confederate leaders – they’re the easiest call of all. They were traitors. They took up arms against the U.S. government. No decent American should want to honor them in any way. Yes, there’s an argument that some of these naming decisions (e.g., for U.S. miIitary bases) were made in order to promote reconciliation between North and South after the Civil War. Indeed, President Trump just made it.

But the U.S. decision not to prosecute the leaders of the Confederacy – and execute them if found guilty – was a strong enough gesture of reconciliation. In addition, nearly all Confederate veterans – including senior officers – were soon permitted to vote and hold public office once more. And the same states whose rebellion ignited the war were admitted back into the Union.

As a result, naming numerous U.S. military bases after Confederate generals represents a grossly mistaken (at best), and I would argue utterly perverse and continuing slap in the face to all American citizens and legal residents of the country, and especially to the soldiers who fought and died to preserve the Union and their families and descendents. There are plenty of other American military leaders who served their country in actually patriotic and genuinely heroic ways. Their names belong on these bases instead.

But what about the graves of Confederate veterans (including rebels from “ordinary” backgrounds who may not have been slave owners or even racists) currently lying in U.S. military or other national cemeteries, including Arlington? There’s no doubt, as made clear here, that a number wound up there because of mistakes in identifying very partial physical remains. But it’s also clear that many were placed in or actually moved to these plots and the graves specially marked as signs of respect – and that Congress approved.

Massachusetts Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren has recently introduced legislation to “remove all names, symbols, displays, monuments, and paraphernalia that honor or commemorate the Confederate States of America and anyone who voluntarily served it from all military bases and other assets of the Department of Defense.” Presumably (though I haven’t found the full text) this includes the markers.

Fox News talker Tucker Carlson (who I generally admire) condemned this measure as grave “desecration.” That’s reckless hyperbole, but if Warren would actually remove the markers, that looks excessive as well, since at least according to the official description in the National Parks Service post linked above, they simply identify the deceased as Confederates.

My bottom line: It’s not possible to figure out which of these veterans were bad guys and which were at least reasonably good guys, and the bodies are already interred. So I’d leave them be.

Not so, however, for the Confederate Memorial at Arlingon Cemetery – which even its official website says “offers a nostalgic, mythologized vision of the Confederacy, including highly sanitized depictions of slavery.” The Cemetery authorites go on to contend that “The Confederate Memorial offers an opportunity for visitors to reflect on the history and meanings of the Civil War, slavery, and the relationship between military service, citizenship and race in America.”

But given the monument’s clear glorification of the Confederate cause and its rose-colored view of slavery, and given that visitors have lots of other opportunities to reflect on the meaning of the Civil War and related issues, I’d ship this slab of stone out of there. It has no place on arguably the most sacred ground of this nation’s civic religion.

What to do with it, however, from that point – along with other Confederate monuments on federal grounds? Here I fully agree with those who would put them in museums instead of simply destroying them. Wouldn’t it be best to show them in a setting that could describe them fully and explain the context of their creation? And I’d deal with these statues and plaques on state and municipal lands in exactly the same way.

>Let’s move to American historical figures who didn’t revolt against their country, but nonetheless owned slaves and/or expressed racist views or supported racist policies. Here I’ll restate the argument I originally made in this post. If these figures were known only or best for racist views and positions – like former segregationist Alabama Governor George C. Wallace, or former (if you can believe it) even more racist Mississippi Governor and U.S. Senator Theodore G. Bilbo, I’d remove any statues etc from public grounds and stick them in museums, displayed as described above.

>The same would go, by the way, for Civil War leaders who for various reasons were widely seen after the conflict as personifications of honor or other military virtues, or who actually repented in word and/or deed after the war. Lee is the leading example of the former. However gentlemanly he might have been, or however well he may have treated his soldiers, and even however distinguished his record in the U.S. Army during the Mexican War (which, to complicate matters further, was in large measure a war of annexation), few would have paid much attention to him, or even known of him, if not for his Civil War role. So let’s get him and his name out of public spaces.

