This is what emboldened white supremacists look like

[ClimateSanity]

....

 

[WizardofOz]

ClimateSanity's link

 

[ClimateSanity]

,,,,
King fought for the rights of his people against an oppressive government. So did Lee. King just wanted fair play. So did Lee. King just wanted blacks to be free. So did Lee. Lee felt a more gradual emancipation would be preferable to a sudden emancipation because slaves needed to be educated and trained in living in a free society. He felt sudden freedom without this would cause serious problems and conflicts. And it did. Problems we are still facing today. Lee set a personal example by freeing his slaves on his own and in good circumstances.

A really evil man huh town?

 

[ClimateSanity]

Not to excuse, but when a culture by and large is steeped in something, it is harder to see the problem.....Lon.


That's what all this moral preaching against our ancestors misses. It judges people by our standards and totally misses the moral atmosphere of the age. Anyone who is not doing everything in their power to make abortion illegal has no right whatsoever to make moral aspersions against Lee or anyone else in that age regarding slavery.

 

[Foxfire]

I am now convinced that there are far too many Confederate monuments. :chuckle:

I don't seem to see very many monuments to American war heroes in the lot. How about a Ulysses S. Grant or William Tecumseh Sherman monument by each one of em?
:think:

 

[Tambora]

How about a Ulysses S. Grant or William Tecumseh Sherman monument by each one of em?
:think:

Both are historical figures in our nation's history. Leave them be.

I have posted pics of the Civil War monuments of both those men. Leave them be.

 

[drbrumley]

Bible slavery is where a person is under a contract to preform duties for hire.

Tell that to Joesph...

 

[drbrumley]

I don't seem to see very many monuments to American war heroes in the lot. How about a Ulysses S. Grant or William Tecumseh Sherman monument by each one of em?
:think:

Sure, why not.....why not two genocidal maniacs

 

[Foxfire]

Both are historical figures in our nation's history. Leave them be.

I have posted pics of the Civil War monuments of both those men. Leave them be.

Frankly, my dear, I don't have any particular irrational attachment to any of them. :think:

 

[fool]

Both are historical figures in our nation's history. Leave them be.

I have posted pics of the Civil War monuments of both those men. Leave them be.

All the Confederate statues should be melted down and recast into statues of Lincoln, Grant and Sherman and then put back up in the same locations.

 

[fool]

Sure, why not.....why not two genocidal maniacs

Maniacs that Won.

 

[Town Heretic]

A really evil man huh town?

Lee led the armies of the South in defense of the evil institution of that slave state. You can choose to separate and compartmentalize whatever suits your bias. Bill Cosby did a lot of good for a lot of people while he was about the business of raping a much smaller number. Do you compartmentalize with him as well? I'd bet you wouldn't.

 

[Tambora]

All the Confederate statues should be melted down

No, they should not.

 

[fool]

Lee set a personal example by freeing his slaves on his own and in good circumstances.

Hog wash!
He let them because he had to it was in the will.
AND he could have let them go sooner but he didn't. And he punished any that escaped and were recaptured.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_E._Lee#Late_1850s:_Arlington_plantation_and_the_Custis_slaves

 

[drbrumley]

All the Confederate statues should be melted down and recast into statues of Lincoln, Grant and Sherman and then put back up in the same locations.

:rotfl:

 

[Town Heretic]

It seems to me town sees himself as morally superior to these men:

I think you think too much about me and not enough about the issue. I don't care who believes in the goodness of Lee. He is still accountable for the terrible choice he made and what that choice served.

Romanticizing him instead of using him as a cautionary tale is partly why it took about a hundred years and additional deaths to secure something as fundamental as voting rights for black Americans.

Dwight D. Eisenhower:*"General Robert E. Lee was...one of the supremely gifted men produced by this Nation...Through all his many trials he remained selfless almost to a fault and unfailing in his belief in God...he was noble as a leader and as a man, and unsullied as I read the pages of our history...I proudly display the picture of this great American on my office wall."

Do you apply the same litmus for nobility to those who do great public works while supporting the right of others to choose abortion?

I'm betting you don't.

Winston Churchill:*"Lee was the noblest American who ever lived and one of the greatest commanders known to the annals of war."

So was Rommel. And Ford was a great industrialist, Nazi sympathizer and avid racist. Lee's prowess as a commander isn't in question.

Booker T. Washington:*"The first white people in America to exhibit interest in reaching the Negro and saving his soul in the medium of the Sunday-school were Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson."

Booker caught and catches a lot of flack among large sections of the black community. But then, George Wallace did a lot of good for blacks later in his political career. But if you put a statue up of him in Montgomery standing in the schoolhouse door it would be sending a message about which Wallace you were meaning to honor. So does putting Lee in his uniform.

 

[drbrumley]

Maniacs that Won.

I guess that is all it takes. They WON!!!

Like I said earlier in this thread..the victors get to write the history. Truth be damned.

 

[Lon]

I don't seem to see very many monuments to American war heroes in the lot. How about a Ulysses S. Grant or William Tecumseh Sherman monument by each one of em?
:think:

Or have a "Sunday School" Lee in a suit ready to take its place 'before' it came down. I REALLY think people make mistakes without thinking first, doing second.

 

[Town Heretic]

Wrote a long answer that was eaten by a storm...so this will be a bit shorter.

if there is no redemption in them, I have never heard it, but from you.

You haven't heard it from me either. You've heard me note a support for those who would remove monuments to an institutional evil.

How is this reasonable? It seems, with the removal of the statues, it is, at least to some, but why? What changed? When does it no longer matter what Eisenhower or Churchill and others believed?

