If there's one thing I think we can all agree upon, it's that Lincoln was not a gar.
Abraham Lincoln
Alligator Gar
Posted on 03/28/2008 12:15:10 PM PDT by cowboyway
Over the last few months, celebrations for Abraham Lincoln's 200th birthday have drawn attention to the Kentucky native's life and his legacy as president. But the 200-year anniversary of another Kentucky president's birth, Confederate President Jefferson Davis, is receiving mixed reviews.
"I'll say it this way - winners write history," said Ron Bryant, a Lexington historian writing a book on Davis. "We need heroes, we need villains. Lincoln became a hero and Davis a villain."
Davis was born in what is now Todd County, Ky., in 1808, one year before Lincoln. Davis served as the only president of the 11 southern states that seceded from the Union between 1861 and 1865. The Confederate States of America surrendered in 1865, and Davis was locked in prison the same year.
Despite being denounced by many civil rights groups, signs of Davis' legacy can still be found throughout the state.
In Southwest Kentucky, a structure resembling the Washington Monument stands in memory of Davis. At 351 feet tall, the Jefferson Davis Monument is the fourth largest freestanding obelisk in the world, according to Kentucky State Parks.
Although Kentucky never seceded from the Union, a statue of Davis stands in the rotunda in the state's Capitol building.
"The Civil War is still very much alive in many places," said Cliff Howard, a Jefferson Davis impersonator. "Kentucky was on both sides of the fence. It still is."
Having heard of Kentucky's reputation for "being a little backward," integrated strategic communications senior James Davidson Jr. was not surprised about Davis' statue in the Capitol building.
Davidson, first-vice president of UK's chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, said a statue of Davis leaves a bad impression.
"What is Frankfort saying to the rest of Kentucky with it being there?" Davidson said. "I respect everyone's heritage and Southern tradition, but given the history, I think it shouldn't be there."
The statue of Davis, installed in 1936, is one of five statues in the Capitol building. Lincoln is the largest in the center, and Davis stands in the corner behind his right shoulder. Former Kentucky Congressman Henry Clay, physician and drafter of the state constitution Ephraim McDowell and former Vice President Alben Barkley also stand in the rotunda.
The last time Davis' statue came into debate was 2003, when a coalition of African-American groups protested its presence in the Capitol building. A state advisory committee left the issue up to former Gov. Ernie Fletcher, who took no action during his term.
Gov. Steve Beshear does not plan to remove the statue because Davis is a historical figure who represents part of Kentucky's cultural history, a spokeswoman said.
Student Government President Nick Phelps said his feelings on the statue in the Capitol building resembled how he felt during a controversy two years ago about a 46-foot mural in Memorial Hall depicting the history of Lexington and its surrounding area. The mural, which some said stereotyped American Indians and blacks, was not removed.
"I was not in support of removing the mural, so I would not support removing Jefferson Davis," Phelps said. "I don't think we should remove history. I think it removes the question, 'Who is he?' "
Many students might ask the same question about Davis.
In Kentucky, the Civil War is part of the middle school curriculum. Unless students take an advanced placement history course in high school, that's usually the last time they focus on 19th century American history, said Nayasha Owens-Morton, a U.S. history and African-American history teacher at Bryan Station Traditional High School.
William Campbell has taught a class on Lincoln at UK for about 10 years as an English and honors professor. Students going into his class know little about the confederate president, he said.
"About Jefferson Davis, Kentuckians tend to know that he was from our state, that there's a memorial dedicated to him somewhere in the state, and that he was the president of the Confederacy," Campbell said. "Of Lincoln's writings, most have read only the Gettysburg Address. Of Davis's writings, most have read nothing."
I do believe I posted this. #332.
I didn't say Southerners were hotheaded. I said secessionists were hotheaded. Not all Southerners were secessionists.
Compare the hot-headed cowboy, George Bush, with the intellectual, nuanced and haughty, John Kerry.
The President is not hotheaded - he is almost the definition of deliberateness and coolheadedness.
I submit to you that the SC Declaration is thoughtful and well written.