A prime example of the latter is Pierre Beauregard. This former Confederate general actually led the troops in South Carolina who fired on Fort Sumter and for all intents and purposes started Civil War. After the conflict, according to the official website of his hometown of New Orleans, he became “an early proponent of equal rights in Louisiana, serving as the outspoken leader of the short-lived and ultimately failed unification movement.”

Since I do believe in redemption (and hope everyone else does, too), I’d go along with a monument of some kind. But not the kind currently standing in the city – which depicts “the uniformed general astride his horse.” How about moving that statue to a museum, complete with a full bio, and putting up a new monument portraying him in civvies and celebrating his efforts to champion equality? Ditto for any similar cases.

As for those leaders with troublesome racial pasts and/or policy records who nonetheless are (rightly) known for much more (as I argued in the RealityChek post linked above) , I’d leave their monuments in place, too – but make the maximum feasible effort to add some explanations that mention these blemishes. By the way, such leaders include not only former slave-owning Presidents like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, and outspokenly racist former Presidents like Woodrow Wilson, but even former Presidents generally seen as race relations heroes – like Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt. 

A final point about dealing with the Confederate and especially other controversial monuments: If anything should be obvious about this discussion of the issue, it’s how complicated much of the history is, and therefore how complicated many of the monuments et al decisions are. Some are indeed easy calls and should be made promptly. But no one should favor anything resembling a rush to judgment on the others.

Im-Politic: Ensnared in the History Wars

04 Monday Sep 2017

Posted by Alan Tonelson in Uncategorized

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Confederacy, Confederate monuments, Holocaust, Im-Politic, racism, Staunton, Stonewall Jackson, Stonewall Jackson Hotel, Stonewall Jackson Memorial Highway, Virginia, Woodrow Wilson, Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library and Museum

I finally had my own personal brushes with the History Wars this past week, receiving a first-hand reminder of the complications entailed in presenting the American past with accuracy and therefore with true integrity. Nothing I experienced has shaken me of the conviction that most of the nation’s Confederate monuments shamefully honor traitors (I discussed some of the exceptions here), and should be removed (lawfully) from public places. Ditto for displays of Confederate symbols on private property – although such displays should remain Constitutionally protected by the First Amendment. But what about dealing with these affronts on a personal level? That, it became clear to me, is another matter altogether.

My encounter with the History Wars resulted from a two-day trip my wife and I took to Staunton, Virginia, a picturesque town of about 25,000 located between the Blue Ridge Mountains and recent History Wars battlefield Charlottesville. We went to the area to check out a big regional book sale, and to take in two plays staged by the town’s renowned Shakespearean theater.

And we scored a deal: a package from a local hotel that included not only two nights’ stay, but two performances and a sumptuous breakfast. What could have been better? Here’s what. The hotel was the “Stonewall Jackson” – named of course after the famous Confederate general.

By the time we put one and one together, it was too late to cancel without a charge (yes, how convenient), so we held our noses and took the trip. The hotel was in all other respects exemplary – including a very friendly, helpful staff. It employed some African-American workers as well, and we saw no signs of dissatisfaction on their part. Moreover, the town lying beneath the (big) “Stonewall Jackson Hotel” sign seemed perfectly pleasant as well. True, we saw very few African-American pedestrians or working at local businesses. On the other hand, Staunton features tony restaurants with fashionable farm-to-table menus, as well as a (quintessentially progressive) fair trade products shop.  In other words, a hotbed of racism and reaction it isn’t. 

I thought of sharing (politely) my opinion of the hotel’s name with the staff, but wound up keeping my thoughts to myself. After all, it’s the owners’ views that really count. I probably will communicate my feelings on Facebook in hopes of persuading them to change – and will let them know (regretfully) that unless they do, I can’t in good conscience stay there again.

History Wars encounter Number Two was much easier to deal with – my visit to the town’s Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library and Museum, located in Staunton because the 28th president was born in the town (and lived there briefly during his infancy before his family moved to Georgia).

Although Wilson held deplorable racial views even for his time, and although he is among my least favorite presidents (overwhelmingly because of his disastrously naive foreign policies), the decision was a no-brainer for me on moral grounds. For as I’ve explained previously – and as with similar figures like the Founding Fathers – Wilson’s role in American history far transcended his record on race. And he didn’t take up arms against his own country.