It doesn't matter who believes a thing if the thing they believe is wrong. So it depends on the quote. That the great industrialist Henry Ford was a Nazi sympathizer and avid racist doesn't really elevate the Nazi or racist nonsense, does it? Same with once national hero Lindbergh.

Will we call Regan and every president since him, until the law is reversed, evil? They all willing took office at such a time. I'm not understanding all guilty-by-association accusations as they relate to those generals.

Again, I haven't set about the issue of declaring men evil, only noting the evil some served and the danger of ennobling that cause in any sense.

Hitler was not dealing with a full deck.

He was a man much respected by any number of people before the war, before the evil of his intent was widely known. The quality of his thinking, memory and ability to move people in speeches was renowned. But that evil (along with the stresses of war and increased reliance on drugs) eventually reduced him to a fairly ineffective leader of the Reich. I don't think some crazy guy just happened to get a hold of Germany and suddenly, miraculously transformed it into an order that nearly toppled the world.

Then the comparison is strained. Why use it?

The comparison you wanted in play was strained, but it wasn't how I used it, only how I responded to your impression.

Wasn't it rather, embracing terms of the truce? The Constitution provided for means of men to stand up for their unalienable rights, on both sides. To disdain one side, in its pursuit, is heavy-handed. We have always been a nation of fighters, not push-overs. As such, the statues imho, are not thumbing their nose at the North, but a celebration of indomitable human spirit. Is the only good American a trodden American? A non-contentious American? A compliant American? I may have bought a slave or a few back then. Why? 1) To keep tribes from killing one another. If they kept their enemies alive, me getting them would save their lives. 2) That I might care for them when they got here, and gave them work, taught them the language. etc. Read again Booker T Washington's tribute to Jackson and Lee. It seems to me, a man born under slavery has a more balanced view than you? How is that possible? Do we not listen to Booker T Washington any more?

I'd say most of what you wrote plays well with the myth you don't seem to have discovered yet. Read the stuff I suggested and get back to me. As to Booker, he was reviled in some quarters of his own community, deeply troubled many who found him a good man with a bad idea, and beloved by empowered Southern whites who would celebrate anyone slowing the progress of his people.

I've no problem, as being 'conquered' that a requirement would be that those uniforms or flags would not be glorified,

Then you shouldn't have a problem with New Orleans. The uniform and military nature of the commemoration is of the same cloth.

but my original problem was the burying of them under the sea

Why should my sentiment be problematic to you? I'm okay with memorials to traitors who served a slave state being set to rest in the ocean. I'm not commanding anyone to do it.

or hidden in a museum

In exactly the same way books are "hidden" in a library.

as opposed to a private group or individual being able to sit them on their own property.

Put up any nonsense that suits you in your yard (though you might want to check with your homeowners association). :think:

Well good. It the blame and evil is mutual, we have to be careful with our statues of Grant and Lee, as we are of Davis and Lincoln.

Well, no. There is no equal footing between men who betrayed their country in the service of a slave state and men who fought to restore that Union and eventually abolished that institution. That service rather trumps the fact they were good husbands or loved dogs, etc.

Again, I think it important that all of them give more than just the one reason for the war. You even mention it yourself regarding business practices as well. You also agreed that The Emancipation Proclamation was tacked on after the war was already going. It couldn't have started without that intent, if that was the only thing to draw from its occurrence. You'd really have to work very hard, not just for me, all of us in the North. We all have been educated to believe slavery was but one issue.

It was one issue. The issue from which every other was generated. The South fought because the north in electing Lincoln was saying that it would not be allowed to expand into the new territories, would not, could not then keep pace with the growing political power of the non-slave holding states. The thought was that after that it would become a matter of time before its economic engine would be forced out of existence by the majority.

In other words, the states withdrew because they read the writing on the wall regarding slavery.

First sentence?

A bit more, but it held the sentiment expressed throughout and I did invite you to read the rest and to examine all the documents states advanced in dissolving their bonds. Here's a link to a lot of that.

Georgia went on a bit, but every paragraph was a recitation about the north intruding on their slave state.

Another?

Mississippi: "Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world...and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin. "

Some take a little longer to get to the point, but it's slavery, over and over again, that moves them to leave when you get into it.

"Traitor" is somewhat subjective, even to this day.

Arnold would disagree. So would the free legal dictionary:

Under Article III, Section 3 of the Constitution, any person who levies war against the United States or adheres to its enemies by giving them aid and comfort has committed treason within the meaning of the Constitution.

The term "aid and comfort" refers to any act that manifests a betrayal of allegiance to the United States...if a subversive act has any tendency to weaken the power of the United States to attack or resist its enemies, aid and comfort has been given."​

Further, the S. Ct. held Lincoln's act of blockading the South legal and the South in insurrection, its supporters traitors. 67 US 635, 17 L. Ed. 459, 2 Black 635, 1862 U.S. LEXIS 282

Will do that. It would preclude our discussion for a bit, however. We'd be talking about other information until such a time.

Added to my reading list. Is it just me, or is there irony in his last name? :doh

Fact is the friend of truth and the enemy of myth predicated in something else. :thumb:

If the removal of those statues accomplishes what you seek, well and good

It accomplishes the good within the act. It no longer lends the stamp of social and government authority to the myth. The rest is time.

, but to me it seems a baby out with the bathwater proposition

Except the baby is the evil and the water is foul.

Thanks for taking the time. It is appreciated. -Lon

:cheers:

 

[fool]

:rotfl:

Forth Option: Harriet Tubman.
Those are your choices.