Should Obama send a Memorial Day wreath to a monument in Arlington that honors confederate soldiers?

[Cyrano]

There’s a monument in Arlington Cemetery which honors confederate soldiers. Starting with Woodrow Wilson, American presidents have sent a wreath to this site on Memorial Day.

Should Obama send one? Let me sum up my opinion as succinctly as possible. No.

The goal of the Confederacy was to destroy the United States. And when they failed, and the freed slaves were getting to “uppity,” an ex-Southern general founded the KKK which many southerners willingly joined.

“Jim Crow” is the name that was applied to the practice of Southern bigotry after the Civil War. It wasn’t slavery, but it sure as hell didn’t stop the endless lynchings that took place anytime a black man dared to look at a white woman. Or let a bunch of rednecks pull off a Saturday night lynching just for the hell of it. Or dared to do anything, anywhere that some bigot found offensive.

For a few centuries, the American South was a really ugly, dangerous place to be if you weren’t a white Christian.

Lyndon Johnson’s “Civil Rights Act” and “Voting Rights Act” supposedly put an end to this crap once and for all. But try telling that to the ignorant wingnut elements of the Republican Party (many, if not most) who still “honor” the South with their despicable rebel flags on their pickup trucks and flying in their town hall squares.

I’ve barely scratched the surface of the ignorance, bigotry and hatred that existed, and to too large a degree still exists today in what was once the Confederacy.

So someone really needs to explain to me why President Barack Obama should send a wreath to a confederate monument at Arlington National Cemetery? (For that matter, why is there even a confederated monument in Arlington?)

[WeDidIt]

1. I can name three reason why he MUST send the wreath

1) Florida
2) North Carolina
3) Virginia

Many people who voted for Obama in those three states had ancestors who fought on the side of the Confederacy, and they are very proud of that heritage.

Besides, it would show how big of a person Obama is.

[jaxx]

2. Yep, send it.

Those confederates were once Americans, and if they had lived they would have been again. Some kicking and screaming, but Americans none the less. That some still fight this war is where a lot of our political division comes from today. We're not going to change their minds, but we can be decent about that war that tore the country apart 144 years ago. Remember, we won.

[cwydro]

3. Good post.

[Zomby Woof]

13. If you see my post below

You will discover that they were still, and are, Americans. They are officially and legally United States Veterans. I can tell you by your post that you get it when it comes to the concept of reconciliation and what it means to move ahead, even while acknowleding the past.

Many of us disagreed with the Vietnam War, and why it was fought, but would we even discuss NOT honoring the fallen from that war at their memorial? The fact is: Confederate Veterans and Vietnam Veterans are equal in status - they are both American Veterans.

[Cyrano]

16. Sorry, but we're going to have to agree to disagree on this "equivalency."

[Raineyb]

44. No. Confederate veteran are veterans of a group of traitors

Fuck this shit, this is why people seem to think that the confederacy isn't all that bad. It is that bad and we have no business honoring their veterans. Reconciliation? There's no reconciling with people who to this day consider me less than fully human.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

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[Berry Cool]

5. I don't believe in collective guilt.

I can't tar the entire South with the guilt of a bunch of people who fought against this country many years ago.

Unfortunately, that's what it would look like Obama was doing if he didn't send the wreath.

I am sure that is the ONLY reason all these presidents have sent one.

But it is the reason he HAS to.

[cherokeeprogressive]

20. Who is "WE", and are you going to enlist in this ass-kicking you wish to see foisted on

American Citizens?

[Name removed]

6. Deleted message

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[Name removed]

18. Deleted message

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[Kalyke]

30. You wouldn't get very far.

If you touched one area of my state, I'd personally kick your ass.

Seriously - the anti-Southerners on this board are far more bigoted and violent than any real Southerner I know (and Texas ain't "southern." It's "south-western" in culture and heritage).

[cwydro]

33. You are so right.

There is some real south hatred on DU.

Personally, I think they're jealous of our beautiful southland.

[cali]

7. yes. if he doesn't it becomes a big deal

you pick and choose your battles and this is one to avoid.

[Enrique]

8. he wouldn't be Obama if he refused to follow the tradition

Obama doesn't make provocative gestures like that.

[OKNancy]

10. very true. That's why he is a successful politician

I think he makes his gestures in ways that count. For example I was just reading about the man appointed to head NASA.
That is the kind of thing that counts, not symbolic stuff like a wreathe.

