CDZ Robert E. Lee is Not Our Heritage

[Slash]

When in the world did we start trying to deny the existence of things we don't like?
.

Since the beginning of time. To destroy reminders of the past in works of art and literature is very ISIS and Taliban and Mao and Lenin worthy...and before them the Greeks, the Romans, the Egyptians, the Moors, the Catholic church. What's next?...labeling disagree speech as hate speech?...demonizing/punishing those with whom we disagree?

Isn't it interesting that the 14th and 15th amendments still excluded women from having the right to vote? Perhaps us gals should campaign to have all the statues of men who served in government or the military prior to 1920 removed from the public square. MLK was against same-sex marriage, so were many political and religious leaders - maybe their statues should be removed too. Slaves had no rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?...neither do unborn babes. Americans of Japanese or Chinese descent can certainly find something to rally against. Columbus was Latino and stupid Custer served in the Union Army and met his well deserved fate at the Little Big Horn. The myth of the noble 'savage' is revealed by history - they were invaders and warriors - engaging in slavery and massacres of the enemy. Does anyone really believe that they only developed weapons of war after Columbus discovered the new world?

My point being - we can all find a cause to rally the mob and attempt to destroy, shout down or rewrite history. The removal of statues differs little from burning or banning books...it is the refuge of the uninformed and/or the fanatic follower. Saints preserve us from the self-righteous practitioners of political correctness. The founders made an attempt to do that, within the world they lived in, as imperfect as it is. History is messy - we should remember that.

I agree. And I really haven't learned a lot from statues and it seems a lot of people here haven't either with this revisionist history we try to write about the reasons for rebellion.

IF we had a group of American's rebelling against the right for women to vote and going to war against the US, I would want their statues off the property of the Government they tried to overthrow as well. If MLK created an army and waged war nearly capturing the President for the purpose of taking away the human rights of homosexuals, I would want his statues removed as well.

The issue isn't that Lee and Davis and others were flawed people by today's standards. It's that they rebelled and took up arms and tried to overthrow the USA.

 

[Dan Stubbs]

There is a statute in Ohio from the Civil War that is our heritage. You can see it here: 4th amendment rooted in county « Harrison News Herald. America was founded on the belief that all men are created equal, it took a while to achieve that and some may say we still aren't there. Let's not go backward. White nationalists, white supremacists, the alt-right, and neo-Nazis do not represent the heritage that is America. The confederacy sought to destroy our heritage as Americans not support it, that much should be clear. Over six hundred thousand died to maintain America's dream of equality for all.

"It is a ‘white man’s government,’ is it? Why, the very first blood shed for the assertion of your independence and the establishment of your nationality, upon the field of Lexington, was the blood of a black citizen of Massachusetts. And when they came to the work, after the victory had been achieved, and the independence of the nation acknowledged, of organizing a constitutional government of the United States, in a majority of the States of the Union the black men voted with white men, and the man who denies it is simply ignorant of the history of his own country. . . .

Your armies bore witness that 175,000 of the black population, made free by the proclamation of liberty, were in the army of the republic. When you consider that the majority of the black population were the slaves of rebels, and within their territory, unable to signify to the United States Government their unwillingness to serve it, the fact that as large a population of the black population as of the free whites rushed to the defense of your flag, speaks well for their patriotism. . . "

Source: Balkinization, 'John Bingham on Racial Equality' Gerard N. Magliocca

"Bingham lived two more years and died in Cadiz on March 19, 1900. Bingham was interred in Union Cemetery in Cadiz. In 1901, the citizens of Harrison County, Ohio erected a bronze statue honoring Bingham in Cadiz." | Ohio Civil War Central

And there is a history and a heritage and it is not one we should be proud of.

"There is a crucial difference between leaders like Washington and Jefferson, imperfect men who helped create the United States, Ms. Gordon-Reed said, and Confederate generals like Jackson and Lee, whose main historical significance is that they took up arms against it. The comparison, she added, also “misapprehends the moral problem with the Confederacy.”" Historians Question Trump’s Comments on Confederate Monuments

"“We would not want to whitewash our history by pretending that Jim Crow and disenfranchisement or massive resistance to the civil rights movement never happened,” he said. “That is the part of our history that these monuments testify to.”" [from above]

States rights my....

