Virginia and Humpty Dumpty

    The New Year rolls in with movement towards removing Confederate statues representing the state of Virginia.

    Governor Northam is offering a bill to remove General Robert E. Lee, the overrated Confederate general is from it's place as one of Virginia 's contributions to the statuary in the U.S.Capitol. 
    https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/virginia-governor-seeks-removal-of-confederate-statue-from-us-capitol/2191799/

    Northam is joined by two Virginia U.S.House members who want Lee replaced by an African American leader.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/two-virginia-democrats-want-to-replace-the-robert-e-lee-statue-in-the-capitol/2019/12/23/5ecc51c8-2365-11ea-86f3-3b5019d451db_story.html

    In Virginia itself, a local judge ruled that a Confederate statue could be moved from its perch in downtown Norfolk, to a cemetery.

    https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/10/23/norfolk-virginia-ok-move-confederate-monument-cemetery/2452814001/

    Most importantly, the new,y Democratic state legislature has the power to change a law the forces Virginia cities to keep Confederate statues in place over the objections of local citizens 

    https://www.salon.com/2019/12/24/why-virginia-must-amend-its-law-protecting-confederate-statues_partner/

    Legislation to change the law could come up early in the next session 

    https://wjla.com/news/local/democrats-virginia-confederate-statues

    The installation of Kehinde Wiley's "Rumors of War" was accompanied by hopes that the legislature would give local communities power over handling Confederate statues.

     

    In recent years, state lawmakers have questioned whether the Confederate statues should be removed or contextualized. Virginia state law currently protects the removal of statues as war memorials.

    In 2017, the deadly Unite the Right white nationalist rally in Charlottesville prompted some lawmakers to propose legislation that would empower localities to decide whether to keep, remove or relocate Confederate monuments.

    While under Republican control, the Virginia General Assembly struck down bills that would let localities make their own decisions on the fate of the statues.

    But both chambers of the legislature flipped to Democratic control in November's elections, and Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam has said he supported moving Confederate monuments to museums. The General Assembly will convene in January.

    Stoney appointed a commission to study the statues on Monument Avenue. The commission recommended removing the monument to Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy, and adding context to the other Confederate statues.

    This week, Richmond City Council member Michael Jones renewed his push for local control of the monuments.

    Many people have expressed concern that “Rumors of War” may be vandalized, as several of Richmond's monuments have been in recent years.

    The sculpture's base is coated in a graffiti-resistant material, and VMFA will have security and cameras 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

    https://www.richmond.com/news/local/there-s-something-changing-in-these-winds-kehinde-wiley-s/article_1e1abd39-69c4-502d-b0c6-28f3921312aa.html#3

    The winds of change are blowing

     

     

     

    Comments

    "overrated"? You *are* determined to piss in everyone's Post Toasties. So is Dagblog an official The Root annex now? Since we're down to about 6-7 readers, guess as good a fate as any.


    Sometimes I deal with it by doing a Trump-style imaginary narrative thing. I figure a Confederate statue must have done something horrible to him as a child and he's never gotten over it. And a therapist suggested keeping close track of the war on Confederate statues might give him hope.

    Also, at this time of year, it reminds me of how angry some atheists used to get when towns put up nativity scenes...


    You are always hilarious. There is a movement afoot to remove Confederate symbols. From your bubble, you see me as the driver of events. Why are you so disturbed by news of actions in progress?


    Confederate nativity? Brilliant. Native son. You're crushing it,Candy Creche.


    The overrated ranking comes from new scholarship, such as the "Myth of the Lost Cause" by Edward Bonekemper.

    Though Lee remains an important, powerful symbol in the South, his reputation among scholars has evolved to the point that many either question or outright ridicule his stature as a battlefield savant.

    To Edward Bonekemper III, the author of “How Robert E. Lee Lost the Civil War” and several other books on the war, Lee is not the humble, proud battlefield loser presented by documentarian Ken Burns and other popular works of history, but a bumbling strategist and the central character in “the most successful propaganda campaign in American history.”

    He’s talking about the Lost Cause — or as he titled a recent book, “The Myth of the Lost Cause.”

    The tenets of the Lost Cause are that slavery was already dying before the war, that states’ rights were really the issue anyway, that the South did the best it could against a powerful killing machine (an early version of a participation trophy), and that Lee’s subordinates (especially James Longstreet) bungled the war, most notably the Battle of Gettysburg.

    “A big part of this myth is the adulation of Robert E. Lee,” Bonekemper said in an interview. “He has gotten a lot of really good press.”

    That began, Bonekemper and other historians have written, shortly after the war ended.

    The narratives of war are usually shaped by the winning side, but after Lee surrendered, the North got on with life and rebuilding the economy. Meanwhile, prominent Southerners set out on a spin offensive, forming the Southern Historical Society, which published hundreds of papers telling its side of the war and shaping its history.

    Lee was elevated to the highest status possible — Southern Savior

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/05/19/the-truth-about-confederate-gen-robert-e-lee-he-wasnt-very-good-at-his-job/

    Just reading new interpretations of historical events. We know Africans sold Africans into slavery. We are now learning about battles fought on African soil with Africans pitted against the enslavers.

    https://www.ohioswallow.com/book/Fighting+the+Slave+Trade
    We are learning more about rebellions on ships during the Middle Passage.

    There are assessments of the push for armed conflict by black abolitionists in the United States, as a transition occurred from moral suasion to self defense between 1830-1850.

    https://www.civilrightsmuseum.org/force-and-freedom

     

     

     


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