Confederate Monuments and Erasing History
For those who read this who might not know me, I have a huge interest in history and particularly military history. As such I have a huge interesting in not erasing history.
What is the actual history?
While most historians would state that there were a variety of issues between the states and the Federal government at that time, slavery was likely the only one that required actual warfare to resolve.
Why?
The Southern economy was largely agrarian based around a plantation culture which depended on slave labor to function. Keep that in mind. One of the key features that could not be removed or altered without bringing down their whole economy was slave labor.
In case you think that’s overstated take a look at the Confederate Constitution. It specifically included a provision that forbade the states from forbidding slavery. There’s one right the states rights folks would not allow the states.
Late in the war when the South was desperately searching around for manpower for the army one general wrote up a proposal that would offer slaves freedom for joining the army and fighting for the South. He was told to get rid of that piece of paper and not to mention the idea to anyone. His superiors understood that to even float that idea risked fracturing the South and permanently doom the Confederacy. The idea would resurface weeks before the end of the war when it was far too late to do any good.
Confederate government papers show how central slavery was to their cause. Military leaders knew not to touch the topic ever though they desperately needed the manpower. Please don’t tell me they weren't fighting for slavery.
So what do the statues commemorate?
The vast majority of the statues were raised during the Jim Crow era. Another spike occurred during the Civil Rights era.
The Jim Crow era is of course a period where Southern whites not only were taking back power but were also ruthlessly stamping out any vestige of black power that had been gained during Reconstruction.
The Civil Rights era again challenged white power as blacks often with the assistance of the Federal government attempted to claim some power over their lives and communities.
Many of the statues and monuments were raised as a way to gather white power and to start telling the myth of the Lost Cause. They started telling the story that the Civil War was not about slavery. It was a noble cause to save the southern way of life. It of course ignores the fact that the way of life was dependent on slavery.
So what do I as a Northern White Male make of this?
When I toured the fields of Gettysburg and saw the statue of Robert E. Lee there I saw it in context. A battle happened here. This was the leader of one of the sides of the battle. By all accounts a great general who got the most out of his army. Gettysburg was not his finest moment, but no other general would have gotten as much out of that army as Lee did.
When I see a monument in a Chicago cemetery to the 4000 confederate soldiers that died in a nearby POW camp, I see it in context. Near this spot 4000 men died hungry and in filth because that’s simply the way POWs tended to be treated then. They signed up to be soldiers, but they didn't die like soldiers.
When I see a statue to Robert E. Lee in Charlottesville, I see it in context. It was an attempt to rewrite history. In effect to erase history and replace it with myth. I see a symbol of the Jim Crow era and those who fought against civil rights. If everybody saw it that way I’d say “leave it up!”. But the truth is, those who marched to protest taking it down, don’t see it that way. They see it as a monument to white power. They see it as a monument to the myth that replaces the history. They see it as a monument to their superiority.
What do we do with obvious symbols of hate? We tear them down.
