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Originally Posted by 1964Alum
I've hesitated to jump into this but will despite my reservations.
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This Tar Heel (though with some old Virginia roots thrown in) appreciates very much that you've jumped in. Thank you.
Admittedly, relatively few people have posted about this topic, so it's certainly not a representative sampling, but I find it interesting that the Southerners¹ who've weighed in have, I think, been uniform in saying that the statues were primarily erected in order to reinforce White Supremacy and no longer have a place in the public squares of our communities, while those who have talked about things like erasing history, honoring the dead or where to draw lines have been from outside the states of the Confederacy. FWIW.
¹ Meaning here people from states that seceded to join the Confederacy. (Though now that I think about it, and without going back and looking through the thread, that may just be you and me. There are others who have posted with family roots in the South.)
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Originally Posted by 1964Alum
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Originally Posted by JonInKC
Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Van Buren, Polk, Harrison, Tyler, Taylor, Johnson, Ulysses S Grant
These are all US Presidents that owned slaves. If we should take down Confederate statues "because slavery" then we need to take down any statues of those people too. Many if not all of these criticisms of Lee can be leveled against those people as well.
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No, their roles in the history and development of our country was very different from that of Confederates who withdrew from and fought against our nation in order to preserve the institution of slavery. |
This. There's a big difference between honoring people specifically because they fought to preserve slavery (and preserving monuments built to reinforce and perpetuate racial division) and honoring people who were instrumental in founding or leading this country
despite being slave owners.
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But I do agree that we need to understand the role of slavery in the formation of our country. And that of White Supremacy. For that matter, only white male land owners were originally permitted to vote. Our founding fathers were also flawed human beings.
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Yes. Monticello, for example, does a good job of exploring the history of Jefferson and his slaves.
