Statues across the World Can’t Stay Put

Would you feel comfortable having historical or religious monuments in your hometown that you don’t personally agree with?

In recent years, the statue of General Robert E. Lee was melted down because residents of Richmon,d Virginia, thought it did not represent them appropriately. 

Author Roy Blout Jr. describes Lee as a “paragon of manliness” and “one of the greatest military commanders in history.”

“Military historians around the world continue to study his battlefield tactics and maneuvering, although some think he should have better designed strategic plans for the Confederacy. It must be noted that he was not given full direction of the South’s war effort until late in the conflict,” writer Richard G. Weingardt wrote. 

Weingardt then went on to quote a speech from the Address at the Southern Historical Society in Atlanta, Georgia in 1891: “He was a foe without hate; a friend without treachery; a soldier without cruelty; a victor without oppression, and a victim without murmuring. He was a public officer without vices; a private citizen without wrong; a neighbor without reproach; a Christian without hypocrisy, and a man without guile. He was a Caesar, without his ambition; Frederick, without his tyranny; Napoleon, without his selfishness, and Washington, without his reward.”

What Weingardt is trying to point out is that any historical admiration for Robert E. Lee is not out of admiration for the Confederacy and their forethought actions of the time. 

The statue was not there for personal admiration of the cause; it was there for the admiration of his war strategies. 

Over the past summer, a Cross looking over the California Eastern Bay was removed. Atheists protested that it wasn’t constitutional for a cross to be in public and to be celebrated on religious ceremonial days, such as Easter or times of disaster, including as 9/11.

“It’s going to be an adjustment for folks, but I think we will all get used to it, and I think it’s a real benefit,” Mayor Tiedmann said to reporter Katie Lauer. 

Opponents of this form of censorship argue that historical statues are not to praise these historical figures but to recognize them.  With religious works of art in public places, it is to worship and praise, but it’s not forcing anyone to do so.