John Bingham and the Story of American Liberty: The Lost Cause Meets the 'Lost Clause' John Bingham and the Story of American Liberty: The Lost Cause Meets the 'Lost Clause' by Michael Kent Curtis :: SSRN

I Studied the Alt-Right So You Don’t Have To: I Studied the Alt-Right So You Don’t Have To – Form and Resonance – Medium


"Education is dangerous - every educated person is a future enemy." Hermann Goering

"Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life. Thus people haunted by the purposelessness of their lives try to find a new content not only by dedicating themselves to a holy cause but also by nursing a fanatical grievance." Eric Hoffer

These radicals want to rewrite history, and taking down memorials are just part of it. Robert E Lee is just part of it.

 

[task0778]

Robert E. Lee and the Confederacy are part of our heritage, like it or not. So is slavery, Wounded Knee, the Trail of Tears, and the Japanese Internment Camps. At one time or another we discriminated against damn near everybody based on ethnicity or where they came from. Who we are now is based in part on who we were, and we cannot hide from it.

This is about politics, one side trying to tar the other with the actions and words of a few white supremacists who do not matter. And someone died out of purely political purposes. No doubt there are many on the Left who feel bad about that, but also way too many on the Left who don't.

 

[IsaacNewton]

Who was Robert E Lee? Without statues I don't remember anything that happened before the last War on Christmas. Or as we in the know call it The War To End All Wars.

So Robert E Lee, or is it Robert Elee? Without an image etched in stone riding on a bronze horse history is lost to me. Yet, for some reason, I remember Tut Ankhamun, Socrates, Abraham Lincoln, The Battle of Gettysburg, The Fall of Rome, Lucille Ball, Caesar, Ghengis Khan, Robbie the Robot, Eli Whitney, The Wright Brothers, The Sea of Tranquility which can also be said of Lake Tahoe, hula hoops, clackers, Pong, Davey Crockett, The Pilgrims, John Wayne saying "Pilgrim", Mt Everest, T-Rex, T. Rex, Star Trek, quasars, and the sound of me putting rubber bands on newspapers at 4 am on Sunday before delivering them decades ago.

But Elee? Not without a statue.

 

[EvilCat Breath]

Who was Robert E Lee? Without statues I don't remember anything that happened before the last War on Christmas. Or as we in the know call it The War To End All Wars.

So Robert E Lee, or is it Robert Elee? Without an image etched in stone riding on a bronze horse history is lost to me. Yet, for some reason, I remember Tut Ankhamun, Socrates, Abraham Lincoln, The Battle of Gettysburg, The Fall of Rome, Lucille Ball, Caesar, Ghengis Khan, Robbie the Robot, Eli Whitney, The Wright Brothers, The Sea of Tranquility which can also be said of Lake Tahoe, hula hoops, clackers, Pong, Davey Crockett, The Pilgrims, John Wayne saying "Pilgrim", Mt Everest, T-Rex, T. Rex, Star Trek, quasars, and the sound of me putting rubber bands on newspapers at 4 am on Sunday before delivering them decades ago.

But Elee? Not without a statue.

What a shame!

 

[JimBowie1958]

Who was Robert E Lee? Without statues I don't remember anything that happened before the last War on Christmas. Or as we in the know call it The War To End All Wars.

So Robert E Lee, or is it Robert Elee? Without an image etched in stone riding on a bronze horse history is lost to me. Yet, for some reason, I remember Tut Ankhamun, Socrates, Abraham Lincoln, The Battle of Gettysburg, The Fall of Rome, Lucille Ball, Caesar, Ghengis Khan, Robbie the Robot, Eli Whitney, The Wright Brothers, The Sea of Tranquility which can also be said of Lake Tahoe, hula hoops, clackers, Pong, Davey Crockett, The Pilgrims, John Wayne saying "Pilgrim", Mt Everest, T-Rex, T. Rex, Star Trek, quasars, and the sound of me putting rubber bands on newspapers at 4 am on Sunday before delivering them decades ago.

But Elee? Not without a statue.

One of the greatest military generals of all time and a Dimocrat cant thunk of who he is, lol.

