With Liberty and Justice for All
The removal of Confederate statues and memorials is nothing
new. This has been going on for
decades. According
to Jane Dailey, associate professor of history at the University of
Chicago, “Most of the people who were involved in erecting the monuments were
not necessarily erecting a monument to the past. But were rather, erecting them toward a white
supremacist future."
A white supremacist future goes against core American values
such as liberty, equal rights, and justice.
When we decide to take down these monuments and statues, relegating them
often to museums, we are deciding to uphold these core American values. We are not erasing history; we are accurately
portraying who we are as a country.
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| Statue of Liberty, photo by Matthis Volquardsen |
In America, we have a strong union, unlike the sometimes
seemingly tenuous union in Europe. Our
union was forged by the Civil War – the deadliest war in our history. When we remove statues of Confederate
generals from places of public honor and put them in museums where they are
displayed in context, we are presenting a more accurate picture of history, and
we are declaring our patriotism, our devotion to these United States of
America.
When we remove those Confederate monuments, we are also
treating all Americans with respect – especially including those Americans
whose ancestors were enslaved. I do not
refer to these ancestors as slaves; rather, they were people who were enslaved,
wrongly enslaved. They deserved liberty,
not chains. America is all about
liberty, not chains.
In nearby downtown Fort Myers, citizens have asked that the
bust of Robert E. Lee not be returned to the public square, but rather, they
say, it should be placed in a museum, and a liberty fountain should be
installed on the public square in its place.
The bust is at a professional restoration company, undergoing
maintenance. When that’s finished would
be an ideal time for it to go to a museum.
In that square across from the City of Palms parking garage
and the U.S. Post Office could instead be a fountain signifying liberty and
justice for all.
If you think these Confederate statues are not hurtful to
black Americans, think again. For
example, my Facebook friend Monique Thomas, a black American musician living in
France, said recently, “There is no higher celebration than a statue. Taking
down [Confederate] statues does not erase history. Firstly taking them down corrects a wrong
because they never should have been erected in the first place. Secondly we
learn history mostly through books (many of which need to be rewritten). You’ll never forget Hitler or Bin Laden (no
statues that I know of!) . . . So please stop nit-picking about the statues.
They are a hurtful reminder to your dear Black friends of how we are devalued
and you wanting to keep them adds salt to the wound.”
As this country moves forward in this trend, removing and
dismantling over 700 Confederate statues and monuments[1],
we should replace them with monuments that represent liberty and justice for
all. As we move in this direction, we
move toward a future where we are all equal, liberty reigns, and racism dies.
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