[Cyrano]

17. Yep, you're probably right that he'll send a wreath.

Whether he should or shouldn't is a different issue.

He does pick his fights and this isn't one he will turn into a major issue. That being said, we still have a portion of people in the American South (and elsewhere) where no one would shed a tear if something untoward were to happen to our president.

Think about that. I spend much time worrying about it.

[Zomby Woof]

9. Federal law was changed in 1913

Under U.S. law, Confederate Veterans are officially the one and the same as all other U.S. Veterans - given the same full legal status in terms of benefits, burial rites, and so forth. Hence, the reason this rite started under Wilson.

It was an act of reconciliation. By this point, veterans from both sides of the war were dwindling in number. They often attended reunions at battlefields, as friends. When the Lincoln Memorial was dedicated in 1922, Confederate Veterans had front row seats alongside Union Veterans.

This was an American war, fought by Americans. The law as it was changed in 1913 was a measure to acknowledge that great sacrifices were made on BOTH sides, by American soldiers and sailors. Sending a wreath recognizes this simple fact, even if the (self-)righteously indignant among you do not.

As for some other points in your post, keep in mind that Nathan Bedford Forrest disbanded the Klan when they went too far with their violence and aims. Any version which continued after him (it was a spent force after Reconstruction, until being revived in the 1920's in Indiana - not exactly a southern state) was without his approval. Forrest opened a school for ex-slaves, by the way. He knew there was value in business by having an educated labor force. He was a racist, to be sure, but no worse than Lincoln, if you actually do any research on this subject. Forrest would have scoffed at the idea of colonization.

Racism was (and sadly still is) a national and global phenomenon. Don't think for a moment when black Americans went north to escape the oppression of the south, that they were welcomed with flowers and candy. A quick read of Malcolm X's autobiography offers some insights there. Also, James Loewen's book on "Sundown Towns" reveals that the north and midwest were supremely unfriendly to black Americans, as they were heavily populated with such types of towns. The territory of Oregon? Off limits to black settlers. Eventually, the Washington Territory was created out of Oregon's northern half, and black Americans did settle there - the first one to do so was named George Washington Bush, incidentally (history has a sense of humor).

There are many other fallacies in your outraged diatribe, but I learned long ago that one can't reason about these things with those who have their minds made up.

So yes, I think President Obama should send the wreath. That would truly bring the point of reconciliation home.

[countingbluecars]

12. Informative post.

I learned something. Thanks.

[Cyrano]

14. I'm aware of most of the facts you've stated.

However, my hostility stems from modern day Southern politicians and the rural, uneducated, uninterested people who vote for them on a regular basis.

Do your really think that Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, South Carolina, and so many other (rural areas) of many southern states have arrived at the 20th Century (not to mention the 21st)?

No matter how much I might want to reach out a hand of reconciliation, do you really think I'd pull back anything but a handful of spit?

I've lived in the South. And the past ain't over yet. Hopefully, it will someday end. But not as long as each generation keeps passing on their historic hatreds to succeeding generations.

[Dreamer Tatum]

40. Your argument was taken up almost 100 years ago...get over it

and it was taken up by people who see things in appropriate shades of grey, not in black/white as you do.

Must be nice to be superior to people you've not met. But then, why would you? They're "ignorant."

[jaxx]

15. Well said.

There comes a time when hatred for old hurts only hurts the one who hates. I've seen the graves at Rock Island, for both sides. It's a solemn place and all are honored.

[Individualist]

23. The anti-south contingent wants to continue fighting the Civil War

They don't want reconciliation.

[Cyrano]

25. Sorry, but it's the South that doesn't want reconciliation

Why do you suppose the Republican Party has become a mere regional (Southern) party? Their "Southern Strategy" was a "kinder, gentler" word for bigotry.

As much as I wish you were right, the rest of America has rejected the age old hatreds that still exist in the South. Check out the election returns from 2006 and 2008. Hopefully, some day in the not-to-distant future, the South will enter the 20th century. It might take them a bit more time to reach the 21st.

[Individualist]

27. Take off the blinders

The south isn't the only region of the country where the republicans have a majority, and if you think there isn't widespread hatred and racism outside the south, those blinders are so firmly in place you may have to have them surgically removed.

