Should American History Incorporate the Confederacy?

History has a way of weighing on a nation. Whether it's Germany and the Holocaust, Japan's struggle with the horrors of Hiroshima, or Argentina's drawn-out Dirty War, a nation's history -- and how that nation's people digest it -- can shape generations and change the way it's perceived by the rest of the world. So, too, is the case with the Confederate States of America. Those spunky secessionists left an indelible mark on American history -- that's beyond dispute. While we're united now, that particular past's hardly done with its dirty work.

Take, for example, two separate but equally important scenarios playing out in South Carolina and Missouri. In South Carolina, state Sen. Robert Ford successfully lobbied a senatorial committee to pass a bill requiring county and municipal governments to recognize Confederate Memorial Day, which some states set aside for soldiers who fought against the Union.

According to Ford, a black Democrat, CMD should be held in the same regard as Martin Luther King Jr. Day, which, in case you're unaware, celebrates the life, work and death of one of America's greatest civil rights leaders.

Blacks and whites don't always get along in South Carolina, Ford admits, but insists CMD could bridge long-standing divides: "I'm tired of all the bickering and the hatred and the fighting we do in South Carolina... A black person needs to know what a white person goes through in South Carolina and vice versa. If you're born in South Carolina, it's your history too. We need to know what made Southern whites do what they did, secede from the Union and fight a four-year, bloody war." South Carolina resident Ron Dorgay whole-heartedly agrees.

Mr. Dorgay's forefathers fought in the Confederate Army and he believes that too many people have turned their backs on an integral component of our nation's past: "Even in our school systems, they don't teach the correct history." History, of course, comes with a price -- figuratively and literally. Under Ford's bill, local governments who comply with the bank holiday would have to shell out hundreds of thousands in overtime to cops and emergency workers who clock in on that last Monday in May. Those who refuse, meanwhile, risk missing out on millions in state-administered funds.

The problem isn't about money, says local NAACP leader Lonnie Randolph: "Here Senator Ford is talking about the importance of race relations by forcing recognition of people who did everything they could to destroy another race.... You can't make dishonor honorable. It's impossible." Meanwhile, over in Missouri, appeals judges also wrestled with the Confederacy this week.

That state's 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled yesterday that St. Louis's Farmington High School acted lawfully when it suspended a trio of students who repeatedly wore the Confederate flag to school. The students contended that school officials violated their free speech rights and, as Americans are wont to do, sued.

For its part, the school said that a history of race-related violence and the potential for more were reason enough to ban the students' sartorial expression. The court concurred, "Based on substantial race-related events occurring both at the school and in the community, some of which involved the Confederate flag, we hold that the District's ban was constitutionally permissible." It also ruled that, in light of violence -- including an incident where a white student allegedly urinated on a black classmate -- "some limitation of normal free expression is constitutionally permissible."

American history, young and old, has shown that the Confederate flag and its many connotations can inflame racial tensions, but that doesn't make the Civil War any less a part of our history than, say, the Revolutionary War. Nor does it diminish that dark period's resonance.

There have been scores of court cases about the confederacy, most commonly with regard to State houses flying the infamous flag. Those debates, however, are peanuts when compared to Senator Ford's pitch. Ford's bill essentially elevates the Confederate history into the upper echelons of our collective memory -- and beyond. For, despite Henry Ford's famous assertion that "history is bunk," it's how we're remembered. Are post-Obama Americans willing to canonize such a bleak event? Is it necessary to revisit the Confederacy and unabashedly accept it into the historical fold?

Robert Herman, a lawyer who represented one of the students in St. Louis, made an interesting point after this week's decision. Violence aside, he said, the court had "essentially taken judicial notice that the Confederate flag is inherently a racist statement, which just isn't true." And that's the headache of historical debates. Yes, the South largely preferred forced, immoral labor, but the Civil War was as much about economics as it was about race. (Although it could also be argued that those two concepts were one and the same at the time.) The war wasn't one-dimensional, nor should it be remembered as such -- that is, if it should be remembered at all.

Our nation made history last November, so perhaps it's time we revisit some other important events and figure out just what lessons we can learn. Or, on the other hand, perhaps it's time for us to accept the terrible sacrifices made in order to reach today and just be happy we survived.

Comments

[Leebobby]

Actually

[RightWingMarine]

Now I know that the Courts have held repeatedly that schools have the authority to impose dress codes, I'm simply debating.

I'm dismayed after reading the 8th courts ruling as cited in the article. The school clearly went beyond their authority in their restrictions on clothing. As a strong proponent of free speech I have serious reservations about having any speech restricted. I believe that the reason stated for prohibiting the flag (racial unrest) is racist on its face. It implies that black students are unable to control themselves when they see a Confederate flag.

The other two students received punishment but the article cited does not state that they were wearing a Confederate flag. One was suspended because their shirt had the statement "The South was right[,] Our school is wrong" and was reprimanded when he wore another shirt that stated "Our school supports freedom of speech for all (except Southerner­s)." The other student had a shirt expressing solidarity with the suspended students.

Some may believe that the school has a compelling reason to prohibit the Confederate flag but the school when beyond that and took action against students for making reference to other students.

