In response to for the Confederate statues:
Many people never had the opportunity to study the history of these monuments (none of us did, as the facts were not in our history books).
These statues and other memorials to the Confederacy were erected in the post-Reconstruction era, concurrent with the reemergence of White supremacy as the dominant political narrative and power structure in the old Confederate states.
It was a time when laws were passed denying voting rights to former slaves, establishing "separate but equal" as legal doctrine and putting into place laws that discriminated against former slaves in every aspect of commerce and employment. The statues were erected as a symbol of the reemergence of White power and intended to convey symbolically this fact.
One solution is to establish a Garden of Reconciliation where the statues can be placed as part of an educational effort to educate and inform citizens and visitors as to the true nature of why these statues were erected. Then perhaps we can finally move past this shameful period of our history.
One note: Robert E. Lee was quite explicit that no statues or memorials were to be erected to memorialize the Confederacy.
"I think it wiser not to keep open the sores of war,鈥� he wrote, 鈥渂ut to follow the example of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife, and to commit to oblivion the feelings it engendered."
PHILIP FRADY
New Orleans