Posted on 03/02/2003 8:23:13 AM PST by Megalomaniac
No Lincoln Statue...EVER! "Sail On Alabama"/"Going Back To Richmond" Music With A Timely Message A Review By T.E. Compton Regular readers of SHNV, are well aware of the proposed Lincoln statue, scheduled for placement, in April, of this year, on the property of the Tredegar Ironworks, in Richmond, Virginia. An organization called The United States Historical Society, announced last December, that it would be donating the monument, that depicts, Abraham Lincoln and his son Tad sitting on a bench, to the National Park Service.
Since the announcement, a storm of controversy and scandal, has brewed nationwide. Late last year a website, under the name, "The Lincoln Statue Scam" released a series of reports, charging that the United States Historical Society, had cooked up the Lincoln project in Richmond in order to sell a miniature version of the statue, among other things. Later the website was pulled by it's host, after complaints by the USHS, but has since gone back online at a new location. Because the Iron Works and thus the proposed statue, are associated with the National Park Service, several public officials, not least of which has been, Congressman Virgil H. Goode Jr., R-5th, VA., have called for an NPS investigation into the matter.
Additionally, Southern heritage supporters and battlefield preservationist, nationwide, have taken the matter directly to their elected officials, newspapers and business leaders. A literal flood of e-mails, letters and telephone calls, as well as articles on and off the Internet, stressing the fact that Lincoln's association, with the South was not a positive one, to seriously understate the facts! The historical record is replete with examples, of what can only be termed as war crimes, committed against the civilian population (Black and White) of cities, like Richmond, all over the South, under Lincoln's direction as commander and chief of the Union army. The proposed placement of the Lincoln statue in Richmond has been, we believe, correctly called "a slap in the face" to the people of the South.
Within this firestorm of public protest, is Robert Lloyd, of Fort Myers, Florida. Mr. Lloyd, a singer/song writer, became involved with the Lincoln statue controversy after reading about it on SHNV. In a recent interview with Lloyd, he told SHNV: "I had to [come to] the defense of Southern heritage and the only way I knew how and the only power I have, is as a musician, that's the talent God gave me". Robert went on to say, "I wanted to write a song in protest of the Lincoln statue coming to Richmond...'Going Back To Richmond' was written with one purpose in mind and one purpose only, to protest that statue in Richmond." Lloyd wrote the lyrics and preformed it for his partner, Nick Ashton, who is the technical specialist of the team. Robert says that Ashton liked the song at once and told Lloyd that they needed to make a video for it. Robert recalls that, "Nick brought the idea [of a video] up and I was really only thinking of the music and not really a video." Ashton, went after the project with passion as Lloyd told us, "I saw it piece by piece and I knew he had something special and beyond my song. I think the video really says a lot."
That does not mean that I don't respect him or what he did, or that I wish a return to the days of slavery. All it means is that a statue like that does not belong there.
{{sound of spitting on floor}}
This is emphatically *not* true.
What is happening in the South is that history is getting re-written.
In one sense I really don't have a problem with a statue of Lincoln here in Richmond.
BUT, the ONLY reason this came about is NOT for historical reasons, but for political correctness and for trashing the south. Regardless of what one thinks of Lincoln or the south, that much is clear.
This statue is supposed to be controversial. It is supposed to re-write history.
Dixie ping!!
And if we we respect tradition, then we should really ban all Confederate flags from public display because they were the looooosers.(/biting sarcasm)
I think that Lincoln should have a presence at every significant Civil War in much the same manner that I hope that both the Union and Confederate flags are displayed. It is our history, so get over it.
With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.
From what I understand, the Lincoln statue is intended to convey this principle of reconciliation, which would seem to be a good thing for many southners who still hang on to antipathy to Lincoln and the North for the South's defeat in the Civil War. It's well past the time to get over it. If the emotional wounds of defeat that are now almost 140 years old cannot be healed by reflection on the presidency of Abraham Lincoln, then focus on his words and intent to bring reconciliation between the regions in the aftermath of the war, and let this statue convey that spirit of reconciliation.
How can you reconcile with people who have no desire to do so? The can't stand the idea that they lost and the Union was preserved. They get up on their hind legs and howl about the Lincoln statue in Richmond and then get all huffy if the confederate flag is banned from a tee shirt in Pittsburg. Well, if Lincoln doesn't belong in Virginia then why does the flag of the rebellion belong in Pennsylvania?
You speak a sad truth. I know the attitude you speak of. I suppose that if this attitude was expressed by someone who was involved in the Civil War, who perhaps lost loved ones, lost property, or otherwise directly suffered some loss in that conflict, I could understand this attitude. But the Civil War has been over for almost 140 years. Some folks won't get over it. Their attitude reminds me of the Serbs and the Kosovars who have been at each other's throats for 1600 years -- and for what? To what end?
They hate Lincoln because they love to hate. It's as simple as that. And there's no reasoning with them. What's the Bible verse? -- "The sins of the father will be visited unto the fourth generation", something of that sort. I suppose this coercive attitude of today's flag-waving Confederate won't be purged until the fifth generation after the shooting stopped.
Neo-confederates need to have their faces slapped silly anyway.
They lost the Civil War close to 140 years ago.
This is the 21st Century, they need to "put some ice on it" and get over it.
Same thing goes for the whacknut "reparations" crowd.
The doggone numnutz are stuck living in the past.
When I visited Kiev in 1992, discussion was afoot about the fate of the Brezhnev monument, "Hag/Crone with Sword." This stainless steel monument to bad taste lifted her sword above the subjugated Ukrainians. Back then, some folks thought she should be melted down and turned into tablewear.
Raping, looting, and occupying your neighbors is not praiseworthy. Rubbing their noses in it is definitely "ne culturny"
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