When were talking about the Lee statue, its a really good example of what can happen when there is disagreement in the community about what its values are. Note: Responses have been edited for length and clarity. In several cities, these tributes have been vandalized or torn down by protestors or removed by public officials. Amanda Holpuch, Ed Pilkington, and Oliver Laughland, Charleston Shooting: Confederate Flag at Heart of Growing Political Storm, theguardian.com, June 20, 2015, 4. Thats a lot of money for one city to pay for, and that money could be used for more important things. Mississippis secession declaration states, Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery the greatest material interest of the world. Take away these men who seem to be inferior to Roosevelt, but leave him. During the globalBlack Lives Matterprotests in the summer of 2020, calls to take down the statues were met with citizens not only actively damaging or removing statues of Confederate figures, but targeting statues of slave-holdingFounding Fathers in general, as well as historic monuments to Abraham Lincoln and abolitionists such as Frederick Douglass. The Onion looks at the pros and cons of removing historical statues. Confederate statues were the focus of protests in Richmond, Virginia, last summer. ", ProCon.org. Lets argue about the facts, lets put them down on paper or on a marker and have a conversation about them. [24], Geoff Palmer, Scotlands first black professor, who disagrees with taking down the statues, warned against being distracted by the simple, concrete action of taking down statues: We dont want to leave this so that people looking back in 50 years will say: you know, they took the statues down, why didnt they do something about racism? [53]. Despite its relatively small price tag, it is still worth considering, especially when compared to the total cost of the Civil War and its aftermath. Theres a reason Christians in Rome didnt topple all the pagan statues and buildings in the city, or raze the Colosseum. [36], Each Confederate monument is a reminder not only of the Civil War and the end of slavery, but the assertion of the federal governments dominance over states rights, as well as the persistence of systemic racism. Here are some top contenders, Stupendous vision, energy, competence, and courage. GREENE: But what about historical figures with complicated, often racist histories who were also Union generals or former presidents? https://www.britannica.com/story/pro-and-con-historic-statue-removal-in-the-united-states, According to theSouthern Poverty Law Center. Monuments to men who advocated cruelty and barbarism to achieve such a plainly racist end are a grotesque affront to these ideals. [41]. Top photo: The base of the Robert E. Lee monument in Richmond, Virginia, after his statue was removed from atop it. "Historic Statue Removal Top 3 Pros & Cons." Those who disagree with the beliefs upheld by the statues should work to understand the history these monuments represent, rather than trying to simply remove them and the history from sight. 4. Jackson was a slave owner. GORDON-REED: I suppose, if people want to, everything can pave the way to some other point. Even more importantly, however, erasing monuments of once-revered figures upsets an unspoken but long-prevailing consensus governing our decisions of whom to commemorate. Greta Anderson, When Free Speech and Racist Speech Collide, insidehighered.com, June 23, 2020, 36. Conocie una fugacidad de las personas y conocie una inscripcin hablada de un poder. When a king dies, his or her statue is also taken down, as are those of their ancestors. They put up monuments to T.J. because of the Declaration of Independence, which every group has used to make their place in American society. Tomas Strakas Vida Poltica de las Estatuas is a collection of essays. Taney's bust was replaced with one of Thurgood Marshall. Since Black Lives Matter protests began in response to Columbuss legacy, a number of statues of him have been removed. In the 1930s and 1940s, revolutionary and reformist forces distrusted Columbus statues because they had been erected with a clearly racist and Eurocentric spirit. Since the election of President Donald Trump, there has been an increased push to remove Confederate statues and monuments. The Day of the Race has been condemned by social science as a result of its extreme racism, including the Nazism of World War II. A few years ago, the nation stood watch as Confederate statues started tumbling down at the hands of protestors or at the direction of city officials, seeking peace and reckoning mainly throughout the South after the deaths of Black men at the hands of police and other racial injustices. The Removal of All Confederate Statues, Flags, Symbols in America; The topic should be a controversial social issue. As some commentators point out, the destruction weakens our consciousness of history, including historys darker side. There are pros and cons to removing statues. Last modified on July 14, 2022. Share This: Over 100 busts, statues, columns, and other memorials to the Confederacy and Confederate general and politicians have been removed around the country. And the vast majority of these statues were erected during the height of the Jim Crow movement, as historian Kevin M. Kruse has shown. I grew up seeing hundreds of small stone and bronze markers along our desert roads telling us about the great white Americans who passed through or discovered the great West or our mighty Colorado River, said Diaz, whowas born and raised in the Fort Mojave Indian Village in Needles, California. 