Moreover, the facility handled these issues very appropriately. In addition to the exhibits describing Wilson’s re-segregation of the Federal government and paternalistic – at best – views of his fellow black citizens, the guide who conducted the tour of the actual Wilson family home forthrightly told our little group that the former president’s parents employed three house slaves – rented from a local farmer for Wilson’s father, a minister, by his congregation. And she made plain as day how low the living standards of these slaves were.

Encounter Number Three came on our drive back, when we decided to take local roads (including one dubbed the “Stonewall Jackson Memorial Highway”) part of the way and came upon the kind of big antiques store that my wife can’t resist. I find these places eminently resistible, but as usual, gave it a quick once over. I wasn’t offended by the Nazi memorabilia I saw. (They can be genuine collector’s items – as with the Japanese sword a childhood friend’s father took back from his World War II service in the Pacific. That didn’t make him an Axis supporter.) Ditto for the “George Wallace for President, 1964” sign displayed in a side room. (The arch-segregationist then-Alabama governor made his first run for the White House that year.) For the record, my wife was much more creeped out by these items.   

What did offend me was the conversation I heard between the young man at the cash register (who was unfailingly polite toward both of us), and two other customers. On top of dredging up the usual canard about Confederate memorial opponents wanting to “erase history” (What? You never heard of history books or museums?), they made the kind of remarks about the Holocaust so ignorant that they were surely in part willful (though they obviously were not Deniers).

As I was in earshot, I was sorely tempted to interject. But I decided that no useful purpose educational purpose would be served. Indeed, far likelier that I would have reinforced any prejudices they had about rude, self-righteous Yankees. Or Jews. Or both.

Since I have no reason to believe that the employee owned the store, or that the owners condoned his views (or even knew about them), I don’t at this point have any issue with patronizing that store again. And getting the cashier in trouble seems way over the top – especially since he didn’t initiate that exchange and could well have been agreeing with his customers largely to be polite, and make sure he completed the sale.

My wife wound up getting some truly beautiful items there. In fact, she considers it one of the best antique stores she’s ever seen – both in selection and price terms. We also still love central Virginia – its countryside is mostly stunning. But as we continued back north on the Stonewall Jackson Memorial Highway, heading toward I-81 and home, we both realized more than ever, how long America’s History Wars, and the collective and individual challenges they pose, are bound to last.

Im-Politic: First Thoughts on Charlottesville

12 Saturday Aug 2017

Posted by Alan Tonelson in Im-Politic

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

ACLU, American Civil Liberties Union, anti-semitism, Charlottesville, civil liberties, Civil War, Confederacy, Constitution, David Duke, Founding Fathers, free speech, Im-Politic, neo-Nazis, racism, Robert E. Lee, secession, slavery, treason, Trump, Virginia

It’s as tempting to offer timely thoughts about today’s Charlottesville, Virginia violence and the reactions it’s generated as it is difficult – for new developments keep taking place, and incontrovertible facts are hard to come by. That said, here are what strike me as as points worth making at present.

First, as I’ve previously written, the triggering complaint of the white nationalist/neo-Nazi/confederate revivalist/call-them-what-you-wish protest and the narrowest-gauge cause it represents should be unacceptable to all Americans who truly love their country. Confederate statues and other monuments to the rebellion (e.g., street and high school names) have no place in our national life. And removing them has nothing to do with erasing history. The history of the Civil War must of course be taught in the most intellectually honest way possible. But statues and street names etc are unmistakable efforts to honor and memorialize.

And whether you view the secession as motivated by intertwined racism and slavery issues (where in my view the bulk of the evidence points) or more legitimate federalist and states rights claims, the decision to revolt violently against the federal government was a simple act of treason, which should always be condemned in the harshest possible terms.

Moreover, please don’t respond with observations that the Founding Fathers’ ranks included slave-owners (like Washington and Jefferson) or that many subsequent American leaders were racists (like Woodrow Wilson). For slavery was, tragically, legal under the Constitution until emancipation. And as I’ve written (in the post linked above), most of the historical national figures with inadequate records on race were, first, to great extents products of their time and, second, known for playing many other roles and making many other contributions to the nation and its success.