 

[IsaacNewton]

Who was Robert E Lee? Without statues I don't remember anything that happened before the last War on Christmas. Or as we in the know call it The War To End All Wars.

So Robert E Lee, or is it Robert Elee? Without an image etched in stone riding on a bronze horse history is lost to me. Yet, for some reason, I remember Tut Ankhamun, Socrates, Abraham Lincoln, The Battle of Gettysburg, The Fall of Rome, Lucille Ball, Caesar, Ghengis Khan, Robbie the Robot, Eli Whitney, The Wright Brothers, The Sea of Tranquility which can also be said of Lake Tahoe, hula hoops, clackers, Pong, Davey Crockett, The Pilgrims, John Wayne saying "Pilgrim", Mt Everest, T-Rex, T. Rex, Star Trek, quasars, and the sound of me putting rubber bands on newspapers at 4 am on Sunday before delivering them decades ago.

But Elee? Not without a statue.

What a shame!

I think that is the quote etched on all the statues in the South about losing the war.

 

[yiostheoy]

There is a statute in Ohio from the Civil War that is our heritage. You can see it here: 4th amendment rooted in county « Harrison News Herald. America was founded on the belief that all men are created equal, it took a while to achieve that and some may say we still aren't there. Let's not go backward. White nationalists, white supremacists, the alt-right, and neo-Nazis do not represent the heritage that is America. The confederacy sought to destroy our heritage as Americans not support it, that much should be clear. Over six hundred thousand died to maintain America's dream of equality for all.

"It is a ‘white man’s government,’ is it? Why, the very first blood shed for the assertion of your independence and the establishment of your nationality, upon the field of Lexington, was the blood of a black citizen of Massachusetts. And when they came to the work, after the victory had been achieved, and the independence of the nation acknowledged, of organizing a constitutional government of the United States, in a majority of the States of the Union the black men voted with white men, and the man who denies it is simply ignorant of the history of his own country. . . .

Your armies bore witness that 175,000 of the black population, made free by the proclamation of liberty, were in the army of the republic. When you consider that the majority of the black population were the slaves of rebels, and within their territory, unable to signify to the United States Government their unwillingness to serve it, the fact that as large a population of the black population as of the free whites rushed to the defense of your flag, speaks well for their patriotism. . . "

Source: Balkinization, 'John Bingham on Racial Equality' Gerard N. Magliocca

"Bingham lived two more years and died in Cadiz on March 19, 1900. Bingham was interred in Union Cemetery in Cadiz. In 1901, the citizens of Harrison County, Ohio erected a bronze statue honoring Bingham in Cadiz." | Ohio Civil War Central

And there is a history and a heritage and it is not one we should be proud of.

"There is a crucial difference between leaders like Washington and Jefferson, imperfect men who helped create the United States, Ms. Gordon-Reed said, and Confederate generals like Jackson and Lee, whose main historical significance is that they took up arms against it. The comparison, she added, also “misapprehends the moral problem with the Confederacy.”" Historians Question Trump’s Comments on Confederate Monuments

"“We would not want to whitewash our history by pretending that Jim Crow and disenfranchisement or massive resistance to the civil rights movement never happened,” he said. “That is the part of our history that these monuments testify to.”" [from above]

States rights my....

John Bingham and the Story of American Liberty: The Lost Cause Meets the 'Lost Clause' John Bingham and the Story of American Liberty: The Lost Cause Meets the 'Lost Clause' by Michael Kent Curtis :: SSRN

I Studied the Alt-Right So You Don’t Have To: I Studied the Alt-Right So You Don’t Have To – Form and Resonance – Medium


"Education is dangerous - every educated person is a future enemy." Hermann Goering

"Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life. Thus people haunted by the purposelessness of their lives try to find a new content not only by dedicating themselves to a holy cause but also by nursing a fanatical grievance." Eric Hoffer

Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, James Longstreet, and every Confederate general should have been hunted down and hanged for treason.

 

[ChrisL]

It was a different time and a different world back then. You can't judge a person from then based upon today's standards which didn't exist back then.

 

[Penelope]

He is on the wrong side of history, he is a hero like Stalin and Hitler were. Same thing.

