Posted on 04/21/2014 1:35:40 PM PDT by armydawg505
Black students at Washington and Lee University have demanded that the board of trustees denounce one of the two namesakes of the Virginia school, Confederate general Robert E. Lee, or face acts of civil disobedience.
The students are calling for the school to apologize for Lee’s “racist and dishonorable conduct,” remove Confederate flags from the chapel, and ban Confederate reenactors from the campus on Lee-Jackson Day (a state holiday), according to the Washington Post. General Lee, who served as the school’s president after the Civil War, is buried on the school grounds beneath the campus chapel.
The tension stemmed from disappointment by black students over the school’s lack of diversity, the Post reports. University president Kenneth Ruscio responded to the students’ demands by saying he’s created a “special task force” to look into the school’s past and “to study the history of African Americans at the school.”
“While we are aware of some of that history, I believe we should have a thorough, candid examination,” he said.
If that were the case, it wouldn’t surprise me.
How will we notice?
They don’t know a lot about Robert E Lee, do they?
But for him, the South would have fought a grinding guerrilla fight and almost certainly have destroyed the United States.
More to the point, he stopped “ethnic cleansing” of former slaves.
These whiners knew what the name of the university was when they enrolled. If they don’t like it, let them go to the Al Sharpton School of Hard Knocks or the Jesse Jackson Shakedown University.
They should just get over it!!
“..moved out to Lexington and LOVED it out there...”
My daughter and her fiance graduated from W & L last year. When they enrolled it was ranked in the low 30’s, I think. Any law school ranked in the top 50 is considered top tier, and being top tier is still prestigious, although the ratings decline is of concern, of course.
Anyway, my daughter and her fiance loved Washington & Lee and now both have excellent first year attorney positions in Manhattan, and had no problems whatsoever passing the New York State bar, so I have a high regard for W & L.
By the way, Lee was far more about states’ rights than wanting to preserve slavery. (and I live in New York State, so am not necessarily very invested in being a Lee apologist).
graduated from W & L last year - to clarify - they graduated from W & L law school, not undergrad.
“If the school does not act by SEPTEMBER 1, 2014 we WILL engage in civil disobedience.”
Imagine in a galaxy far, far away that a university president had the decisiveness to say, “Anyone who engages in civil disobedience on our campus for any reason will be met with the full force of the law including all physical means necessary to maintain order.”
Of course, he/she would have to know they had the backing of the board of trustees & that there was a local mayor and police chief who also did not tolerate disruption & violence by college radicals.
Fuggedaboudit!!!
W&L Law School actually has a pretty good reputation nationally.
AFFIRMATIVE ACTION ADMISSIONS.
They are idiots.
They do all this demanding and civil disobedience.
I have to laugh.
Back in the day someone would have burned down a building. Kids these days don’t know how to get anything done.
[sarcasm]
There have been several stories on this. It started with about 10 law school students. It may have expanded to the undergrads.
They charge about the same as Harvard, Yale and Stanford. And they're nowhere in the same league.
These students are so stupid they walk around all day and night carry pictures of slave owners in their wallets.
This isn't about principle, it's about future bragging rights in their later law careers that they were the ones who took down Robert E Lee.
Actually, I think Harvard and Yale are a cancer on the legal community. They pretty much have a monopoly on prestigious clerkships, and, more and more, on federal judgeships as well.
The result: you get totally unqualified legal “intellectuals” like Elena Kagan on the Supreme Court who has virtually no experience as a practicing lawyer—she was a junior associate for less than two years. But she had the Harvard Law mafia backing her, and another deficient Harvard Law graduate nominate her for the court.
Contrast her to Harriet Miers, who had a sterling resume as a top lawyer and litigator nationally, was the managing partner of a large law firm, the president of the Texas bar, and headed major committees of the ABA. Yet Bush was forced to withdraw her name because she only went to law school at SMU, and was therefore deemed unqualified to serve on the top court.
I would suggest you can get just as good a legal education at W&L as you can at Harvard and Yale. What you won’t get is the connections that get you the best jobs, whether you have talent or are a moron.
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