May 10, 2024

"A Virginia school board voted to restore the names of two schools previously named after Confederate leaders...."

"The Shenandoah County School Board voted 5-1 to call the schools Stonewall Jackson High School and Ashby Lee Elementary School, four years after the board — under different members — changed the names of the institutions due to their ties to Confederate leaders Stonewall Jackson, Robert E. Lee and Turner Ashby."

WaPo reports.

66 comments:

mikee said...

A great general is a great general.

n.n said...

DEI

Yancey Ward said...

Don't they know it is illegal to change a school name back?

Narayanan said...

snatching defeat from jaws of victory bequeathed by jackasses

Narr said...

Hooboy.

Some people just can't leave well enough alone.

Quaestor said...

Good news at last.

tim maguire said...

I can see the value in arguments that we shouldn't glorify the leaders of a slave state that rose in rebellion and then lost the subsequent war, but still, I'm pleased.

They're part of our heritage and I can't muster the blinkered outlook I'd need to ignore the eternal values that they are exemplars of despite the land in which they lived and died. Now bring back The Dukes of Hazard.

Robert Cook said...

Well, of course they did.

Fredrick said...

Don't they know that they are a conquered people who must do what Washington D.C. tells them?

Quaestor said...

The usual suspects will condemn me in moronically nocuous terms for greeting this development with pleasure. I would advise them to think first on this historical conundrum: If those who fought the Civil War agreed with the simpletons who speak of it as a crusade against slavery, what is the non-insane explanation of the fact that the senior command of the Union Army was first offered to Robert E. Lee, a slaveholder?

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

Our history is our history. Good or bad - right or wrong. It's HISTORY.

Lefitsts want to dumb down our kids, sexualize our kids, and remove history...

all while they shove pro-hamas anti-history Neo-Nazi propaganda in everyone's faces.

NKP said...

It's a start... YEA!!!

R C Belaire said...

So, in 5 more years, another "woke" board changes it back? Let's just call them School #1, School #2, and so on. This crap is tiresome.

mindnumbrobot said...

Chalk one up for sanity. A rare thing nowadays.

Wa St Blogger said...

I am conflicted on this. On one hand these were people who rose up in rebellion against this country and might not be good choices to immortalized with school namings. On the other hand, where do we draw the line on honoring or memory-holing individuals that might fall out of favor eventually. We are trying to do that with Washington and Jefferson and others. I assume soon I will be living in the state of North Pacifica.

So, while I think we should go cautiously when un-honoring people from the past who did great things, but not always seen to be the correct thing, I also wonder if there are just some people who should not be honored - Lenin (statue in Seattle), Hitler, Etc. Bright lines are hard in this area.

Eva Marie said...

In other parts of the world, where there are civil wars - animosities last forever. In the US, the north honored the heroism of the south. The result of that magnanimity is that southerners are extremely patriotic Americans.Those statues and remembrances of participants of both sides of that terrible conflict help to bind our nation.

n.n said...

Correction: anti-DEI to mitigate progress. We should be wary of exercising liberal license to indulge diversity [dogma] (i.e. color judgment, class bigotry).

Joe Smith said...

Democrats and liberals want to deny history.

They are ashamed of their racist, slave-owning legacy so they with to bury the evidence.

Prove me wrong...

Robert Cook said...

I hear whispers that Germany is considering whether (and if so, when) to reinstall Adolf Hitler to public acknowledgement and honor for his achievements as one of the notable heads of state in their history.

n.n said...

Slavery, diversity, and redistributive change. Still, there was no [ethnic] Spring.

wildswan said...

The history?
Lee is most important in US history because, after Appomattox he told his Confederate soldiers to disband, go home and be good citizens rather than urging them to fight as guerillas. This gave the Union a chance to heal. Lee and Jackson's military exploits are studied in military academies world-wide; they are something more than Confederate generals.
Ashby Turner was a very effective Confederate cavalry commander operating in the Shenandoah Valley under Stonewall Jackson. He hated Northerners and the Union and became a legend to Confederate supporters in his own time and later.
Summarizing:
Lee and Jackson can easily be taught as something more than Confederates upholding slavery; Turner Ashby is a local hero of an era that is passing in the area where the school is located.

