There has been much in the news around as America struggles with racial issues. The New York Times today has devoted a lot of space to Juneteenth; the opinion section has a number of pieces that address it and American racism.
One of the issues is the question of what to do about monuments to the Confederacy. Although markers on battlefields and statues in cemeteries have a straightforward memorial purpose, too many monuments to the confederacy are the equivalent of gang sign graffiti. They mark territory and send a message — and it’s not a good one.
The National Trust for Historic Preservation has issued a formal statement of what they believe is the best means of dealing with Confederate Monuments.
Statement | Washington, DC | June 18, 2020National Trust for Historic Preservation Statement on Confederate Monuments
- Author:The National Trust for Historic Preservation
- Contact Email:pr@savingplaces.org
- Contact Phone:202-588-6141
In recent weeks, protests throughout America and around the world have sprung up in support of racial justice and equity, sparked by the horrific killings of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and others. The National Trust stands committed to support this fight for justice. We believe that Black Lives Matter, Black History Matters, and that historic preservation has a powerful role to play in telling the full story of our often-difficult history. A critically important part of this work is elevating and preserving the enormous and important contributions that African Americans have made to our nation and carrying that profound legacy forward through places of truth, justice, and reconciliation.
This nationwide call for racial justice and equity has brought renewed attention to the Confederate monuments in many of our communities.
The National Trust for Historic Preservation has previously issued statements about the history and treatment of Confederate monuments, emphasizing that, although some were erected—like other monuments to war dead—for reasons of memorialization, most Confederate monuments were intended to serve as a celebration of Lost Cause mythology and to advance the ideas of white supremacy. Many of them still stand as symbols of those ideologies and sometimes serve as rallying points for bigotry and hate today. To many African Americans, they continue to serve as constant and painful reminders that racism is embedded in American society.
We believe it is past time for us, as a nation, to acknowledge that these symbols do not reflect, and are in fact abhorrent to, our values and to our foundational obligation to continue building a more perfect union that embodies equality and justice for all.
Although Confederate monuments are sometimes designated as historic, and while many were erected more than a century ago, the National Trust supports their removal from our public spaces when they continue to serve the purposes for which many were built—to glorify, promote, and reinforce white supremacy, overtly or implicitly. While some have suggested that removal may result in erasing history, we believe that removal may be necessary to achieve the greater good of ensuring racial justice and equality. And their history needs not end with their removal: we support relocation of these monuments to museums or other places where they may be preserved so that their history as elements of Jim Crow and racial injustice can be recognized and interpreted.
We believe that communities have an obligation to take on this issue forthrightly and inclusively. We recognize that not all monuments are the same, and a number of communities have carefully and methodically determined that some monuments should be removed and others retained but contextualized with educational markers or other monuments designed to counter the false narrative and racist ideology that they represent, providing a deeper understanding of their message and their purpose. We also recognize that some state legislatures have prohibited removal of such monuments, disallowing the rights of local communities wishing to remove these offensive symbols. Until such state laws are changed or overturned, contextualization may be the only option, at least for the present. Our view, however, is that unless these monuments can in fact be used to foster recognition of the reality of our painful past and invite reconciliation for the present and the future, they should be removed from our public spaces.
Putting the policy to the test
Statues are coming down; some by design, some by direct action. There’s one place that the suggestions from the National Trust could be put to the test and really send a statement: the monument to Confederate armed forces war dead in Arlington National Cemetery.
Arlington itself dates back to the Civil War:
...In May 1864, Union forces suffered large numbers of dead in the Battle of the Wilderness. Quartermaster General Montgomery C. Meigs ordered that an examination of eligible sites be made for the establishment for a large new national military cemetery. Within weeks, his staff reported that Arlington Estate was the most suitable property in the area.[12] The property was high and free from floods (which might unearth graves), it had a view of the District of Columbia, and it was aesthetically pleasing. It was also the home of the leader of the armed forces of the Confederate States of America, and denying Robert E. Lee use of his home after the war was a valuable political consideration.[13]
If there is any sacred ground in America, Arlington has to be at the top of the list. It’s the site of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and so many other memorials to Americans who gave their lives in service to this country. How did we end up with a monument dedicated to those who sought to destroy it?
The Confederate Memorial is a memorial in Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington County, Virginia, in the United States, that commemorates members of the armed forces of the Confederate States of America who died during the American Civil War. Authorized in March 1906, former Confederate soldier and sculptor Moses Jacob Ezekiel was commissioned by the United Daughters of the Confederacy in November 1910 to design the memorial. It was unveiled by President Woodrow Wilson on June 4, 1914 (the 106th anniversary of the birth of Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederate States of America).
The memorial grounds have changed slightly due to burials and alterations since 1914. Some major changes to the memorial were proposed over the years, but none has been implemented. Since the memorial's unveiling, the President of the United States has almost always sent a funeral wreath to be laid at the memorial every Memorial Day. Some presidents have declined to do so, and the tradition is controversial.
The monument could be taken as a token of reconciliation, of binding up the wounds of the nation. There is some justification for it in that there are confederate troops buried in Arlington. It was erected at a time when there were still many surviving members of both armies. But...
It was also an era which saw brutal racial repression and the second rise of the Klu Klux Klan. The symbolism on the monument perpetuates the myth of the Lost Cause. The description of the dedication ceremony sounds like a giant dog whistle to contemporary ears. You’d think that it was abruptly ended by a thunderstorm would have been taken as a message from above…
It’s 2020 and we still haven’t come to terms with the racial divisions in this country. The monument to the Confederacy is not likely to be relocated from Arlington; the fact that it is part of the complex taken from defeated General Robert E. Lee adds a certain salience in any case.
It might be time to think about adding some monuments in the area around the Confederate memorial — room permitting — dedicated to the African Americans who fought for America in the Civil War, and who have served in every conflict up to the present day. There’s no shortage of potential subjects. Something for the Tuskeegee Airmen, Jesse L. Brown, or Henry Johnson would be a powerful statement. There’s a definite need to find a way to display all of the history.
What would you like to see done?