Tearing Down Statues: Revisionism or High-Minded Vandalism?

Which statues should be torn down? Which should be kept?

Tough call. There happens to be a statue in Washington, DC, not far from where I used to live, and a very similar statue in Boston, depicting Lincoln 'freeing the slaves,' with a freed slave kneeling in front of him, supplicating in gratitude. Lincoln extends his hand toward him in, well, the attitude is questionable. Some say it welcomes. Some say it's condescending.

Is this still appropriate? It was built in 1876. Should it, and others, be torn down and merely statues to Lincoln built in their place? Or will some other statue be more appropriate?

The DC statue is in Lincoln Park, about 13 blocks due east of the Capitol. It was dedicated with the help of a speech by ex-slave and widely known speaker Frederick Douglass. "My white fellow citizens," said Douglass, who also lived for a while in DC, "You are the children of Abraham Lincoln. We are at best only his stepchildren; children by adoption, children by forces of circumstances and necessity. Despise not the humble offering we this day unveil, for while Abraham Lincoln saved for you a country, he delivered us from a bondage, according to Jefferson, one hour of which was worse than ages of the oppression your fathers rose in rebellion to oppose." (This taken from Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom by David W. Blight, reviewed in this space)

Aha, you might say. The prostrate depiction of the freed slave really is appropriate. That's not exactly what I said in a letter to the editor. I was responding to an article about what might be considered outdated statues in Washington, written by a black correspondent who was not the least prostrate, but quite edgy about the submissive, excessively grateful image that the statue indicated about blacks. Those articles were written in 2013, when he had a black president who downplayed his blackness amidst a Tea Party reaction against him. I wrote that the statue was built to indicate, and celebrate, that Lincoln freed the slaves--which will always be true, regardless. The black man, supposedly, is supposed to be rising up from being captive, not engaging in docile bootlicking.

But the journalist wasn't without a point. It's all in how you look at it. It's been nearly a century and a half since it went up. Maybe it's time to reconsider it. I found another comment, flat out accusing it of white supremacy, written for the blog Medium in 2017 by a Hispanic gentleman, no less. "What are we going to do about it?" he asked.

It isn't as if a statue to a black person is lacking in the area. Steps away, at the other end of the small park, is a statue dedicated to Mary MacLeod Bethune, the famous black educator, with a moving quote from her etched on it. So not only did someone think a statue of a black person was appropriate, a statue of a black woman was built, too.

And it isn't as if Lincoln doesn't have an enormous, famous, massive monument built to honor him elsewhere in the city, one that thousands visit each year, virus notwithstanding. If you take the Lincoln Park statue down, though, and take down the one in Boston, and wherever else such a statue appears, is that the best thing? Should there be no reminder that there was a slave status from which black people had to be rescued?

You could say, as I do about statues of old Confederates, that history books can't and won't ever forget that there was a Civil War, so the names of the most important of the traitors--Lee, Jackson, Davis and the like--will always be in someone's memory. Except their status now is enhanced by statues and likenesses, like on Stone Mountain, as I wrote not long ago.

Is it right, then, that slavery be forgotten, or at least not visibly noted, except in history books, in which it will have to be? Or will that fade there, too? As time moves on, what shall we best remember, and what is it best to forget?

It's been reported that in San Francisco, people have torn down a statue of Ulysses S. Grant, who led the Union Army to it final surrender of the Confederates. Did Grant own slaves? Yes, exactly one, because he married into it. He freed it before the war began. Is that a bit too purist? I think so. If it's torn down in San Francisco, would it be torn down, too, in Galena, Illinois, where Grant's from?

There is, too, a statue of Father Junipero Serra, under whose guidance a great number of Spanish Catholic missions were built in the 1700s. But they were built with lots and lots of Native slaves, conquered and subjugated by the Spanish. I have no qualms about taking his statue down, as it was.

So, too, was that of Christopher Columbus, the European discoverer of North America that sparked settlement thereof (as opposed to the Scandinavian Vikings, who came much sooner but whose legacy had to be discovered by others). But Columbus captured Natives as slaves, and hundreds of them died of disease and starvation on the way back from the New World. Many of them died on board Spanish ships, and were thrown off. That is subjugation, and I've had a different view of him since knowing that.

He, like Cortez, was a conquistador, and a butcher in the name of an insatiable religion--insatiable for gold. We should rethink him as a 'founder', so to speak, of our nation, since he never did actually land here. His actions spurred others to embark on discovery, yes, but in what name and why? Is that something to be proud of?

If we go down this road far enough, we will find something wrong with everyone--including Washington, commander of the Continental Army and our first president, who had plenty of slaves and also freed them (protesters in Portland, OR, have already torn down a statue of him); Jefferson, major author of the Declaration of Independence, who had six children by one of them; and Madison, the Father of the Constitution, whose house was full of slaves. There are monuments to them and well-kept former homes of theirs in Virginia. Do we now let them go to seed? Burn them down?

And how about the Museum of Natural History in New York taking down a statue of Teddy Roosevelt, up on horseback and flanked by a Native and a Black person (I now capitalize 'black' in terms of that usage because the Associated Press has pledged to do so)? The statue is supposed to celebrate his environmental activities, but on horseback, he's 'above' the two minority people. That feels a bit awkward, taking it into present-day context.

I like that move. Someone can always recommission, and resculpt, another statue of T.R., New York's former governor, if it's deemed that important. Right? Why do we need the two minorities in there? Is it a comment about how he 'helped' them? If so, it's a stretch. And is it different than the aforementioned Lincoln Park statue, which specifically addressed an act far more earth-shattering?

It's not as if I want all statues of previous-day achievers torn down. But I do think we should reconsider them. It's very much about time. If it causes some empty space, then so be it. If it causes different, more appropriate statues to be built, so be that, too. Tomorrow's another day. We can remake purposefully.

Everybody should feel better upon happening upon a statue of a person deemed important to the country. But I'm not sure Washington should be taken down. Like the country itself, he had great courage but was flawed. I don't think that should be ignored. We need to deal with all of our history, not just selected parts of it. A reminder of that isn't all bad.

Yet, some revision of what public art we are forced to see daily is a way of saying that the country is changing and so is awareness. And the country will be a majority of minorities within another 40 years, as demographics tell us. There's nothing we can do about it. 45's wall, even if it would work, is too late.

This will pass as will other aspects of this upheaval. What it should leave in its place is a rethinking of who we are and what we want to tell the world about who we were. The two are closely related. Said author William Faulkner, "History isn't dead. It isn't even past." No, it isn't. There's a lot more to who we've been than who we now are. The only greater wonder is who we will be--and that is yet to be determined.

Be well. Be careful. With some luck, I'll see you down the road.


Mister Mark