[hfojvt]

37. But Kansas, South Dakota, Nebraska and Montana are South

dontcha know? They were part of the Louisiana territory. I am not sure how Utah qualifies though, or the 5 million Republican voters of California. I think for California that if you are a minority of voters in your state that you don't count. Just like the Democrats in Kansas, Texas, Alabama and South Carolina don't count when our states are being bashed.

[cwydro]

35. Listen, bub. I was in the first experiment of forced busing.

This was in Charlotte, NC. We integrated without any trouble.

The other half of the experiment was in Boston, where they attacked school buses full of little black children.

I remember being horrified at the way they acted and asked my parents why someone would do that. They told me the people were just ignorant.

This anti-south stuff gets so old. We are all Americans and no part of the country has a monopoly on bigots or assholes.

[Thothmes]

52. Before 1964 it was the Democratic Party

They were the party of Jim Crow in the South, they were the party of the KKK from the end of the Civil War until the 1960s. They were the party that supported FDR's New Deal, they were the party that opposed making lyncing a federal crime.

[Stinky The Clown]

11. They're American veterans

So, yes.

[Cyrano]

19. They're American veterans who tried to destroy America

And also fought to perpetuate one of the most despicable practices of the human species -- slavery.

[cherokeeprogressive]

21. I'm convinced that had they lived, they all would have seen the error of their ways.

How do you feel about Robert Byrd?

[Cyrano]

22. How do you feel about Trent Lott? Or Haley Barbour? Or any other

Southern politician who has used and still uses bigotry (however subtly)to get elected and reelected and reelected?

Does the word "Macaca" ring a bell? The stupid bastard who used it got trounced, but the point is that he had no hesitation in using it, spitting it out in front of the cameras, and believing it would work.

Perhaps there are changes taking place in the South. But are we talking about another 100 years or more?

[cherokeeprogressive]

29. I love that you hold a grudge in the name of people you never met and probably weren't related to

I'm sure they appreciate it too. I know it goes a long way toward reconciliation...

I'm equally sure you'd give Robert Byrd a pass after seeing the error of his ways, if asked whether or not you thought he should be ran out of town on a rail for being a racist bigot. I'd bet money he uses the word nigger in front of an all-white group of his family and friends.

To answer your question, I wouldn't piss on Lott, Barbour, or Macaca Man if they were on fire. And like many others, I consider fallen Confederate Soldiers to be American Citizens who deserve to be recognized. I'm sure that not EVERYONE in the South supported secession.

[Zomby Woof]

31. They only represent the south to themselves

And to "good liberals" like you. Most southerners, and Americans in general, want nothing to do with either extreme.

I have always maintained that unrepentant pinheads like Lott or Barbour have something in common with self-appointed "liberal" guardians of truth - they are more alike than different. Certainly, it is a unhealthy symbiotic relationship based on mutual paranoia and reactionary 'thinking'. You need each other. They need "liberal" caricatures (frothing moralists, or rather, what they describe as "PC") to keep their base excited, and you need to perpetuate the stereotype of the ignorant redneck cracker to keep YOUR base hard and throbbing with outrage. Personally, both of your camps can lump it.

[jaxx]

34. Well I see we fought the war again today.

Some people never learn.

[Zomby Woof]

28. They fought for independence

If by "destroy America" you mean to end the north's economic stranglehold (the tariff, the northern industrial base, etc. - basically the south was a colony of the north) on the south, then okay. But they sought independence, not the overthrowing of the U.S. government. If you can't see the difference, then once again, you prove my point about having your mind made up beyond reason. The average Confederate soldier was dirt poor, had no interest in slavery, and more likely than not, fought because their home was invaded by the Union army. As Shelby Foote succinctly reported, "We fought them because they were down here." Tip O'Neill once said all politics is local. Well, that applies very much to the war too.

Don't think for a moment that the north didn't benefit from slavery, or sought its ending. The textile mill owners hated the abolitionists as much as any plantation owner. Lincoln promised in his first inaugural addreess not to interfere with slavery. I suppose you could say he wanted to perpetuate it too, but I refuse to succumb to your brand of oversimplified nonsense.

As for slavery, it was legal in Union states also, such as Maryland, Kentucky, Delaware, and Missouri. It still existed in parts of New York, New Jersey, and other parts of the northeast. It was the 13th amendment that finally brought an end to it. Even if the Confederacy was granted its independence, it was a doomed institution. The genie was at long last uncorked by the war, no matter which side.