As for the protesters’ broader supposed grievances about repressed and endangered white rights and even safety, I have no doubt that economic stresses and anxieties are at work in many cases. But feeling the need, or advisability, to fly the Confederate flag or wear the swastika simply signals a form of derangement that our society has rightly decided is beyond the pale politically and morally speaking. So public figures should decry this message and reject any association with those sending them.

Which brings us to the question of the Trump response. It was, as critics have charged, far too weak. What I can’t figure out is the “why”. Is the president a racist? He’s had too many African-American friends and supporters for that charge to stick. He and his advisers and aides also have too often argued for restricting immigration by pointing to the benefits U.S. blacks would reap.

Related anti-semitism make even less sense, given that Mr. Trump’s daughter married an orthodox Jew (who he has anointed as a top White House aide) and then converted herself to Judaism. I know that the “some of my best friends are….” argument can be and has been abused by anti-semites (as well as racists). But insisting that “some of my children and grandkids….” is much harder to dismiss.

The only explanation that makes even some sense to me (meaning of course that I’m not totally convinced) is that the president worries that a substantial part of his (largely white) base either covertly or (much likelier) subconsciously sees itself as racially repressed or marginalized, too, and would suddenly desert him if he went after the David Dukes and Richard Spencers of this country. In other words, Mr. Trump’s troubling words reflect a political calculation, not a shared bigotry.

If so, his position is not only timorous, but pathetically mistaken. Because for every hater he retains by his silence or anodyne words at times like this weekend, he risks losing many more moderates and independents who have no use for the identity-politics obsessed, and therefore intrinsically divisive, Democrats but who are disgusted by overt racists – much less neo-Nazis. In fact, Duke’s tweets today show that this arch-racist and anti-semite is infuriated by the president’s Charlottesville remarks.

More important, the president will earn much more durable support from independents and moderates – especially those who have actually lost economic ground or fear such losses – by keeping the campaign promises he made to restore living wage jobs than by even minimal pandering to prejudice.

Finally, the role of the Charlottesville police and any other law enforcement authorities tasked with handling the protests needs to be scrutinized thoroughly – along with our notions of protesters’ rights. I’m pretty certain that most Americans would agree with the right of Nazis and the like to stage a protest over the treatment of Confederate memorials (or any other reprehensible) cause, and to display symbols that should disgust all people of good will. And of course, these are Constitutionally protected rights.

But I’ve long thought that the right to protest also entails the right of protesters to be protected from those seeking to disrupt their events. In other words, once counter-protesters started physically interfering with the Nazis, the police force present should have stepped in and started making arrests. Even better, they should have taken much more effective measures to keep the counter-protesters physically apart from the protesters, to reduce the odds of violence breaking out to begin with. To my knowledge, law enforcement authorities have never been sued for such failures (not even by the American Civil Liberties Union, which admirably supported the Nazis’ etc right to demonstrate in Charlottesville). I hope the organization will consider bringing such a case in the wake of Charlottesville, if the circumstances merit this action.

For failing to establish protesters’ right to security could easily turn into an open invitation for harassment that could crimp free speech rights yet further. And what would induce the Nazis – and violence-prone lefties – to start licking their chops more eagerly?

Im-Politic: Why Most of the U.S. History Wars Shouldn’t Even Be Fought

21 Saturday Nov 2015

Posted by Alan Tonelson in Im-Politic

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Abraham Lincoln, Civil War, Confederacy, Confederate flag, Founding Fathers, history, history wars, Im-Politic, political correctness, Princeton University, racism, Robert E. Lee, slavery, Woodrow Wilson

Last week I wrote about my experiences with the political correctness and free speech disputes at my alma mater Princeton University in the mid-1970s and, what do you know? They reappeared on the campus this past week in their “history wars” form. It’s worth covering – but not because the demands for more or less erasing the physical legacy of former university and U.S. President Woodrow Wilson from the campus were especially novel or unusual according to the standards of our time. Nor was the university’s response, which could be interpreted in various ways ranging from a polite brushoff to an instance of kick-the-can-ism.

Instead, this episode is worth covering because it provides a good opportunity for presenting some common-sense guidelines on depicting historical figures in public spaces or within private communities when such a private controversy arises (as in the case of a private university).