1. They were on the wrong side of history. They teach us, and it depends on us whether we practice what we learn. Jos Vasconcelos and Jos Enrique Rod have been appointed as ambassadors, and they have been actively involved in the work of the United Nations. They can be kept in museums with proper historical context rather than on a plinth to be admired. Moving such monuments to museums or other places where they can be contextualized and interpreted is a goal of the National Trust. It started in the 1890s with the Worlds Columbian Exposition in Chicago. In illuminating how vulnerable Americans have long been to ugly racial appeals, and how willfully blind we have been to racial injustice, those statues could remind us of the catastrophic consequences of not putting bigotry aside. [51], Some jurisdictions have chosen to put explanatory plaques beside Confederate monuments to teach a more complete history. This article was published on January 20, 2022, at Britannicas ProCon.org, a nonpartisan issue-information source. Henry Louis Gates, Jr., PhD, Director of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University, notes that enduringly charged symbols of the former Confederacy [add] to our fears that, instead of embracing the promise of democracy in a diverse society, some want to return us to a far more restrictive time, when freedom was circumscribed by race. [22], We cant get to learning from our history if we keep accepting that racism should be celebrated in American history, according to Khalil Gibran Muhammad, PhD, Professor of History, Race and Public Policy at Harvard University [1]. Despite Nicole Douglas' team-leading 14th goal of the season, the Sun Devil soccer team was unable to claim its first Pac-12 victory of the season after falling to the Oregon State Beavers, 2-1 on Thursday night. I have a complex relationship with monuments, said Diaz, now a world-renowned poet. It is also important to remember there is a difference between removing the statues and destroying them. Confederate monuments are more likely to be removed in cities with large African-American and Democratic populations, as well as chapters of the NAACP, and where state legislatures have the authority to approve their removal. There are a number of reasons why Confederate monuments should be kept. A statue must be erected on land that is yours and have the authority to do so. Confederate statues depict anti-abolitionists as heroes and very honorable men, therefore they should be removed. A statue of Lord Charles Colston was erected in Britain more than 60 years before slavery was abolished there. In recent years, there has been a movement to take down statues of historical figures who have been accused of racism, sexism, and other forms of bigotry. Their actions also took a violent turn, as when revolutionaries murdered bishops and priests who refused to sign a loyalty oath. For example, a statue of black abolitionist and former slave Frederick Douglass was damaged over the July 4, 2020 weekend in Rochester, New York. These battles have a strong historical context, as they were influenced by a very Venezuelan tradition: Bolivarian political historicism. [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [54], According to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), 59 Confederate statues and nine markers or plaques were removed from public land in 19 US states between June 17, 2015 and July 6, 2020. Even after the statues were erected, there was never a common ground between them. It would be odd for me to condone other people doing something I would not do. The removal of Confederate monuments is usually around $1.8 million in total, but this varies by location. Brian Palmer and Seth Freed Wessler, The Costs of the Confederacy, smithsonianmag.com, Dec 2018, 5. It is hard to explain on other than political grounds why so many more monuments and places arededicated to John F. Kennedythan to much better presidents. GAZETTE:As a law professor, what is your view on people unilaterally deciding to pull down statues they find offensive after officials often enjoined by laws or judicial rulings barring such action decline to do so? Opponents said, well, if you're going to take down Jefferson Davis, the next day you're going to take down George Washington. [10] [11] [12], Washington, Jefferson, and Grant had undeniable ties to slavery. The Recycling Economic Information (REI) Report found that, in a single year, recycling and reuse activities in the United States accounted for 757,000 jobs, $36.6 billion in wages and $6.7 billion in tax revenues. No logr derribarla. Tomorrow, a white nationalist majority mightuproot monuments to Martin Luther King citinghis adulteries and other indiscretions. Iconoclasm is not new; its been going on for thousands of years in different circumstances, Lamp said. David Greene talks to Manisha Sinha, professor of American history at the University of Connecticut, about the recent toppling of non-Confederate statues like those of George Washington. The First Amendment protects everyones speech, not just the speech approved by the majority. According to Richard Rose, President of Atlantas