The Moral Lesson
The Dems are now effectively supporting Hamas and the October 7 attack on Israel by crippling effective Israeli retaliation; and the black community is supporting the Dems. This is completely irrelevant to attitudes toward figures in our historical past such as the Confederates, many of whom supported the Confederacy but were actually opposed to slavery. That is an unreal position somewhat like chanting "From the river to the sea" while claiming that one is not antisemitic. And it's irrelevant. The Dems have the moral high ground, no matter what they do.
Summarizing:
The Moral Lesson To Be Learned Is: There is Nothing To be Learned.

n.n said...

Sanger the abortionist, Cecile the [clinical] cannibal, and diverse other inspirations of social progress and justice. Perhaps Mandela in a tribal conflict and justification of a genocidal divestment from imperial holdings with retention of mineral benefits.

Dude1394 said...

Faster and MORE please.

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

Quaestor said...

...what is the non-insane explanation of the fact that the senior command of the Union Army was first offered to Robert E. Lee, a slaveholder?

Lee never owned slaves. The slaves at Arlington were inherited by his wife from her father.

Grant had a similar issue, his wife's family were slaveholders and gifted them with at least one slave as a wedding present.

Quaestor said...

Cook relates his auditory hallucinations, how charmingly candid. His fascist right hemisphere telegraphs his communist left hemisphere and voilĂ .

mezzrow said...

Our large urban system ran the same protocol to remove the Confederate stain, and they had a LOT of names to change. We passed a half-cent local sales tax to support new school construction about the same time.

Weeks ago, we were informed that due to COVID supplemental funds running out, we were on the brink of closing dozens of public schools and (more important) letting as many as 700 employees go, due to reduced enrollment. The surrounding counties are busting open with new residents while they are building dozens of new schools, while local voucher transfers to private and charter schools grab the rest.

We have magnificent magnet schools in many areas in this system, but beyond those the demography (even in a growing area) is working against them. Most of my cohort has retired by now, and the remainder are in the home stretch. People aren't having nearly as many children.

Bill, Republic of Texas said...

I hear whispers that England has no intention of removing the statue of George Washington from Trafalgar Square.

Josephbleau said...

I always thought they named Fort Bragg after Lt. Gen. Bragg as an insult to the confederacy.

Oligonicella said...

Eva Marie @10:41 AM

That's the reason the terrorists want them torn down.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"Democrats and liberals want to deny history.

They are ashamed of their racist, slave-owning legacy so they with to bury the evidence."

Since they have never for a minute stopped exploiting Black Americans, what choice do they have?

You can't bury the past without obfuscating the present. And vice versa.

Jersey Fled said...

There are no high schools or elementary schools named after Joe Biden. I just checked.

Goetz von Berlichingen said...

These statues don't really commemorate the men, do they? They commemorate the hope that we can put our shared enmities in the past. That we recognize and value personal bravery and courage of conviction.

We cannot know what motivated every Confederate to fight. There are manifold reasons. Sure, some wanted slavery to continue... but many fought because of fear of an all-powerful Federal government. Some, maybe most, fought simply because their homes were invaded.

There is value to our national spirit that we honor those who stand and fight. It is of value to our national soul that we remember both the good and the bad that lies within each of us. Each statue is the beginning of a discussion, not just about the figure represented, but about who we are as a Nation. What we aspire to be.

MfG,
Goetz von Berlichingen


Narr said...

"There are no high schools or elementary schools named after Joe Biden."

Wait a while.

Rocco said...

Yancey Ward said...
"Don't they know it is illegal to change a school name back?"

They forgot to say "No backsies".

Rocco said...

Quaestor said...
"[Cook's] fascist right hemisphere telegraphs his communist left hemisphere and voilĂ ."

