Slitherine

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ORIGINAL: Trugrit

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ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

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ORIGINAL: AcePylut

I, personally, think it's absolutely ridiculous to have statues of men that tried to destroy our nation, on "gov't" property.

I don't care if Robert E. Lee was for or against slavery, I don't care if he was a good man or a bad man by todays or 1860s standard of judgement. In my opinion, the man was a traitor, nothing more nothing less. As as a result, not one single gov't penny or parcel of gov't land should should have his (or any other Confederate leader) image, likeness, bust, statue etc. on it... unless it's in a museum or a history book.

This is the crux, that all the "Washington, Jefferson . . ." apologists miss. The Confederacy was a traitorous enterprise. It was never a nation (see USSC decision.) The officers of the CSA, especially Lee, were traitors by the plain wording of the US Constitution. Put the statues in museums, with plaques explaining they were traitors. Get them off public streets and out of public parks.

Yes, but the American Revolution was a traitorous enterprise.

I'm perfectly fine with England refusing to erect statues of Washington or Jefferson.

Famous people get the monuments.

That's not the test for traitors.

Almost every single individual that has ever had a monument erected to him or her
Is a Son of a Bitch in one area or another. It is almost an historical requirement because
Famous people are often complex like that.

Again, not the test for treason. I don't like everything John D. Rockefeller did, but I'm OK with a statue.

The problem is where does it end?

It ends with the traitors.

What is the next step? I’m a southerner and I don’t have a dog in this fight. I don’t care if the monuments stay or go but what about me?

My ancestors fought for the south. In your book they were all traitors. When the war was over they returned to their homes and farms and had children. In your book they were they still traitors even after they took the oath of allegiance. I’m a direct descendent of those people. I have their DNA in my body and bloodstream.

They were traitors, yes. They were citizens of the United States, and they waged war on their country. If they had statues I'd want them taken down. They don't, so I'd settle for an understanding that what they did was a terrible mistake and the system they sought to perpetuate was the most terrible thing humans can ever do to other humans. Far worse than killing them.

But their leaders deserve no praise. They knew better. Lee was a West Point graduate and a senior officer. No slack.

You could say without reservation that I’m a living monument to those traitors and slave owners.

You are living. Not a taxpayer supported monument on a city street, however. When young black children pass you they don't think what your ancestors did to theirs. I grew up in the South too, 100 miles from Richmond. We were forced to field trip to Battle Abbey in Richmond and be fed CSA propaganda. The black kids too. I wonder how that made them feel?

There are direct descendents of Jefferson and Lee living in our country.
There are black people living in America that have Thomas Jefferson’s DNA in them.

Slavery is a separate issue from treason. Conflating them gives apologists a place to hide. I don't. Jefferson had slaves. I graduated from the university he created. He wrote the Declaration. He was a good president. He probably once cheated at cards. I don't know. But he wasn't a traitor to the US. And I very much doubt if he had been alive in 1860 he would have still have had slaves OR supported the CSA. Ditto Washington. The CSA, whose constitution encapsulated a permanent slavery, was at the ass-end of slavery history. Cuba was late, and Brazil was the late 1880s, but everywhere else in the West slavery was over by 1860. Yet the South wanted it forever, and forever, and forever.

What are you going to do with us living monuments?

Hope you come to understand what the argument is about.

Maybe we will have to wear an armband. Instead of the Star of David maybe a small Confederate flag
On the armband to signify we have at least one drop of slave owner blood in our systems.

Sigh.

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ORIGINAL: warspite1

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ORIGINAL: Orm

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ORIGINAL: warspite1

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ORIGINAL: AcePylut

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ORIGINAL: Trugrit
I’m a southerner and I don’t have a dog in this fight. I don’t care if the monuments stay or go but what about me?

What about you? You didn't fight against the nation 150 years ago, so nothing. I don't blame kids for the choices their parents, or ancestors, made.

warspite1

Yes but in fairness your opinion doesn't count - you wanted 50 Shades of Grey to be made. Don't think we don't remember....

Of course he wanted that film to be made because he knew it would include what counts. The only thing really important.

warspite1

You mean a decent theme tune?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJtDXIazrMo

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ORIGINAL: Orm

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ORIGINAL: warspite1

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ORIGINAL: Orm

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ORIGINAL: warspite1

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ORIGINAL: AcePylut

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ORIGINAL: Trugrit
I’m a southerner and I don’t have a dog in this fight. I don’t care if the monuments stay or go but what about me?

What about you? You didn't fight against the nation 150 years ago, so nothing. I don't blame kids for the choices their parents, or ancestors, made.

warspite1

Yes but in fairness your opinion doesn't count - you wanted 50 Shades of Grey to be made. Don't think we don't remember....

Of course he wanted that film to be made because he knew it would include what counts. The only thing really important.

warspite1

You mean a decent theme tune?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJtDXIazrMo

Of course not.

England expects that every man will do his duty. Horatio Nelson October 1805

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ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

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ORIGINAL: Trugrit

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ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

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ORIGINAL: AcePylut

I, personally, think it's absolutely ridiculous to have statues of men that tried to destroy our nation, on "gov't" property.

I don't care if Robert E. Lee was for or against slavery, I don't care if he was a good man or a bad man by todays or 1860s standard of judgement. In my opinion, the man was a traitor, nothing more nothing less. As as a result, not one single gov't penny or parcel of gov't land should should have his (or any other Confederate leader) image, likeness, bust, statue etc. on it... unless it's in a museum or a history book.

This is the crux, that all the "Washington, Jefferson . . ." apologists miss. The Confederacy was a traitorous enterprise. It was never a nation (see USSC decision.) The officers of the CSA, especially Lee, were traitors by the plain wording of the US Constitution. Put the statues in museums, with plaques explaining they were traitors. Get them off public streets and out of public parks.

Yes, but the American Revolution was a traitorous enterprise.

I'm perfectly fine with England refusing to erect statues of Washington or Jefferson.

Famous people get the monuments.

That's not the test for traitors.

Almost every single individual that has ever had a monument erected to him or her
Is a Son of a Bitch in one area or another. It is almost an historical requirement because
Famous people are often complex like that.

Again, not the test for treason. I don't like everything John D. Rockefeller did, but I'm OK with a statue.

The problem is where does it end?

It ends with the traitors.

What is the next step? I’m a southerner and I don’t have a dog in this fight. I don’t care if the monuments stay or go but what about me?

My ancestors fought for the south. In your book they were all traitors. When the war was over they returned to their homes and farms and had children. In your book they were they still traitors even after they took the oath of allegiance. I’m a direct descendent of those people. I have their DNA in my body and bloodstream.

They were traitors, yes. They were citizens of the United States, and they waged war on their country. If they had statues I'd want them taken down. They don't, so I'd settle for an understanding that what they did was a terrible mistake and the system they sought to perpetuate was the most terrible thing humans can ever do to other humans. Far worse than killing them.

But their leaders deserve no praise. They knew better. Lee was a West Point graduate and a senior officer. No slack.

You could say without reservation that I’m a living monument to those traitors and slave owners.

You are living. Not a taxpayer supported monument on a city street, however. When young black children pass you they don't think what your ancestors did to theirs. I grew up in the South too, 100 miles from Richmond. We were forced to field trip to Battle Abbey in Richmond and be fed CSA propaganda. The black kids too. I wonder how that made them feel?

There are direct descendents of Jefferson and Lee living in our country.
There are black people living in America that have Thomas Jefferson’s DNA in them.

Slavery is a separate issue from treason. Conflating them gives apologists a place to hide. I don't. Jefferson had slaves. I graduated from the university he created. He wrote the Declaration. He was a good president. He probably once cheated at cards. I don't know. But he wasn't a traitor to the US. And I very much doubt if he had been alive in 1860 he would have still have had slaves OR supported the CSA. Ditto Washington. The CSA, whose constitution encapsulated a permanent slavery, was at the ass-end of slavery history. Cuba was late, and Brazil was the late 1880s, but everywhere else in the West slavery was over by 1860. Yet the South wanted it forever, and forever, and forever.

What are you going to do with us living monuments?

Hope you come to understand what the argument is about.

Maybe we will have to wear an armband. Instead of the Star of David maybe a small Confederate flag
On the armband to signify we have at least one drop of slave owner blood in our systems.

Sigh.

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ORIGINAL: fcooke

Folks - this is a very reasonable forum and I have great appreciation for the scope of history intellect here. I do not post often but have been here for over a decade. We always have seemed to appreciate each other over time, so I would ask that we drop the negative side of the dialogue and keep it professional. I am first generation Irish so Warspite could have issues with that (I don't think he does), or, if I was in Boston, where I grew up, 250 odd years ago, I would be a traitor too. So leave the memorials alone. The men fought for what they believed in. Many of them died in the process. As someone mentioned, who knows how history will judge us a couple of hundred of years down the line.

England expects that every man will do his duty. Horatio Nelson October 1805

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ORIGINAL: Zap

I disagree with the Traitor comment. The south followed the untested mechanism in the Constitution to secede from the Union. Earlier in history the north too contemplated seceding from the Union over the war of 1812. They were not Traitors.

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ORIGINAL: tocaff

On Tinian Island on a fateful day in August 1945 my father and the rest of his crew were lazing around as they weren't scheduled to fly their B-29 anywhere. An officer appeared and told them to report to Operations. Once there they were told that they were a Super Dumbo, an observation plane, and would that they would also report any downed planes. They were issued dark goggles and told that there would be a bright flash that they weren't supposed to look at. Their plane was loaded with gas and that's it. They were part of a mission over Nagasaki. There would be a weather plane, 2 Super Dumbos, a plane with a bomb and later another plane for damage assessment. My father's bewildered crew boarded, took off from Tinian's North Field and tried to figure out what was going on. A single plane with one bomb? They witnessed the second A bomb used in anger. They were initially horrified by what they saw and on the way back to Tinian reported a downed P-47. By the time they landed they had realized that they had witnessed a chance to end the war. They wanted one of these bombs for every B-29 so that Japan could finally be defeated and then they could go home.

Revisionist history would tell us another story. It is impossible for us, today to put ourselves into the shoes of the men fighting against Japan in 1945 as the values were totally different due to the monumental struggle that had been going on for years. To judge another time by the values of today is flat out wrong, just as judging one culture by another culture's standards is wrong.

Does the USA owe Japan an apology? To my thinking, no.

I don't intend this to be a political football,

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ORIGINAL: geofflambert

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ORIGINAL: tocaff

On Tinian Island on a fateful day in August 1945 my father and the rest of his crew were lazing around as they weren't scheduled to fly their B-29 anywhere. An officer appeared and told them to report to Operations. Once there they were told that they were a Super Dumbo, an observation plane, and would that they would also report any downed planes. They were issued dark goggles and told that there would be a bright flash that they weren't supposed to look at. Their plane was loaded with gas and that's it. They were part of a mission over Nagasaki. There would be a weather plane, 2 Super Dumbos, a plane with a bomb and later another plane for damage assessment. My father's bewildered crew boarded, took off from Tinian's North Field and tried to figure out what was going on. A single plane with one bomb? They witnessed the second A bomb used in anger. They were initially horrified by what they saw and on the way back to Tinian reported a downed P-47. By the time they landed they had realized that they had witnessed a chance to end the war. They wanted one of these bombs for every B-29 so that Japan could finally be defeated and then they could go home.

Revisionist history would tell us another story. It is impossible for us, today to put ourselves into the shoes of the men fighting against Japan in 1945 as the values were totally different due to the monumental struggle that had been going on for years. To judge another time by the values of today is flat out wrong, just as judging one culture by another culture's standards is wrong.

Does the USA owe Japan an apology? To my thinking, no.

I don't intend this to be a political football,

I grew up feeling it was a war crime, but with what I came to know over time I think I would have made the same decision as Truman, who I've come to feel was one of our better Presidents. It is like one of Shakespeare's tragedies, where both sides lose. Like Creon and Antigone.

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ORIGINAL: Bullwinkle58

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ORIGINAL: Zap

I disagree with the Traitor comment. The south followed the untested mechanism in the Constitution to secede from the Union. Earlier in history the north too contemplated seceding from the Union over the war of 1812. They were not Traitors.

Because they didn't do it.

If the South wanted to secede they had ample constitutional means to amend the document and get secession in there. That they didn't have the votes . . .

So, "Section 3

1: Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court."

In Texas v. White, 74 U.S. 700 (1869) , the Supreme Court, acting in original jurisdiction, ruled conclusively that the Confederacy never existed as a nation, but only as states in rebellion. It remains the law.

Also, interestingly for the "right to secede" crowd, the constitution of the CSA, such as it was, did not have an article allowing secession either. Hmm.

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ORIGINAL: Lecivius

This is gonna get locked, folks. Move along.

England expects that every man will do his duty. Horatio Nelson October 1805

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ORIGINAL: witpqs

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entropy is the normal order of things

Dan,

Quite off topic this observation, but in spite of your prodigious work with words that turn of phrase likely towers over anything you published! Greyjoy eat your heart out!

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The grand jurors of the United States of America, in and for the District of Virginia, upon their oaths and affirmations respectively, do present that Jefferson Davis, late of the city of Richmond, in the county of Henrico, in the district of Virginia, aforesaid, yeoman, being an inhabitant of, and residing within, the United States of America, and owing allegiance and fidelity to the said United States of America, not having the fear of God before his eyes, nor weighing the duty of his said allegiance, but being moved and seduced by the instigation of the devil, and wickedly devising, intending the peace and tranquillity of the said United States of America to disturb, and the government of the said United States of America to subvert, and to stir, move, and incite insurrection, rebellion and war against the said United States of America on the fifteenth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty- four, in the city of Richmond, in the county of Henrico, in the district of Virginia aforesaid, and within the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court of the United States for the fourth circuit in and for the district of Virginia aforesaid, with force and arms, unlawfully, falsely, maliciously, and traitorously did compass, imagine, and intend to raise, levy, and carry on war, insurrection, and rebellion against the said United States of America, and in order to fulfill and bring to effect the said traitorous compassings, imaginations, and intentions of him, the said Jefferson Davis, afterward, to wit, on the said fifteenth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-four, in the said city of Richmond, in the county of Henrico, and district of Virginia aforesaid, and within the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court of the United States for the fourth circuit in and for the said district of Virginia, with a great multitude of persons whose names to the jurors aforesaid are at present unknown, to the number of five hundred persons and upward, armed and arrayed in a warlike manner, that is to say, with cannon, muskets, pistols, swords, dirks, and other warlike weapons, as well offensive as defensive, being then and there unlawfully, maliciously, and traitorously assembled and gathered together, did falsely and traitorously assemble and, join themselves together against the said United States of America, and then and there, with force and arms, did falsely and traitorously, and in a warlike and hostile manner, array and dispose themselves against the said United States of America, and then and there, that is to say, on the said fifteenth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-four, in the said city of Richmond, in the county of Henrico, and district of Virginia aforesaid, and within the jurisdiction of the said Circuit Court of the United States for the fourth circuit in and for the said district of Virginia, in pursuance of such their traitorous intentions and purposes aforesaid, he, the said Jefferson Davis, with the said persons so as aforesaid traitorously assembled, and armed and arrayed in the manner aforesaid, most wickedly, maliciously, and traitorously, did ordain, prepare, levy, and carry on war against the said United States of America, contrary to the duty, allegiance, and fidelity of the said Jefferson Davis, against the constitution, government, peace and dignity of the said United States of America, and against the form of the statute of the said United States of America, in such case made and provided.