NAACP, there can be no contextual or commutational discussion of racism because the statues were intended to promote white supremacy. Keep reading for all the pros and cons of removing Confederate statues. And then he went on, in fact, to defeat the Confederacy, which was extremely important in the destruction of slavery. I think it dishonors them to celebrate the men who killed them and tried to kill off the American nation. The XVI Tumba-estatuas de Guaicaipuro present the main lder of the resistencia indgena a la conquista del Valle de Caracas. George Gerbner, PhD, and Larry Gross coined the term symbolic annihilation in 1976 to describe the lack of representation of a group of people. This article was published on January 20, 2022, at Britannica's ProCon.org, a nonpartisan issue-information source. Rob Natelsonisa constitutional historian and former constitutional law professor, serves as asenior fellow in constitutional jurisprudenceat The Independence Institute, the Montana Policy Institute, and The Heartland Institute. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. It is not acceptable to state that statues represent history if they do not represent the roles and responsibilities they serve. However, preservationism remains the dominant outlook of the sector. Taking them down is to censor, whitewash, and potentially forget that history. The results of these revoluciones can be viewed in the following format: Un momento climtico en el derribamiento de alguna ser industrialization de Marx. They can be offensive and hurtful to certain groups of people. [17] [18] The Lost Cause mythology was used to continue the idea that black people needed to be subjugated for their own good and as justification for Jim Crow laws. GREENE: Has your view on all of this changed since George Floyd was killed and we've seen such anger on the streets and such a growing movement at this moment? Scottie Andrew and Anna Sturla, A Statue of Frederick Douglass Was Toppled over the Fourth of July Weekend, the Anniversary of His Famous Speech, cnn.com, July 6, 2020, 10. These figures were not commonly known to be ridden by equestrians. Here are the proper bibliographic citations for this page according to four style manuals (in alphabetical order): [Editor's Note: The APA citation style requires double spacing within entries. In the event that these statues are removed, the country would lose a valuable educational tool about the effects of the Civil War. Ultimately, as far as who gets to decide, I think activism is what gets it done. The statues represent the countrys history, no matter how complicated. PRO: These monuments should be removed because they honor slavery and segregation CON: Confederate monuments should stay because they connect past racial crimes to current racial inequality Nearly every heavy-crane company in southern Louisiana has received threats from opponents. Defunding the humanities, cutting history classes and departments. Accessed April 27, 2023. https://www.procon.org/headlines/historic-statue-removal-top-3-pros-cons/, Whose Heritage: Public Symbols of the Confederacy, 1. Their statues pay homage to hate, not heritage. Beyond building monuments to honor black Americans, monuments could employ and elevate living black artists, such as Kehinde Wiley, whose 2019 Rumors of War statue depicts a black man on horseback in a pose reminiscent of statues of Robert E. Lee. The Confederate symbols and associated values that Americans hold in high regard are paid for by them. How will Mr. DeSantiss wild Disney ride end? Consider appealing to the American Alliance of Museums for the use of the statues removed from public display. Does removing statues of Columbus or Confederate officials pave the way for action against monuments honoring those who helped create the United States? There are many other people who deserve statues that better represent the countrys historical progress and diversity. Do we protect Confederate graves and battlefields? Politics plays a role in answering close questions. As James Grossman, PhD, Executive Director of the American Historical Association, notes, Its not just that the statues represent white supremacy, but the purpose of building the statues was the perpetuation of white supremacy. There are far more dangerous threats to history. ProCon/Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc. May 16, 2017 0 The statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee and his mount, Traveler, face the setting sun on Monument Ave. in Richmond,. Sophia A. Nelson, Opinion: Don't Take Down Confederate Monuments. In later years, Lee alsodistinguished himself as an educator: As president of the institution that is nowWashington and Lee University, he was largely responsible for fashioning the modern college honor code. On the other side, opponents of the statues argue that they celebrate white supremacy. We disregard or discount those faults common to the individuals time and place. To the best of our knowledge, no resistance is shown in 1895 in the Neapolitan pieza de mrmol; all hecha pedazos must be resisted. GREENE: You said something interesting. Southern Poverty Law Center, Whose Heritage? There are statues of people all over the place, and they should be removed. Petition Pushes for Parton Statues, arkansasonline.com, June 23, 2020, 30. In several cities, these tributes have been vandalized or torn down by protestors or removed by public officials. [35]. Venezuelas mezcla is characterized by a lack of eclecticism, as well as a widespread, general sense of izquierda. procon@eb.com, 2023 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc. Should historic statues be taken down? THE HILL 1625 K STREET, NW SUITE 900 WASHINGTON DC 20006 | 202-628-8500 TEL | 202-628-8503 FAX. Photo courtesy of Getty Images/iStockphoto, (480) 965-9657