It's an extremely well-written rhetorical performance, but its reasoning is slim: it boils down to this: we don't like the new President-elect, so we quit.
I think the most telling line in it is this: "It [the Lincoln incoming administration] has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory." What Lincoln said was very different: he said that he would bar slavery from the remaining unorganized territory.
So the document is either misrepresenting Lincoln deliberately for rhetorical effect and the document is thus a cynical and disingenuous one, or the South Carolina legislature was saying that slavery and the South were synonymous - that any Southrons settling in federal territory without holding slaves weren't really Southerners.
Show where secession was illegal in 1860.
The Constitution clearly states that the Constitution and the federal laws that emanate therefrom, are the "law of the land." The Constitution further mandates that legal controversies between the states and the federal government are to be decided by the federal judiciary, not by individual state legislatures. When Southern state legislatures acted to undo their states' ratifications of the Constitution they did so in violation of the very law of the land they had agreed to with all the other states, and thus the so-called Confederacy violated the law of the land and engaged in insurrection - an activity specifically forbidden by the Constitution.
Didn't the north act in it's own self interest without any consideration for their 'fellow countrymen' in the South?
The North considered the South extensively. Northerners invested deeply in the South, many tieing up their personal fortunes in Southern commerce. The South did not reciprocate that confidence, choosing to invest almost entirely in the South, principally in land and slaves.
Question: If you join a club and they start making rules that will impoverish you, are you going to continue your membership or will you cut your losses and get out while you can?
The South's economic inadequacies had nothing to do with the North. The South's system of production was inherently flawed and inevitably doomed: without free labor, there is no flexibility in the operating costs of an enterprise.
There are quite a few Southern thinkers who pointed out that wealthy Southerners did not diversify their capital, but placed all of their liquid assets into buying more land and more slaves to cultivate the same small portfolio of commodities. Meanwhile, Northern landowners invested capital in shipping, railroads, manufacturing and banking.
Most of the capital that built Southern railways, ports, banks and the handful of Southern factories came from Northern investment.
I'll point something else out: since one of the Confederacy's central grievances was the opposition of the North to expansion of slavery to the territories, and given that the Confederates considered the territories as much their property as the Union's, the logic of the Confederate position dictated warfare over the West.
I meant to cut the part of post 336 in which cowboyway - after calling my family members "POS" - was complaining about "personal attacks."
The point to this whole article is that Jefferson Davis should not anything celebrated about him. He was a traitor through and through. Hell, I live right off the highway and I think that is one memorial too much.
You know who was one of the investors in the Wanderer? None other than that well known slave-trader and source of your tagline, Nathan Bedford Forrest. One hell of a guy, wasn't he?
KC, that’s where I would have to disagree with you.
America’s history is what it is. To deny it, warts and all, is to do exactly what the revisionists would have us do. It is imperative that we at least attempt to keep the dialog open in the hopes of finding reasoning and reasonable people.
Just because we have the Al Sharpton’s and the Jesse Jackson’s, should we throw up our hands and say that discussions of race are “impossible”? Because we encounter bigots like swattie and cowboyway should we abandon and ignore one of the most important chapters of our country’s history?
It is pretty apparent that the author of this piece is a provocateur - trying to fan the flames and passions of unthinking people. In post #5 I pointed out the method by which she “poked the anthill” to see what sort of mayhem she could cause. And 300+ posts later we see that she managed to get at least some reaction. In fairness I must point out that the FReeper who posted this piece do so for precisely the same reason - not to raise the level of discourse, but to fan the flames of discord.
IMO it is when we STOP talking about it that the revisionists win...
Well more power to you and I wish you luck. Luckily, the reality is that there is only a real small minority feels like that.
Yes he was.
If disagreeing with a yankee makes me a 'bigot', then sign me up.
Of course, the rhetoric that you've posted against Southerners clearly defines you as a bigot.
No, being a bigot makes you a bigot.
Show me anything that I’ve posted “against southerners” bigoted or otherwise. I’ve made posts in response to stupid bigoted posts of yours and swattie’s, but the only time I ever mentioned anything in context with the south is a reference to your insipid “It’s a Southern thing......you wouldn’t understand” tripe.
