[Socon-Econ]

... History is history. I think Andrew Jackson was horrible on many levels…pro-slavery, a cruel slave owner himself, anti-Indian, ani-Catholic, expansionist not matter whose legal property it was. He was terrible in his attacks on Spanish Florida, but he was successful and ended up being the first US Governor of Florida.
**********
Good point. The issue here isn’t men like Andrew Jackson or George Washington, whose legitimate claims to fame do not involve fighting in a war to keep slavery. Their great accomplishments outside of slavery cannot be cancelled just because they owned slaves.

[FLT-bird]

Good point. The issue here isn’t men like Andrew Jackson or George Washington, whose legitimate claims to fame do not involve fighting in a war to keep slavery. Their great accomplishments outside of slavery cannot be cancelled just because they owned slaves.

the war wasn't about keeping slavery. Slavery was not threatened within the US.

[FLT-bird]

Good point. The issue here isn’t men like Andrew Jackson or George Washington, whose legitimate claims to fame do not involve fighting in a war to keep slavery. Their great accomplishments outside of slavery cannot be cancelled just because they owned slaves.

The war wasn't about keeping slavery. Slavery was not threatened within the US.

[livius]

Yes, the point is that they were real people who had a real influence on our country. We’re not talking about a lunatic like Hitler, who will certainly never get a monument...but just people whose policies may have been just or unjust, right or wrong, but were acting in a rational political way and had an impact on our country.

Erasing them doesn’t help in any way. Their positive actions are something to be commemorated while their mistakes and even bad actions are something to be learned from - but none of this can happen if we erase them and pretend they never existed.