[drauz]

The Stars & Bars is a symbol of our Nation's past that today represents diverse meanings. Our challenge is to understand those meanings. To respect the importance of symbols for segments of our culture (& in individual lives) is quite distinct from endorsing their specific manifestation. If the United States promulgated a higher quality education in history and civics, all of our symbols would better serve us to achieve E Pluribus Unum.

[Pettit]

I really enjoy your article.

A united country should have ONE flag...not two.
You can remember the soldiers that fought against the Union without a C onfederate flag.

It's the equivalent of people in Europe trying to honor their fallen with a Nazi flag. Wars are declared and fought by rulers, whoever those might be.

One thing is remembering the dead, another thing is remembering them in honor of the reasons and values they fought for....

[jhNY]

Your headline is misleading here, as it cannot be questioned as to whether the Confederacy is a part of US history. The Civil War is a historical fact, the all-time bloodiest war fought by Americans, with a death toll per capita that exceeds the losses of most wars in history. A couple hundred thousand plus of those who died were Confederate soldiers. Hard to sweep that under a rug, even a really big rug.

But in a way, the Confederacy has been excluded from American history, in that its defeat has obscured what should be a relevent question even today, and was at one time the most pressing political question in the US: Under what circumstances, if any, can a state legally secede? (If there are no such circumstances, then the US seems in at least one respect to resemble the Cosa Nostra-- you can join on your feet, but you leave feet first.)

And the defeat of the Confederacy allowed passage of another politically impossible act: the end of slavery in the US. No Constitutional amendment to end the practice could have ever passed (2/3s Congressional or states' approval) before the end of that conflict, and in all probability never would have passed had the Congress which passed the amendment not been filled with Reconstruction lawmakers from the South.

[mcole]

well then they can mandate that it be taught in schools...­but instituting a national holiday? seriously?

[jhNY]

Nope. I never meant to imply anything whatsoever about a national holday. That would be Belonsky, the author of the essay.

[randyjet]

South Carolina made it abundantly clear in its statement of secession, that slavery WAS indeed the issue at stake. It is sophistry to say otherwise. One has to remember that Lincoln was a lawyer and respected the Constitution and laws of the US. He had NO power under the US Constitution to free any slaves in Federally controlled areas or states that remained in the Union. THAT is the reason for the way the Proclamation was worded that way. If the South had remained in the Union, he could NOT have issued an Executive Proclamation and freed the slaves by his order alone. The ONLY places that he could use such power was in places that were in rebellion and thus subject to martial law and the exceptional powers that he was allowed under the Constitution.

When Virginia was re-admitted to the Union, it agreed to West Virginia's status. I guess some people forget their US history.

[RightWingMarine]

Virginia seceded on 4/17/1861
West Virginia was accepted as a state on 6/20/1863
Virginia was re-accepted into the Union on 1/26/1870

Statehood was conferred on West Virginia without the consent of Virginians. Any election after the fact is moot.

[Leebobby]

Actually, statehood was conferred without the consent of most West Virginians. Our historians have failed us miserably in telling the story of West Virginia. They don't tell you that most of West Virginia is composed of counties that voted for secession, or that West Virginia gave as many soldiers to the Confederacy as to the Union. One of the Unionist legislators, Chapman J. Stuart, said at the Constitutional Convention in Dec. 1861- "Now, Mr. President, to show you, and it needs but to look at the figures to satisfy the mind of every member, that even a majority of the people within the district composed of the thirty-nine counties have never come to the polls and expressed their sentiments in favor of a new State. In a voting population of some 40,000 or 50,000 we see a poll of only 17,627 and even some of them were in the [Union] army." They added 11 more counties to the 39, and they were almost all secession counties. Much of this is told in Richard Curry's "A House Divided".

As far as incorporating the Confederacy into American History, that had already been done. But we have gone through a period pc-fication which has reopened what had been settled.

[RightWingMarine]

The Civil War was about states rights. It became an issue over slavery after Lincoln bravely freed the slaves in states that he had no control or influence over. He specifically exempted freeing the slaves in states that remained in the Union. If this war had truly been about emancipation then why did the Union not free their own slaves at the start?

Furthermore, just as fun historical trivia, the state of West Virginia should not exist. The state was carved out of Virginia after that state joined the Confederacy. The US Constitution Article IV prohibits the creation of a state from parts of another state unless that state agree to such a thing. VA never did.

[jhNY]

The Emancipation Proclamation was an executive order Lincoln issued, as was his legal right as commander -in-chief of the US armed forces. As commander, he could declare slaves free in seceded (enemy ) territory, but as president of the US, he could not abolish slavery in US territory. To do that, a Constitutional amendment was required. And securing that amendment was a major campaign issue for Lincoln in the 1864 elections, wherein he found himself running against one of his former generals, the Little Napoleon, McLellan. Of course, It's also not entirely accurate to say Lincoln had no control or influence over the states wherein he declared an end to slavery. At the time of the proclamation, many parts of many Confederate states were under US military occupation and/or control.

You are correct about the creation of West Virginia, although I doubt West Virginians want to know much about it.