Theres one school of thought that says communities should be the ones to decide. Phil Davis, George Washington Monument in Druid Hill Park Spray-Painted with Destroy Racists, Anti-Police Sentiment, baltimoresun.com, June 21, 2020, 11. Catherine Thorbecke, Walmart donates $100K to replace Arkansas' Confederate-linked statues at the US Capitol, abcnew.go.com, July 7, 2020, 32. The 12th of October 2004 marks the beginning of a new era in Venezuela. His policies were also deadly for thousands of Native Americans. Many in that group argue the monuments represent Southern heritage. In a 5-4 vote, the court rejected the Trump administration's push to end an Obama-era program that gives nearly 700,000 Dreamers the ability to work in the United States and avoid deportation. The greatest tragedy in the history of the United States was the loss of over a thousand lives as a result of the countrys wars. [4], As Karen Cox, PhD, Historian of the American South at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, concludes, The state is giving the stamp of approval to these Lost Cause ideas, and the money is a symbol of that approval. I think what you see with the Lee monument and this new time capsule is a good example of how we can handle that. They are a part of our cultural heritage. Those are the real threats to history. The shooter was said to have glorified the Confederate South, posing in Facebook photos with the Battle Flag of the Northern Virginia Army (also known now as the Confederate flag, though it never represented the Confederate States) and touring historical Confederate locations before the shooting. The bus will arrive in Che Guevaras honor. Were holding them up as a model of civic identity, of what the rest of us should be doing. The plaques can not only detail the history of slavery and the Civil War, but also the white segregationist history that promoted the building of such statues to promote the revisionist Lost Cause history. The result is that, as a result, the Primera Guerra is no longer averse to it. [45] [46] Martin Luther King, Jr. regularly cheated on his wife. While he hoped the next generation would abolish slavery, he wrote in 1820 that maintaining the institution of slavery was like holding a wolf by the ear, and we can neither hold him, nor safely let him go. [40], Grant came from an abolitionist family, freed the one slave he owned in 1859, supported black enlisted Army men, led the Union Army in the Civil War to abolish slavery, and was endorsed by Frederick Douglass for president. But I think whats so interesting about the City Beautiful movement is that it controlled public spaces in a very specific way, and it was ultimately a movement about assimilation, and a movement that came out of a real concern about immigration. Eventually, police descended on the. Theyre models of civic behavior that we should all strive to. [4], Monuments are ultimately about which values we want to honor and put on public display. In response to a question posed by The Daily Mail, the Queen Mothers statue in Trafalgar Square should be chosen. She won the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award for her explosive 2008 work, The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family.. Several years have passed since the debate over the removal of Confederate statues began. Second, because almost everyone conforms in most respects to prevailing social practices, disqualification for such conduct is necessarily arbitrary and driven more by politics than by merit. Statues elevate a person from a historical event rather than demystify it. The statues in major British cities are being reviewed. Since this fundamentally conflicts with American values and ideas, they should be removed. Glenn Foster, founder of The Freedom Neighborhood, stated of the Emancipation Memorial, which depicts Lincoln over a kneeling freed slave, When I look at that statue, Im reminded my freedom and my liberation is only dictated by white peoples terms. The police killing of George Floyd sparked widespread protests and reignited efforts across the U.S. to remove Confederate and other statues viewed as symbols of slavery and racism. I understand the importance of remembering those who died fighting for both sides of the war. That, my friends, is what we must work toward eradicating. [50], Ellis Cose, Senior Fellow at the ACLU, states that the statues should remain, with plaques and other material in place that point out that these men were traitors, not American heroes, and that their ugly legacy haunts us still. Annette Gordon-Reed, JD, Professor of American Legal History at Harvard University, explained, There is an important difference between helping to create the United States and trying to destroy it. For one thing, it can be a close question whether a persons extraordinary feats made the world a better place: Franklin D. Roosevelt is widely commemorated, even though scholarsstill argueover whether his leadership