 

[JoeMoma]

The Supreme Court never even heard a case on whether secession was legal or not, so that's a non-argument. The reason why is that nobody ever brought such a case, certainly not Buchanan or Lincoln, which was the proper procedure, but of course the reasons no one ever brought such a case before the Court was because no one was stupid enough to bring one, since it wasn't illegal and was never considered to be illegal, and there is some 70 years of history before 1860 that clearly demonstrate nobody thought it was illegal, not even Lincoln, or he would have brought suit.

But, the cognitive dissonance is amusing that someone would cite a Court case that had nothing to do with the legality of secession as an appeal to higher authority, to a Court that also ruled slavery was legal, Dred Scott, etc., etc..

Yes they did. Makingup falsehoods doesn't make your point.

The Supreme court ruled in Texas vs. White that secession was illegal. That was the burden of proof on them in the case. Their ruling was that hat the Constitution did not permit states to unilaterally secede from the United States, and that the ordinances of secession, and all the acts of the legislatures within seceding states intended to give effect to such ordinances, were "absolutely null"

The entire reason that case went to the Supreme court is it relied on whether it was a legal secession or a rebellion.

Let see, it was 1969 and a war over the right for states had just been fought. 600,000 dead. Can you imagine the Supreme Court saying at this time... oh, never mind!

For all practical matters, this issue was settled by the civil war.

 

[JimBowie1958]

He is on the wrong side of history, he is a hero like Stalin and Hitler were. Same thing.

Robert E Lee was fighting an entirely defensive war to stop a Northern invasion of their homes and towns. Stalin and Hitler launched offensive wars entirely unprovoked at Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Netherlands, Yugoslavia, Greece and more nations by the dozens.

Lee was a general who led his men in battle. Stalin and Hitler were dictators who led from the safety and comfort of desks hundreds of miles from the conflicts that they began.

Lee loved democracy and had respect for human rights. He despised slavery and wanted to be rid of his ownership but at the same time recognised that simply freeing unskilled human beings into an economy not set up for free black labor was not a responsible and humane thing to do. Stalin and Hitler believed that human beings have no intrinsic value and are simply assets of the state to be used as needed. Both men are responsible for ordering literally millions of innocent people to be murdered by their governments.

Penelope, you are not only hysterical and ignorant about history, you have no sense of right and wrong.

 

[Penelope]

He is on the wrong side of history, he is a hero like Stalin and Hitler were. Same thing.

Robert E Lee was fighting an entirely defensive war to stop a Northern invasion of their homes and towns. Stalin and Hitler launched offensive wars entirely unprovoked at Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Netherlands, Yugoslavia, Greece and more nations by the dozens.

Lee was a general who led his men in battle. Stalin and Hitler were dictators who led from the safety and comfort of desks hundreds of miles from the conflicts that they began.

Lee loved democracy and had respect for human rights. He despised slavery and wanted to be rid of his ownership but at the same time recognised that simply freeing unskilled human beings into an economy not set up for free black labor was not a responsible and humane thing to do. Stalin and Hitler believed that human beings have no intrinsic value and are simply assets of the state to be used as needed. Both men are responsible for ordering literally millions of innocent people to be murdered by their governments.

Penelope, you are not only hysterical and ignorant about history, you have no sense of right and wrong.

Don't make him out to be something he is not. Loved democracy and had respect for human rights, one did not need to own slaves, all the southern plantations needed to do was pay them as workers but they would dip into their bottom line , wouldn't it? Freedom does not mean they would not work, but they just would not be owned and could go and find a high paying plantation owner.

No Stalin and Hitler wanted more land and most of their beefs were due to Jews. Wonder what would the US be like if the south had won, I hate to think of it.

 

[hunarcy]

Who was Robert E Lee? Without statues I don't remember anything that happened before the last War on Christmas. Or as we in the know call it The War To End All Wars.