The Princeton students protesting the university’s longstanding showcasing of Wilson base their position on the former president’s segregationist views on racial subjects and on the segregationist policies he approved during his White House tenure. There’s no legitimate doubt that their accusations are accurate.

Defenders of the university status quo have pushed back with equally accurate points – noting that some of Wilson’s decisions on a related question – the role of Jews in American society – both on the campus and in Washington, D.C. were enlightened by the standards of his time. Indeed, they legitimately go even further, and argue that, in both these positions, Wilson was a major champion of many progressive values. (Here’s an excellent summary of this case.)

In my view, the pro-Wilson forces have the better argument, by a considerable margin. But they don’t deserve victory for the reasons they emphasize – i.e., because their opponents have failed to recognize what how exemplary Wilson really was. Instead, their position is stronger because it makes clear what should matter most in evaluating and acknowledging the role of historical figures: the sum total of their records and significance. As a result, leaders like Wilson deserve recognition because their impact on university and American history far transcended characteristics rightly regarded as shortcomings today, and that were hardly impressive even in their own eras.

That is, Wilson was not simply a racist. He was someone whose actions shaped American politics and higher education in ways felt even today. And because this record was at worst lamentable in some (but hardly all) respects, it’s fitting and proper that the nation – and the university – have decided to honor him.

In this way, therefore, Wilson resembles the Founding Fathers. As widely known, Washington and Jefferson were slave-holders. But obviously they were so much more. It’s somewhat less widely known that Lincoln held racist views about black people. But he was so much more. This point might seem indistinguishable from the debate over merits that I just belittled, and obviously they’re very close. The essence of it is, though, that for figures of wide-ranging importance whose legacy was not overwhelmingly malevolent, these debates simply shouldn’t be necessary. Therefore, when they break out, the kind of common sense that’s essential for sound decision-making inevitably and damagingly takes a back seat.

Moreover, in this way, Wilson, the Founders, Lincoln, and others in this category fundamentally differ from, say major Confederate leaders. Although Robert E. Lee, for example, served America admirably in the Mexican War (which was not an especially admirable venture), his name wouldn’t be on roads, public schools, and even university campuses all over the country because of that role, or even because he became commander at West Point. He’s only widely remembered at all because he was a leader of the greatest single act of treason – and one motivated overwhelmingly by racist considerations – in American history. So he clearly belongs in the textbooks – along with other prominent Confederates. But honoring their memory, and that of their cause, is disgraceful.

Not every such decision is an easy call. Andrew Jackson, for instance, embodied many praiseworthy populist impulses, and was certainly a consequential president. He also rose above sectional interests and perspectives by opposing southern claims of states rights over federal law, and would have enjoyed great ratings had opinion polls existed back then. But his Indian expulsion policies were reprehensible, and arguably so even for the early 19th century.

If the common sense rule is invoked, however, Americans shouldn’t be faced with too many of these hard calls. Because the essence of history is change, and because it’s vital to keep learning about and rethinking the past, judgments about various historical events and individuals should never be fixed in stone or so viewed. But unless you think that the basic, admirable narrative of American history is fundamentally wrong, or that most of our leading forebears were in fact generally contemptible, you’ll agree that the overwhelming burden of proof is on the revisionists to overturn the current consensus on events and individuals that Americans have chosen to honor – and that far more often than not, this burden has not remotely been met.

Blogs I Follow

  • Current Thoughts on Trade
  • Protecting U.S. Workers
  • Marc to Market
  • Alastair Winter
  • Smaulgld
  • Reclaim the American Dream
  • Mickey Kaus
  • David Stockman's Contra Corner
  • Washington Decoded
  • Upon Closer inspection
  • Keep America At Work
  • Sober Look
  • Credit Writedowns
  • GubbmintCheese
  • VoxEU.org: Recent Articles
  • Michael Pettis' CHINA FINANCIAL MARKETS
  • RSS
  • George Magnus