during the Great Depression actually improved American life. Personally, I think there are other ways to remember our racist history as a society. All rights reserved. How? Perhaps that is precisely why the standard is flouted by those who want to politicize everything. The ornaments do not represent the history of the world; rather, they represent what the past chose to celebrate and commemorate. Those who argue against keeping political statues in public spaces typically make the following points: 1. During the global Black Lives Matter protests in the summer of 2020, calls to take down the statues were met with citizens not only actively damaging or removing statues of Confederate figures, but targeting statues of slave-holding Founding Fathers in general, as well as historic monuments to Abraham Lincoln and abolitionists such as Frederick Douglass. Michelangelos David is not only a statue of a man, but also a statue of God. GORDON-REED: This moment feels different because theres been a great awakening in the country about police-on-citizen violence. [5], The Virginia statues still stood amid the protests following the death of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, though they were tagged with graffiti then (and later removed on July 10, 2021). So for instance, I just read today that the Museum of Natural History wants to take down a statue of Theodore Roosevelt that has an African American man and a Native American man standing alongside him while he's astride on a horse. Also removed from the monuments base was a 133-year-old copper time capsule containing artifacts and ephemera related to the Confederacy. Confederate monuments were put up in response to Blacks getting more rights, as a kind of a backlash. Its a pleasure to be a part of the politics of Los diferentes estrellas de la Avenida. [52], Next to the Peace Monument in Atlanta, Georgia, a plaque reads, This monument should no longer stand as a memorial to white brotherhood; rather, it should be seen as an artifact representing a shared history in which millions of Americans were denied civil and human rights. [24], Sheffield Hale, JD, President and Chief Executive of the Atlanta History Center, stated of the plaque, I do think it gives [people] a starting point, which is sorely needed right now, in our society, as a way to deal with contentious issues. There are at least two reasons for not permitting contemporaneous vices to disqualify historical figures from favorable commemoration. NPR Morning Edition, For Stanton, All Women Were Not Created Equal, npr.org, July 13, 2011, 46. SINHA: I think then it becomes a purely destructive exercise, a way you are simply destroying all monuments and all statues. A similar scenario unfolded in 1918 in France, when the imperios took advantage of the French Revolution to gain power. These monuments are controversial because they are seen by some as honoring the Confederacy and its pro-slavery and white supremacist policies and by others as historical markers of the nations history. The monuments go up because, without Washington, there likely would not have been an American nation. What you got in the interim before that happened was a kind of a battle over community values. PRO First and foremost, they are part of our history and should be preserved as such. Lee was distinguished from his contemporaries by an exemplary career, both in the U.S. and Confederate armies, of competence and honor. 13.8K Followers. [49], Author Sophia A. Nelson, JD, who notes she is the granddaughter of a slave, states that she does not fear 150-year-old statues of old dead white men. Nelson argues that her classmates at Washington & Lee University didnt hate [black students] because there were statues of Robert E. Lee or George Washington (our nations first President and a slave owner) on campus. [29] [30], Walmart donated $100,000 to help Arkansas replace statues of Confederate sympathizers Governor James P. Clarke and attorney Uriah Rose in the US Capitol, with statues of Johnny Cash and civil rights pioneer Daisy Bates. Should Statues Be Removed Pros And Cons - Stay informed with breaking news, in-depth analysis and community coverage. The main duty is not to hide the bitter parts. [43]. There are pros and cons to removing statues. So what should be the standard for taking down a statue? In recent years, there has been a growing debate over whether or not political statues should be in public spaces. Only one battle was fought in the larger history wars between Columbus and Rome. John Daniel Davidson, Why We Should Keep The Confederate Monuments Right Where They Are, thefederalist.com, Aug. 18, 2017, 37. Are you. Why are Confederate statues being removed? Were trying to let the government know were not going to wait any longer for our freedom to happen. [19] Celebrations of Columbus have long been criticized due to his colonization and genocide of Indigenous people, as well as the false narrative that he discovered America when he never set foot on North America. Alex Parsons, Replace All Confederate Statues in Tennessee with Dolly Parton, change.org (accessed July 8, 2020), 31. The consensus renders the commemoration process more meaningful and less political than it otherwise would be. Do you agree? Theres nothing to memorialize there, except a history of white supremacy and treason.
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