So Robert E Lee, or is it Robert Elee? Without an image etched in stone riding on a bronze horse history is lost to me. Yet, for some reason, I remember Tut Ankhamun, Socrates, Abraham Lincoln, The Battle of Gettysburg, The Fall of Rome, Lucille Ball, Caesar, Ghengis Khan, Robbie the Robot, Eli Whitney, The Wright Brothers, The Sea of Tranquility which can also be said of Lake Tahoe, hula hoops, clackers, Pong, Davey Crockett, The Pilgrims, John Wayne saying "Pilgrim", Mt Everest, T-Rex, T. Rex, Star Trek, quasars, and the sound of me putting rubber bands on newspapers at 4 am on Sunday before delivering them decades ago.

But Elee? Not without a statue.

That sounds like the Taliban asking who was Buddha. Funny how these censor types all end up sounding the same.

 

[hunarcy]

He is on the wrong side of history, he is a hero like Stalin and Hitler were. Same thing.

I don't remember where Lee executed millions of his own people in gulags and concentration camps. He WAS on the wrong side of the issue, but don't overstate things.

 

[Penelope]

He is on the wrong side of history, he is a hero like Stalin and Hitler were. Same thing.

I don't remember where Lee executed millions of his own people in gulags and concentration camps. He WAS on the wrong side of the issue, but don't overstate things.

Millions died in the civil war, they didn't take prisoners. I take that back I guess they did.
read about the POW's prison camps.
American Civil War prison camps - Wikipedia
Camp Sumter / Andersonville Prison - Andersonville National Historic Site (U.S. National Park Service)

 

[Picaro]

He is on the wrong side of history, he is a hero like Stalin and Hitler were. Same thing.

Robert E Lee was fighting an entirely defensive war to stop a Northern invasion of their homes and towns. Stalin and Hitler launched offensive wars entirely unprovoked at Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Netherlands, Yugoslavia, Greece and more nations by the dozens.

Lee was a general who led his men in battle. Stalin and Hitler were dictators who led from the safety and comfort of desks hundreds of miles from the conflicts that they began.

Lee loved democracy and had respect for human rights. He despised slavery and wanted to be rid of his ownership but at the same time recognised that simply freeing unskilled human beings into an economy not set up for free black labor was not a responsible and humane thing to do. Stalin and Hitler believed that human beings have no intrinsic value and are simply assets of the state to be used as needed. Both men are responsible for ordering literally millions of innocent people to be murdered by their governments.

Penelope, you are not only hysterical and ignorant about history, you have no sense of right and wrong.

We know what Lincoln's idea of 'freedom' for slaves was; his military governors ordered them to stay on the plantations and work ... for $3 a month, since they weren't 'slaves' but 'free'; he even set their 'free' wages for them, he was such a wonderful 'freedom fighter'. They also couldn't leave without written permission from the new plantation owners, Republican carpet baggers, of course, who bought them for pennies on the dollar. 'Freedom' for blacks according to Republicans didn't resemble 'freedom' by modern standards, or even contemporary ones. See also the draconian Black Codes passed in the Midwestern states after 1850, including the ones Lincoln advocated for Illinois as a pol there, making it impossible for blacks to immigrate into many of the states, or earn a legall living, and then there were the debtor laws applied against blacks that had them sentenced to forced labor. There were a lot of black slaves in the northern states, they just didn't call them slaves, is all; they called them 'criminals' and 'prisoners'...

Those that did jump off the plantations and flee were herded into 'property camps', to keep them from fleeing into northern states; hundreds of thousands of them died from starvation and disease epidemics, as many as were killed in battle, maybe more.

 

[Staidhup]

Time to move on, the Civil War was fought to purge the country of a stain which blanketed and tarnished the country. From the moment all men are created equal was adopted, the founding fathers turned a blind eye toward slavery, it was dictated, the time would come when this blight would be paid for with blood.
Let us never forget!

 

[hunarcy]

Time to move on, the Civil War was fought to purge the country of a stain which blanketed and tarnished the country. From the moment all men are created equal was adopted, the founding fathers turned a blind eye toward slavery, it was dictated, the time would come when this blight would be paid for with blood.
Let us never forget!

The Civil War was fought to hold the union together. If that could have been accomplished without freeing slaves, they would not have been freed. If the preservation of the union could have been accomplished by freeing some, but not all slaves, that would have been done. I’m glad slavery was wiped out in the United States, but don’t over state the motivations of the Northerners.