You obviously learned some very one-dimensional, poorly taught history. I can't undo years of conditioning and damage in a DU thread, so I will stop here.

[Raineyb]

45. They fought to destroy this country.

So no.

[SpartanDem]

24. Yes

not doing so violates the spirit Lincoln tried to foster after the Civil War, he sought forgiveness and to have these people embraced as Americans. I suspect that he would frown on not giving these people equal respect.

[anonymous171]

26. He should go there himself to do it. It would symbolize the start of a new era. nt

[Raineyb]

47. A black man putting a wreath on the grave for a confederate soldier?

Are you out of your fucking mind? That's a slap in the face to every black person in this country.

[anonymous171]

49. I was thinking that it would be more of an affront to every racist in this country.

Also the irony would be pretty funny.

[nini]

50. LOL

thankfully our president has a better grasp of history and what is right and wrong than you do.

[Raineyb]

51. Rilght because honoring those who fought against the country

just because everyone else did is the right thing to do.

Bullshit.

[nini]

56. LOL again

You really need to do some reading - it's not that black and white - pardon the pun.


I have ancestors who fought on both sides. I have white and black folks in my family. Believe me the ancestors who fought for the south were not rich slave owners - quite the contrary - they got caught up in a war and were defending their little farms and homes. Sure that doesn't play into the stereotype of the southern soldier - but it's reality.

Take a valium or something. sheesh

[Iggo]

32. Who gives a shit?

Distraction.

[moondust]

36. Those who fought and died for crimes against humanity?

Isn't this tantamount to Reagan laying a wreath at the graves of 49 Nazi Waffen SS officers at Bitburg, Germany?

[Berry Cool]

38. Um, no. It is not.

And if you fail to see how it isn't, I'm afraid there is nothing I can do to persuade you otherwise.

Except to maybe say that that was laying a wreath at the graves of NON-AMERICANS who fought against our country because they were trying to conquer the whole effing WORLD.

Oh, and I don't believe slavery = genocide on the scale of evils. Close, but no cigar.

[cali]

39. no.

[hfojvt]

41. which, of course, he didn't do

Nor was that something done by American Presidents every year going back to Wilson

[Adelante]

42. Yes

For a long time I was feeling we were stuck in the Vietnam war. Americans have resolved a lot of the pain and divisiveness of that era, though it took decades. If we can't get past the Civil War of a century and a half ago, enough for an American president to send a wreath to honor ancestors of his constituents who were soldiers on Memorial Day, we as a nation are going nowhere fast.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

43. Yes. n/t

well. You asked.

[book_worm]

46. Yes he should. And why should he be the president to end almost 100 years of tradition?

Why didn't FDR, Truman, Ike, JFK, LBJ, Carter, or Clinton end it?

[Raineyb]

48. Racist tradition.

But why should we bother to change it now heh?

:eyes:

[Thothmes]

54. Evidently President Obama does not see a need to end the tradition.

[Thothmes]

53. He did send the wreath.

[leftofthedial]

55. Yes he should.

I'm glad he did.

[proteus_lives]

57. He should and he did.

It's a slap in the face to the South if he doesn't.

I know on DU, the South is one of the favorite targets but you know where I've encountered the most racism in my life? Right here in Indiana.

Like or not, victory doesn't erase the memory of the CSA or the fact that it existed. I think to embrace and remember the Union veterans and piss on the Confederate ones would disgrace the memory of the whole nation at the time.

It was a civil war, we were brothers before the war, during the war and we remain brothers long after the war ended.

[supernova]

58. Yes, it was the right thing to do

He sent a wreath. He didn't perform a ceremony, as he did at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldiers.

It is appropriate to acknowledge them as American casualties of war and veterans of that war because they are. Just as it is equally appropriate to lay a wreath at the Memorial to A-A soldiers who fought for the Union.

But there's another reason also, and I'm betting POTUS didn't miss it. In a very strange way, the confederate war dead, in their dying and their losing paved the way for his very existence and especially now, his job as President. If history hadn't played out the way it did, we'd have a very different country today. Would we be a better country today without the Civil War? I don't think so. A better case for that argument would be if JFK hadn't been assassinated.

Just as individuals have their own life paths to play out, so too do countries. We have a collective journey to make as Americans, and it takes all of us to make that happen, even those of us who are sometimes on the losing side of the argument.