(What’s Left Of) Our Economy

  • (What's Left of) Our Economy
  • Following Up
  • Glad I Didn't Say That!
  • Golden Oldies
  • Guest Posts
  • Housekeeping
  • Housekeeping
  • Im-Politic
  • In the News
  • Making News
  • Our So-Called Foreign Policy
  • The Snide World of Sports
  • Those Stubborn Facts
  • Uncategorized

Our So-Called Foreign Policy

  • (What's Left of) Our Economy
  • Following Up
  • Glad I Didn't Say That!
  • Golden Oldies
  • Guest Posts
  • Housekeeping
  • Housekeeping
  • Im-Politic
  • In the News
  • Making News
  • Our So-Called Foreign Policy
  • The Snide World of Sports
  • Those Stubborn Facts
  • Uncategorized

Im-Politic

  • (What's Left of) Our Economy
  • Following Up
  • Glad I Didn't Say That!
  • Golden Oldies
  • Guest Posts
  • Housekeeping
  • Housekeeping
  • Im-Politic
  • In the News
  • Making News
  • Our So-Called Foreign Policy
  • The Snide World of Sports
  • Those Stubborn Facts
  • Uncategorized

Signs of the Apocalypse

  • (What's Left of) Our Economy
  • Following Up
  • Glad I Didn't Say That!
  • Golden Oldies
  • Guest Posts
  • Housekeeping
  • Housekeeping
  • Im-Politic
  • In the News
  • Making News
  • Our So-Called Foreign Policy
  • The Snide World of Sports
  • Those Stubborn Facts
  • Uncategorized

The Brighter Side

  • (What's Left of) Our Economy
  • Following Up
  • Glad I Didn't Say That!
  • Golden Oldies
  • Guest Posts
  • Housekeeping
  • Housekeeping
  • Im-Politic
  • In the News
  • Making News
  • Our So-Called Foreign Policy
  • The Snide World of Sports
  • Those Stubborn Facts
  • Uncategorized

Those Stubborn Facts

  • (What's Left of) Our Economy
  • Following Up
  • Glad I Didn't Say That!
  • Golden Oldies
  • Guest Posts
  • Housekeeping
  • Housekeeping
  • Im-Politic
  • In the News
  • Making News
  • Our So-Called Foreign Policy
  • The Snide World of Sports
  • Those Stubborn Facts
  • Uncategorized

The Snide World of Sports

  • (What's Left of) Our Economy
  • Following Up
  • Glad I Didn't Say That!
  • Golden Oldies
  • Guest Posts
  • Housekeeping
  • Housekeeping
  • Im-Politic
  • In the News
  • Making News
  • Our So-Called Foreign Policy
  • The Snide World of Sports
  • Those Stubborn Facts
  • Uncategorized

Guest Posts

  • (What's Left of) Our Economy
  • Following Up
  • Glad I Didn't Say That!
  • Golden Oldies
  • Guest Posts
  • Housekeeping
  • Housekeeping
  • Im-Politic
  • In the News
  • Making News
  • Our So-Called Foreign Policy
  • The Snide World of Sports
  • Those Stubborn Facts
  • Uncategorized

Blog at WordPress.com.

Current Thoughts on Trade

Terence P. Stewart

Protecting U.S. Workers

Marc to Market

So Much Nonsense Out There, So Little Time....

Alastair Winter

Chief Economist at Daniel Stewart & Co - Trying to make sense of Global Markets, Macroeconomics & Politics

Smaulgld

Real Estate + Economics + Gold + Silver

Reclaim the American Dream

So Much Nonsense Out There, So Little Time....

Mickey Kaus

Kausfiles

David Stockman's Contra Corner

Washington Decoded

So Much Nonsense Out There, So Little Time....

Upon Closer inspection

Keep America At Work

Sober Look

So Much Nonsense Out There, So Little Time....

Credit Writedowns

Finance, Economics and Markets

GubbmintCheese

So Much Nonsense Out There, So Little Time....

VoxEU.org: Recent Articles

So Much Nonsense Out There, So Little Time....

Michael Pettis' CHINA FINANCIAL MARKETS

RSS

So Much Nonsense Out There, So Little Time....

George Magnus

So Much Nonsense Out There, So Little Time....

Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Follow Following
    • RealityChek
    • Join 411 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • RealityChek
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar