Talk about recent debates over historical monuments, discussing how people could make decisions about removing or contextualize exam based on Historical Information and public sentiment. The american historical so cetacean associated and recorded this event. Good afternoon. And i say that with some trepidation, because our audience is national and international. So, good morning to some of you and good evening to some of you. I am jim grossman, the executive director of the american historical association. And this is an initial experiment in something that we are likely to call history behind the headlines. The aha considers Historical Context and perspective essential to decisionmaking in public culture and especially in all aspects of public policy. The aha is a membershipsupported organization, just a reminder. , one has to say these things, anybody who watches Public Television or listens to public radio is ready for this. If you would like to become a member and support this type of content, membership links are located in the chat on zoom and in the comments on facebook live. I want to give an especially grateful thank you to History Channel for their generous sponsorship of this webinar. Lets get started. It is an honor to introduce todays panelists, annette gordonreed, professor of law and history at harvard university. And david blight, professor of history and director of the center of slavery, resistance and abolition of slavery at yale university. The professors are Pulitzer Prize winning historians and they have won lots of other prizes as well. They have written and spoken frequently and insightfully on issues relating to monuments, history, memory and our nations continued failure to fully confront the implications of its own history. Professor gordonreeds most recent book is most blessed of the patriarchs, Thomas Jefferson and the empire of the imagination. Professor blights is frederick douglass, prophet of freedom. Both of these leaders are notable for the insistence of people and the way that we honor those people are complicated. Whether we are thinking about frederick dallas or Thomas Jefferson. We are going to have roughly 35 minutes of moderated discussion, after which there will be questions from the audience. And i apologize in advance, given the number of people we will not be able to address probably even most of the questions that we will get. We will do our best. Lets get started. No lets start with the meaning and implications of removing cadet frederick statues from our public landscape. Which i know, both of you, david and annette have discussed frequently and in all sorts of venues. This is not a new issue, but something is clearly different at this time. So, lets start with whats different and why. And that, he referred to whats happening now as a awakening. Waking up is always a good place to start, so why dont we start there . Well, i think its different this time. I dont know a precise reason, but i have some series. Obviously, the killing of george floyd provoked a lot of soul searching. The nature of the video, the stark nature of the video actually captured peoples attention in a way that hasnt happened before. It could be because we are in the middle of a pandemic, and people have been clustered added till two, and in the community, theyre actually doing something that wed think about other people, that they had to think about other people. Ive a feeling that that may have contributed to it as well. The fact people could focus on it and the fact that we are engaged in a typically lots of americans do or havent done recently in a communal fashion. Looking at this, people Say Something had to happen. This struck people bitterly that the killings of other people have not. That is always people concerned about trip on martin, so forth, but i think the social circumstances that historians always like to this, the context is different, and that made a difference to the way people have responded to anything. So, whats interesting then is, so we have the statues being toppled. We have the statues being toppled in the context that you just talked about. These statues are part of a story, and they tell stories. So, one day i am curious about, and maybe david you could speak to this is this the death of a lost cause . Probably not, but we could hope. I try to see this moment now and again. No its putting anything right now in this climate, especially as historians. But it really is a combination of about 150 year counterattack on the lost cause ideology. It takes form right after the war, especially 18 seventies, an 18 eighties. Confederate monuments came out of a leader here than that, during the jim crow era. When the united daughters of the confederacy and you know the confederate veterans took hold of that process. But it wasnt ideology, you know, racial ideology, and ideology of white supremacy, and it became not a story of loss at all. It became a victory narrative, and the pictures of a reconstruction. The attack back on the laws clause led by fire fredericton goes and many of them was 150 years old, as early as 1871. Right after a league died, he died in 1870. Shortly after, that was an early 71. Right after that, douglas wrote a piece in which he said he was sick and tired, quote, of the nauseating flatteries of robert e. Lee. You wondered why the president killed the most Union Soldiers, what killed the most americans to divide the country was getting all the accolades. So, this is an old set of arguments. However, we obviously not have to politic. If it hadnt been for the massive protests in the streets these past month, massive numbers of people in the streets, i doubt police forces, the various kinds, would have allowed people to tear down monuments as they have. Police have not always, but by and large been letting this happen. So, there is a politics on the streets and bring this about, and i guess i would add right now, at a honeyed out on this, but trumpism. Lets just be honest, the nature of our politics, the lost three and a half, four years, this out there in the streets. Now, is everybody defending a Confederate Monument be removed, or attacking a Confederate Monument, or even other kinds of monuments . Are you always thinking about trump . Probably not. But trump has developed a toxic kind of politics that is now bringing out all kinds of resistance that we had not earlier seen, and it is directly related to police killings, but its also, i think, related to a bursting out of rage against trumpism. I just hope this can be harnessed somehow it is something that was my next question, the harnessing. Youve talked here about how the politics affect what happens in the streets, and right before that and it framed the politics and whats happening in the streets, in essence, as a larger context that ties together. So, i am curious the politics effects will happen in the streets, and it explained how that happens. I wonder if either of both you could talk about how it happens in the streets effects of politics. We pulled out a whole bunch of monuments. So what . Well, its interesting question we are talking about this before. We had this moment we had huge numbers of people, finally, beginning to look to the question of policing in america. Particularly policing at the African American community, and voicing support for black lives matter, and then the focus shifts to statues and, you know, for me, theres a little bit of frustration. Is that i dont think monuments and statues are important, but its way more important to get the issue of Police Reform voter suppression, those kinds of things on the front burner, and we have fallen into battles about culture, these sort of culture were things that deflect from real economic, social kinds of issues that brought people out in history to begin with. People are being killed. African americans feel threatened by police. This is on that has been going on for decades, and everybody can tell you a story, many black people can tell you stories about people that they knew, they know of who went into plea stations and didnt come out. People who had encounters with police that ended in death, were minor things. Those kinds of that kind of issue that brought people out, i want to talk about monuments, and i think they are important, but i dont want us to get away from that, from those kinds of essential issues. What will happen november 3rd, with the election . You know, voter suppression, all those kinds of things are the things i think i would like to be focused on. Theres a way that we have this moment, the moment can sort of move and we could lose it, there is momentum on that focus too much on the wrong things. As important as they are, you know. I have a powerful argument in that, and one of the ways that manifests is that it is easier to oppose the monument that it has to figure out a new social policy. One of the things i would, again, we are historians, we like evidence, and all of that, but you know, one of the things i wish people would do now is actually go read the policing and justice act. This is the house bill. Theres a lot in their. You know, its not everything, but its a new kind of civil rights idea, it has the antilynching law in their. Theres a lot in that act and, you know, thats how this has to get converted, hopefully, earnest into a new politics. A, you know, a new civil rights regime of some sort. However, whats interesting about the monuments is we do have a Tipping Point here, and we see these throughout history, when we reach a point or somehow people who have really defended Confederate Monuments your ago cant quite do it now. Even republicans in the senate are saying, well, yeah, maybe those military bases, maybe thats not such a good that wasnt such a good idea after all. There is a Tipping Point here that we werent at even a year ago. Absolutely. We werent at the summer 2015, one so much of this began after the charleston massacre. Back then, it was about taking the Confederate Flag down and a few monuments were under duress. Now, its everything confederate. Its everything confederate. Or brands yeah, well, this is, you know, every moment like this, every Tipping Point has access. It is, its going to have accesses and you know, everybody is mourning right now. How could you take down a grand statue . You know, he was the read that slave, and so on, and so on. He saved the union okay, right, there are going to be excesses, we have to people to stand up, you know, and say, you know what . Toppling that one thats wrong. Thats wrong. Right. Topple that one . Yeah, okay. I am with you. You make choices every single day. We do that all the time. The point is how it takes place, the kind of discussion that takes place about it. Some will stay and some will go. All three of us have talked about this. But there is not an inevitable slippery slope. This is a ridiculous argument. And then, annette, you have written prizewinning work about jefferson, about the founders in general. This is what is constantly brought up by the people who say that inevitably, all the icons will be smashed. What are the criteria that you can imagine using, thinking about, when you say, no, theres judgment here. The criteria, there is lots of them. The one that i have always given in distinguishing the confederates from the founders is that the funders created the country, and the confederates tried to destroy the country. I think thats a pretty good bright line rule. When you lose the war, you dont usually get to continue glorifying yourself by putting up statues in Public Places mocking the people who defeated you, you know, the confederates were vanquished. There is no reason for them to be there. The confederacy was a branch. If you think of the country as a river, it was sort of a branch that went off to nowhere. There was nothing they can contribute to us that we cant get from some other place. And it is not what we stand for. African child slavery,. The inferiority they specifically repudiated jefferson and that the declaration of independence. Alexander stephens did. So, we could do without them. The founders are different because they found a the country. It is hard for me to think of living in a place without telling the story or actually commemorating, not celebrating. When you think of what a statue is about, to me, it is not about, this was the greatest this was our god, this was the greatest person ever lived or whatever. It is about recognizing that this person did something important. And i think founding the United States there are some people who dont think it was a good idea but, if you think it was a good idea, these people did that, and it is important to see them in all of their complexity. To see them in all aspects. You have jefferson. You have washington. You mention that they bought and sold people. You mention those kinds of things, the good with the bad. We are, to my mind, stock with these stuck with these people who created the country, the confederacy, that is not a story that continues in any kind of way. We have made use of the things that jefferson, in particular put forth. In particular, ideals. Whether it is some religious belief in your heart, those ideas have been useful. So that is a distinction i would make. I understand people say he owned slaves and therefore they should go. But that is like, you cant redo your parentage. You cant stop and pretend that those people did not exist, and that they didnt do something that most of us think was a positive thing, but you have got to tell the whole story about them. It creates, to my mind, a much more mature attitude about history and historical figures. They are not about our best friends. They are not people we want to hang out with. These are people who did things that we have to know about. In order to understand who we are and to do things differently, take the best of what they gave and reject the things that were bad. I think it is hiding your head in the sand to pretend that they didnt do anything positive, or about the negative things automatically outweigh those. Lets talk about both of them. Annette, can i ask you a question of a sort . Not that you have to answer for everyone who studies the founders, by any means, but first of all, i would say, it is so true. If we could help the public focus their mind on just what the confederacy was, it was an insurgent revolution to create a slave holdersrepublic. I would just say to people, we dont want to name too many books here but you should read stephanie mccurrys most recent book called confederate reckoning. If you have any kind of progressive view of the United States and if you actually believe in our pluralism and in equality, you cant read that book without a tremendous sigh of relief that the confederacy did not win. [laughter] yeah it is really important to understand that. It only lasted four years. I was going to answer your question you let them off the hook. If you put them, and they would like nothing more than to be lumped in with washington and jefferson. We are just like those people. No. That is not they were the vessel of the American Revolution, resisting centralized authority, that was the central tenant of the lost cause. A lot of people believe that, but they never quote stevens. They dont look at the documents that framed the government and society. Yeah, they were slaveowners and they were racist and they may have been like jefferson and washington in that sense. But the documents that they set for their nation dont comport with anything that we say we believe. We can take the constitution, transformed by the 13th, 14th and 15th amendment. We can take the declaration and make a new society. We cannot take the cornerstone speech, we cant take the constitution or the secession, we cant do anything with that and continue in peace in this country. Or jefferson daviss 1200 page memoir. Yes. On every page it defends the existence of slavery because africans were savages. But here is a quick question ok. We are living in a moment right now where there are a lot of people i will just name it, the 1619 project suggested that americans ought to reconsider what the founding is. That the founding is really when slaves arrived and not the creation of the republic out of the American Revolution and the writing of the u. S. Constitution. And maybe that kind of set of assumptions was out there anyway, i am not just blaming the 1619 project. But there are a lot of people who say that the founding was all racist anyway, it was all in the service of slavery, so why not get rid of jefferson . I dont believe that necessarily. I know, it is hard to respond to that. In the first place, if you want to pick something other than 1776 as the founding, you might pick the british founding. 1607. You might pick when englishmen rolled up on american cotton and said, we have discovered it, and began to push Indigenous People off the land. So that is a point. Certainly, 1619 is the point. But that was part of the english empire. There was no United States of america at that point. As historians, we cant treat that as if those moments put forth some sort of inevitable outcome that we end up at 1776 and then we end up with me sitting in my apartment now. Anything could have happened at that point. So i think the founding was racist. Certainly the constitution protected slavery. We could argue about that. Protected slavery. We should have had shawn here today. I think he is watching. I think he should be here. It protected slavery, but it also and these an antislavery movement, the revolution did. What happened from that was not inevitable. But it did. The fact is, africanamerican people, other people said, wait a minute, this applies to us as well. And that has been the basis for a struggle up until now. That is real. It is as real as the founding is many things. It is not any one thing. And it is what you make of it. And people made Different Things of it. So first, you are focusing on the east coast. Which we do. And on the english. What happens if you shift the angle of vision . There are issues over the statues in the capitol. It is easy to identify 11 or 12. I got into an argument with the reporter of whether it is 11 or 12, theres also father sarah. And he never dawned a confederate uniform, he never took up arms against anything called the United States of america. But he did some pretty bad things to people who are the ancestors of americans. I do when we think about fathers are in the capital . Well, david, you ought to try that one . Well, im going to have to come up with some kind of principles, i suspect, that would apply to these things. Every case is not identical, we seem to have a developing set of principles about the confederates. Insurgency to destroy the United States, treason. What are doing inside the u. S. Capital are now, thats craziness. You know, it will be like putting up a statue in the u. S. Capital of the general who commanded the burning of washington in the war of 1812, or something. Father sarah and what happened to native americans in california, did you know they had it since set of principles here about just how much that offense americans broadly . Not just native americans . How much that is inconsistent with values and our mission as a Pluralistic Society today . I think we may need some kind of commission within the congress and maybe not just congressman. Hopefully not just congressman. The American Association is to be part of that commission, david. I agree with you. And you might get 500 Volunteers Office webinar, who knows. But, you know, to come up with some criteria because, otherwise, this is going to be willynilly. And even if somebody pastoral that you revisit these things every 25 years or something, which i guess has been consistent is still not that just my suggestion. Okay. It was only my suggestion, no one else we have a lot of power, jim. You can do that, you can make it happen. You know, you cant do this by popular referendum. Look what mississippi just found out. That referendum on the state flag about ten years ago, and they decided to keep it by 75 . Right now, the politics and such, they just got rid of it. Got rid of it. People think what would never have happened. It happened. All of things are happening right now that mayo sought would never happen. Nobody in my field who studied this for most of their lives ever really thought that would be gone for monument avenue enrichment, or a bunch of other things, but he is going to be gone. So, you know, youre right, father sarah didnt wear uniform, wasnt the confederate, was military, didnt take up arms against the United States, but he slaughtered them. And what about the Union Soldiers . Who, after finishing off the confederates turned west so that theyre complicated subject as well, but the point is to have these kinds of discussions. I mean, you know what, as miscible yesterday, i think a lot of it has, my response to this may be worse to, david, orgy we can ask yourselves, as historians, and we deal with the past all the time, and we know all the terrible things that people do, and have always done in the past, in the president , and will do in the future. And its a given, its human, its a given. You cant purify your history. You cant purify the past. I think the point you just made in that is so crucial, because i actually saw what happened last week and i dont neighborhood. I live for blocks from a moral, and one of the issues there is the difference between how we as historians think about that statue, and how people as parents think about that statue. What does it mean to be apparent and walk past that statue with your nine year old . How do you explain it . And im curious whats happening in that park is exactly what you just described. People discussing. Its become a way in which their civic culture happening. Which is how it should be, but what do you say to people who all of these moderates around the country are, innocence, role models. And what do you say to high school teachers, to parents. How do you explain this whole controversy and what it means to younger people . David . Youve written about this. I thought he was asking your first. It doesnt matter, i am happy to take that on. Ive been all to public about this, i guess. I personally hope that the friedmans memorial as is often called or sometimes called the emancipation group. It goes better for names. I personally hope that statute survives. I agree, and ive said so, that the imagery today is certainlynr racist. The kneeling slave, weve got like, very christian god like lincoln with his hand out reached, giving emancipation and of course forever these people can debate whether the kneeling slave is running breaking is on chance and all of that. I dont want to get into that. But one of the important things about that particular monument is first of all it is about black freedom, it was created by a large by black people. 20,000 dollars raised by African Americans. People are happily earning by charlotte scott, former slave owner from history. For the rest of her life was known as the woman who created the friedmans memorial. It was a huge event in d. C. The day it was unveiled, huge classic d. C. Black parade with bans and fraternal orders, and all the rest. Master ceremonies the dean of the howard law school, douglas is sort of the day, and amy bishop gave the, you know, the opening. So, but, i think that ground, and the rarest of cases for a monuments rendered important. All by speech at its unveiling. Most compelling speeches are either forgettable or repulsive. And this case, douglas gave the second greatest breach of his life. The first being the 4th of july speech, but history and memorial speech, all 13 pages of it, was masterpiece. The first part, he took on lincoln directly. That honestly he said, iran like it was a white mans president. Iran lincoln and is prejudices, assumptions was a white man. He was not our president. Many our black rules president , and came that famous line. By white fellow citizens, you are abraham against children, i and my people are his step children. Incredible metaphor. Step children by adoption, by necessity, and by circumstance. And then, in the middle that speech, comes a pause, and he shifts, he shifts not to celebrate lincoln, but he says, with a refrain street three times. Under his rule, and into time, what are his role and into time, lincoln found the method, the way to create the policy by which we became free. It honors lincolns essential kind of political pragmatism. But at the same time, douglas had been dead honest about what most black folks had not a blanket in the first year and a half or more of the war, including douglas. And last point, that speech is really directed at the audience in the first two rows, because he had president grand, members of the cabinet, justices of the supreme court, members of the house and the senate, the entire government sat in front of him and douglas is telling them, you are losing reconstruction. Their construction is falling apart. You dont act now, you will never have another chance. Im sorry, im not too long about the speech, but i do know the imagery of that monument is offensive to many people, but not all people, and i am now in dialog on email, more than i want to be, but with people who live in the neighborhood. African americans who live in that neighborhood, who are of different opinions about this, and breaking down generationally, i dont know. But its interesting how people respond to that particular image, which is such a 19th century image. Well, you know, for me, i this is what i disagree, with david. I think the statue should probably. I know he seems hated when we say, we should be put in museum, were gonna keep this. Were gonna put . It the National Museum of African American history would be a wonderful place to put it, with douglas is speech, and everything put into context. The difficulty, you know, im impressed by the fact that this was black people who raised money for this, but they dont get the opportunity to say what the image should be. And, its not a surprise that the image would be that of a white savior. And an ailing slave. I kneeling slave i mean, im not one of those people who says Abraham Lincoln got shot in the back of the head. He was martyred for coming up with that policy and having people think that he was creating black citizenship. He sacrificed all. I am not one of those people to put lincoln in the corner. But African American men bled and died for freedom. As soldiers, africanamerican men, women and children ran away, left the plantations, ended the plantation system. Black people brought about their freedom, contributed to bringing about their freedom. And the idea that they would raise money, give it to whites, and their answer would be a white savior motive. You said this is a 19thcentury thing. It is not a 19thcentury thing. If you want to talk about race, we can talk about today, the image of the white savior in films, movies, everywhere. This notion that you cant have blacks and whites, cant exist equally. Not a statue with a person standing next to him. Maybe not shaking hands, that might have been too much, but maybe a gesture toward it for their joint effort to end slavery. I said before about the confederacy, this thing sort of going off into nowhere . The notion of the white savior exists today. And people who are whites who see themselves as progressives and our allies still have an easier time dealing with us when you are in a position of superiority. Thats a comfort, that level. Even if you are doing something good, it has to be whites here, blacks down there. I think seeing that image it is a similar feeling when i felt going along Central Park West with teddy roosevelt, with the native american and the black person on either side. I dont have a problem with it, if they could just get some welders to separate those two people off and just have tr on the horse, that will be fine, but it sends a message. If that message were something, the emancipation message, if that were something that had gone, if the notion of the white savior didnt exist today, then i might have a different view but, the 19th century is still present here in the 21st century i wouldnt want my kids walking past us. I felt the same way taking my kids into the museum of natural history, that statue, what is that saying about who you are and who you have been . Let me add, my proposal was to build an additional emancipation monument next to the freedmans memorial. It was actually douglasss suggestion, which we only recently had verified by the inteprid researchers, who found the clippings in the past week, to my knowledge, of douglass five days after that unveiling. The national republic, the newspaper in washington, d. C. , douglass said, he did not like that kneeling slave, he wanted a standing strong image of emancipation. And he himself suggested an additional monument should be put there. I guess my point of view on this is why not have both . What incredible teaching one can do . Because, how many people are going to see this in a museum . You are right, if its in a good space in the africanamerican museum, it may indeed be seen by a lot of people because a lot of people go there. Why not have that juxtaposition there that shows the then and the now, the past and the present, and celebrate douglasss speech as well, and why not have a douglass statue . Would that be your solution . Lets extend this problem. I started off by saying that what is wonderful about the work you do is the two of you present historical figures as complicated people. Yes. So, here is two complicated people, general sheridan and general Oliver Otis Howard, both heroic figures in terms of their role in the civil war, although somewhat less heroic in terms of their role in killing and removing native americans after the civil war. David, your solution would be anytime we have a statue of sheridan, we put another statue next to it that somehow commemorates or helps us to remember the other things how do we deal with complexity people lived 5, 6, 7 decades . How do you deal with the complexities of their lives . It is tough. First of all, i am not even sure Phil Sheridan merits that kind of worry and concern. There are sheridan monuments clearly. There is a sheridans square in d. C. And one in new york as well. There is one in new york. Down in the village, isnt it . Mmhmm. Yeah, and that most americans dont even know who Oliver Otis Howard was unless they know unless they know howard university, i suppose. But you know, yeah, this is a, mess, complicated, and it always will be. I think people need a reminder that you just cant purify the past. And you cannot purify your memory. You have to make choices about these things. Some monuments, some memorials are worthy of keeping not just because of what we can learn from them, but because of the circumstances of their creation, and some are not. And we are going to have to come up you know, not that yale is a paragon for this, but when yale had to consider getting rid of the name of john c. Calhoun of the president ial college here, the administration created a committee and i was on the committee, to try and come up with principles that you could actually follow by which a university, at least, we are not talking about a nation or company or a city, but a university might rename something. And we did. We did a lot of research. In fact, we called in gordon reed as an advisor among others. Yeah. We came up with these principles by which the administration could put calhoun through those principles. In the end, they said, we are going to remove that one. Now, we are going to have to think in these terms, whether it is monuments in congress, monuments on a Public Square or elsewhere. School names. Yeah. Rather than willynilly, the politics right now that this has to come down. Do we wait for the new politics for that one to come down . Or do we actually have some kind of principles . Otherwise the mob will take the monuments away when the mob can get away with it. Yes. In any event, the notion of taking it down without deliberation from other people is problematic. Now, that is the law professor, lawyer in me, saying that is problematic. We believe in deliberation and knowledge. I believe in that, they will take down statues of people i admire. And it is just not thats not the way to go, that isnt something that i would encourage. That goes back to what you earlier said annette, back to, the value of civic culture. Maybe one value of monuments is that if we say, not only principles but process. Every generation, every 25 years, we will look at all of the names in some kind of civic process. And i said that is very jeffersonian, the earth belongs to the living. But every generation of people should sit down and there should be a discussion about, do we agree with this, and is this what we wish for . It is not a simple it will not necessarily solve all the problems, but we have to have discussions about this. It may have a larger benefit because then we see what our values are, our points of commonality and where we disagree. But, not talking about it, having a large conversation about this i think would be a mistake. And we should listen to young people, lets face it. That may seem like a cliche. We should listen to young people right now, what they think about all of this. Especially when they get themselves informed. Well i am looking at the questions. We have a lot of questions, we cannot get to all of them. I am just going to pull some out randomly. Not quite randomly. Someone has suggested that maybe, especially given that we are supposedly a nation with democratic values, maybe we should not build memorials of people. Maybe our memorials should not have people. I was just about to say, maybe monuments are a thing of the past. We dont seem to do them very well. Very few new statues that i look at am i impressed. Some people have done them well. Maybe that could be it. Emancipation is not a person, it is an epic historical process. It is a pivot of american history. It is the greatest result of the civil war, but not a Single Person by any means. Yes. Yeah. Nor are things like industrialization. But it still does not answer the question about what do we do with the ones already there . Because there are people, members of our community who admire, who like the statues of people, who find something meaningful about it. The question suggested maybe we shouldnt be building more, but it doesnt answer the question of what we are to do about the ones that are there, how we decide who stays and who goes . That is a fascinating thing to ask and i taught a bunch of courses and seminars on memory and memorials when you asked the question, what memorial have you ever visited that really works for you . What memorial have you ever visited that made you weep . What monument did you ever visit that offended you . You know, we all will have perhaps different answers to that. Some people are appalled by triumphal 19thcentury equestrian statues, which, they fit their age. Some people love modernist visions of something complicated, and some dont. But, what monument moves you, what monument doesnt . It is kind of worth asking people. The vietnam memorial, everyone not everyone, but most people today, there is a consensus about that design that has been adopted, almost, as a place of healing, a place of mourning and commemoration. And it was controversial, people hated it at first. The Reagan Administration did not want to put it. Because they wanted something triumphal. Holmes created something that was deeply moving and personal to people of all types. And it has been modeled elsewhere as a way of memorializing at least, death in war. But it is worth asking as commissions get created, what memorials actually work for people and what dont . One of the things i have recommended publicly i dont know if it will happen but the Biden Campaign should get ahead of this issue. If the confederate landscape is coming down, and the lost cause is in deep trouble, if the lost cause and the confederate landscape is coming down, what might replace it . Why doesnt the Biden Administration bring together a bunch of people and start thinking about that . Sean molensk in an email yesterday to me said, we need to advocate a marble new deal. I dont know if that would work, right now, but why not . Get ahead of the issue and say that there is going to be a National Project that could also, of course, become local. Most monuments are local. They were created by somebody in that town. To rethink the idea of memorialization, especially about subjects like emancipation. Im still waiting for infrastructure week. That is just me. I know. The monuments, when you say they are local, they are local chronologically as well as spatially. When you say what are the monuments that make you cry . What are the monuments that inspire you . Doesnt that change over time . Yes. And one has to usually know the story the monument represents. But most people dont. Right . Most people, you walk past a monument and your kid says who is that . Or you dont know who they are. Yeah. Or if you say Phil Sheridan, what are you gonna say . But what do we do with that as historians knowing peoples, values change over time, and to go back in some ways to where annette started, that social and political needs and conflicts in the country change over time. My own favorite example of that question, jim, is the shaw memorial in boston. The shaw 54th massachusetts memorial. That is augustus st. Gaudens masterpiece. In a very public place, a bus stop. But that monument tells a narrative. It tells a story. It tells a deeply moving story of what black men had to do. They had to go die in a war to be acknowledged as men. Furthermore, it is an artistic masterpiece. It is a bas relief like no nothing else i dont think any american artist has ever created. Once people learn that story, that monument moves them still. Not just because there was a movie made about the 54th, but they have got to know the story. They have got to know what it represents. And it is about suffering. It is about blood sacrifice in a war, the way that can grab our emotions that other kinds of stores dont. But monuments do need to tell a story if they are really good. Yes. And the ones that we are upset about are the ones that tell stories that are painful in another way. It is not a story i talked before about the values that we have, the value of suffering and redemption, those kinds of things, versus the white mans burden or manifest destiny. Or white supremacy. Which some of these monuments, that is the story they are telling. One of our questioners has actually asked, what the two of you think about, instead of doing individual monuments, maybe this goes back to shawns marble new deal commissioning artists to create monuments exactly to what you just described annette, monuments to values, monuments to emotions, to the way we feel about our environment. I hate to call it a solution. Robin kelly has suggested all military monuments be wiped off of the earth and that would be the statement of values we would like to see. But these monuments do state our values, so should we be more explicit and say monuments are about values instead of people . The problem is that the word monuments to values. Were monuments to values. Because the people supposedly exhibited values that the people admired. There is a statue of jefferson in front of the Journalism School at columbia. It is not about him being a slave owner, it is not even about the declaration, it is about the notion of freedom of the press, and that is what the people who put the statues up typically they are not putting people up, lets put joe up for no reason, it is somebody they think embodies a particular value. Or tr, courage, when he is by himself, that monument was the value of white supremacy. Clearly. So, yeah, we should do that. I think that is what has some of those values are not values that are serving us very well. At all. I love that question, though. I have Great Respect for robin kelly but i want to be careful of that one, i would hate to tell surviving world war ii veterans but there shouldnt be any memorial to them at dday, or the shaw memorial, i am sorry. It is military but, by god those people fought for something. They fought for something that we value and they sacrificed in ways that we arent. And thank god we dont have to sacrifice, i wouldnt want them to be forgotten. And a key point is that historically, monument, making came out of the romantic age. At least the monuments we know of. Where the individual hero is always exalted. In the 19th century, the measure of every sculptor is whether he or she could do an equestrian. That was the measure, could you do an equestrian. Which is the way st. Gaudens started out with the shaw memorial and ended up putting the soldiers there. This exultation of the romantic, individual hero there always had to be an individual. Why not a National Monument to the natural rights tradition . The American Republic was born out of this thing jefferson called natural rights. Lets inspire some really creative artists. Artists to go after that. How about popular sovereignty . How about a monument to equality . Or we could say every civilrights monument is a monument to equality and it is. But maybe we do need to inspire artists now, or maybe they already are inspired, maybe they need to tell us. Moving away from people as the embodiment of these things. Because thats why you dont name things after people who are still alive, you dont know what they are going to do. Now we know with historical figures, we know what they did. We want to say oh, lets get rid of that. As jim said, these people lived 60, 70 years as a human being and they might have done awful things as well as the one thing that was heroic that we are recognizing them for. Exactly. I was talking to somebody the other day, for everybody that you have, you gave historians a week, we could probably rip that person. Any persons over 100 years old has a problem somewhere. And let me say, i dont want to minimize slavery as a thing that people did, but the point is, as i was suggesting before, and this is looking at it the way we look at things historically, it is very, very hard to have a person, anybody who is not going to have something that people will find revolting, repulsive about them if they keep looking at it. And i think thats very important. There is a lot of questions we are getting relating to education and young people. It does seem to me, what you are saying is one of the values of learning history is that humility, right . That this recognition that very few people go through their lives purely heroic. Some do go through purely villainous, we know some of those people. Unredeemable. Unredeemable. But thats an aspect of humility that kids learn by learning history. And having a relationship to people that is proper. Not to think, you can admire people for what they did. But this notion, its a must a judgment of value on my part but it is proper. You can admire people for what they did. Most like hollywood, the dream factory. It is not enough to watch someone on the screen, you have to know all about their private lives. And identify with them, so much so that people had to lie about who they were to keep this thing going. You have a personal relationship with the people you actually know in your life and you have a stake in those people. Maybe changing how you view what your connection is to the person, just to look at what they did but not all into them, in the sense that this is me and i identify with them and i am pretending i am them or whatever. A healthy skepticism about everybody. Detachment is the word i am looking for here, about the figures on the public stage who did something important. But they are not gods. You shouldnt be measuring yourself as them or buy them. Also with school naming. Yes. Are you suggesting that when schools have names, usually the students at some point have to learn why the school was named after that person and that person becomes in a sense the role model you were describing annette. , should we be suggesting that every curriculum should also consider to include a critique of the person for whom the school is named, no matter who it is . Well, almost you have to, dont you . There was a place in texas i think decided, i am forgetting where it was, decided to change all of the stonewall jacksons and robert e. Lees to names from nature. The only safe way to go. Get off people. Birds, nature. Why not . Street names, the same thing. I was just going to say really quickly, after the charleston massacre in15, and after the memories and monuments and so on, i decided i would go to every audience with three principles. I didnt always get very far with this, the first principle was you had to have a deliberative process. The second was, you had to learn some more history first. Always hard. The third was learn some, humility from the process. Now, that sounded so schoolmarmish and scolding it did not always work, that it it still seems to me it is important. If we are not deliberative about this, if we dont learn the history of behind how did this monument get here, and we dont gain a little humility about human nature, then the exercise might be futile. I think thats right. These are people. Humility is not in vogue, though. You noticed that . [laughter] it is 1 30. It is time to go, and you guys are busy. I am ok in ending on the relationship between humility and human nature as an argument to why everyone should study history and why history should remain a Central Place in the curriculum, which is an important thing to remind people on right now. Thank you very much and we will be back with everybody another time. Up next on the civil war historians at now up next, historians Edna Greene Medford and Vernon Burton discuss the debate over moving Confederate Monuments and memorials they often talk about how we remember slaveholders li
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