You on the other hand put EVERYTHING into a “north vs. south” context. You can’t see anything without your bigoted regional bias. That is what makes you (and not me) a bigot.
Suck on it...
Of course he was, if you like slave traders.
most people on these threads believe that you win the BOOBY PRIZE for arrogant ignorance/silliness & being a "general, all-around DUMB-bunny".
PITY that you don't know that you are constantly ridiculed for your SILLY posts.
free dixie,sw
DYs comprise only 10-15% of the northern citizens, but that small minority are REALLY bigoted/filled with hate/IGNORANT of the FACTS & are a DISGRACE to THEIR home states.
if telling that TRUTH drives you away, so be it.
free dixie,sw
Very good. That's what I've been saying for weeks. You've come a long way since your insistence a couple of weeks ago that "'states rights' is not a 'euphemism'" and dismissing the online that said:
The phrase states' rights (and all variants of the words and the phrase) does not appear in the U.S. Constitution or its amendments -- rather the word rights is exclusively associated within the Constitution with the phrase the people , while the word powers is extensively and exclusively associated with government entities such as Congress or states. Therefore, the phrase states' powers is more technically consistent with the terminology of the authors of the U.S. Constitution, with the phrase States' rights popularized by repeated usage.But, if it's your mission in life to delete this commonly used term from the lexicon of American language and replace it with your more preferred terminology then, by all means, go for it.
And if you're happy wallowing in a fundamental misunderstanding of the relations between citizens and their governments, and the difference between rights and powers, don't let me stand in your way. It's certainly not the only misunderstanding you labor under.
i'd bet that you are a "gubmint-apruved pubic screwl produck", huh???
the FACTS are on our side. the DY minority has ONLY MYTHS/hate/ignorance/arrogance/bigotry on theirs.
free dixie,sw
free dixie,sw
You are the one who said that it was an attack upon freedom to end a slave regime.
Your manifest inconsistency is not my fault.
i'd bet that you are a "gubmint-apruved pubic screwl produck", huh???
As usual, you are wrong. I've never attended public schools - only private ones.
the FACTS are on our side.
Fact: the states of the so-called Confederacy seceded not because of any provocation Lincoln offered - they seceded before he was even sworn in.
Fact: the seceding states gave between one and three occasions for secession in their various secession ordinances and declarations. (1) Lincoln was elected and they didn't like him; (2) they were afraid that slavery was in danger; (3) they were afraid that there would be no new slave states created from the territories.
the DY minority
Do you honestly believe that more Americans buy into the revisionist history of pro-slavery propagandists than accept the traditional patriotic view?
Really?
has ONLY MYTHS/hate/ignorance/arrogance/bigotry on theirs
I've presented you with plenty of arguments which have failed to refute. So far, all you have offered are accusations and insults - not analysis.
If there's one thing I think we can all agree upon, it's that Lincoln was not a gar.
Abraham Lincoln
Alligator Gar
Well, OK, but now I gotta ask - is the Gar gay?!
not even ONE slave ship was "out of" a dixie port. over 90% of ALL slaves brought to "the new world" were brought here by ships "out of" New England AND those "oh, so wunnerful, wunnerful & marvlus", SELF-righteous,sanctimonious, DYs.
further, MANY of the same northerners (who CLAIMED to be "antislavery") were INVESTED IN slavery (hypocrisy has FOREVER been a DY trait.), as they owned slaves,slave ships,plantations (in the south & in the "sugar islands"), etc. from the beginning of the "peculiar institution" to it's bitter end (long after Richmond fell.)
the FACTS are NOT on your side, so instead you post BLATHER/myths/SILLINESS/propaganda.
as for attending "private schools" ===> didn't learn much, did you??? PITY/
FACT: the south seceded from the USA because they feared that "lincoln, the TYRANT" & "his merry band of crooks & south-haters" would destroy LIBERTY. all the other NONSENSE that you posted is just that: NONSENSE.
free dixie,sw
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