Thanks, Quaestor. This is the first time I've heard someone place fascism on the right and it actually makes sense.

Freder Frederson said...

Lee never owned slaves. The slaves at Arlington were inherited by his wife from her father.

So what you are really saying is that Lee never bought any slaves. Because if your wife inherited from her father, then Lee did own slaves. In the mid-1800's, any property his wife owned, was his property too.

Also, if you want to bring up how Lee despised the institution of slavery, his writings make clear, that slavery itself was not the problem, but the way that it made wealthy landowners and especially, their children, lazy and too dependent on their slaves.

You are ridiculous

JAORE said...

How about Robert Byrd schools? Or Teddy Kennedy? Or Obama?

Freder Frederson said...

So, while I think we should go cautiously when un-honoring people from the past who did great things, but not always seen to be the correct thing, I also wonder if there are just some people who should not be honored - Lenin (statue in Seattle), Hitler, Etc.

So where can you find a statue honoring Hitler? Certainly not in Germany (where even displaying a swastika or having coded pro-Nazi combinations of letters and numbers on your vanity license plate is illegal-You can search the list of German license plate and you will not find one instance of license plates that include the characters SS, SD, 204, or 911, among others). In fact, the U.S. military can't even use 911 as an emergency number in Germany (which they do in England and Italy), so they use the European Standard 999.

John henry said...

Was England treasonous for seeding from the European union?

Should France Germany Italy & Co armies have invaded England and forced it back into the EU?

We are calledthe "united states" (plural) for a reason.

Not the united provinces or the united state

Lee said, correctly in my understanding of our constitution, that he was a citizen of the "state" of Virginia first and of the USA second.

John Henry

Leora said...

What were the new names? Angela Davis and Che?

William said...

What the statute of limitations on slave holding? Yesterday, there were some here who were fulsome in the praise of Marcus Aurelius. It seems to me that what with all his pondering and deep thinking, the thought should have crossed his mind that slavery was a bad idea. Likewise, it should have crossed the mind of those here that praised him that the man was a Roman Emperor and as such deeply committed to the institution of slavery. That certainly didn't happen. Those who praise Marcus Aurelius are implicitly supporting slavery. Back then most of the slaves were Celts as were my forebears. What they're saying is that it's okay to enslave my ancestors as long as you think pretty philosophical thoughts whilst doing so. I'll let the insult pass, but, please, recognize it as an insult....If I were the Roman Emperor back then, I'd have taken a strong stand against slavery and the subsequent history of the world would be a lot nicer.

Joe Smith said...

"I hear whispers that Germany is considering whether (and if so, when) to reinstall Adolf Hitler to public acknowledgement and honor for his achievements as one of the notable heads of state in their history."

A reminder that, like you, Hitler was a socialist.

And just like today's leftist liberal democrats, hated Jews.

You guys have a lot in common...

Joe Smith said...

"Lee never owned slaves. The slaves at Arlington were inherited by his wife from her father."

According to Ancestry.com, my family on my mother's side owned quite a number of slaves in the late 1600s.

Don't really give a fuck.

victoria said...

Ugh. So bad. But, figures, it's Virginia. Glorifying the south and the confederate army.
Losers.


Vicki from Pasadena

loudogblog said...

There should be a rule that if a community names something after someone, they're stuck with name until the place is demolished. They should also be required to put up a big plaque that tells all about this person, both the good and the bad. I've never been a big fan of iconoclasm. You don't learn about the mistakes of the past by erasing them.


One Fine Day said...

"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 a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." - A. Lincoln

This is the way. Words to live by unless you're a liberal.

effinayright said...

William, you poor booby: virtually every society in the world practiced or condoned slavery, all the way up to the 19th century. Some still do today.

While you're at it you might as well condemn all men of the past denying women equal rights, which in most cases were no rights at all. (Living under tyrannies or at best benevolent monarchies.)

I'm sure you're very proud to have demonstrated your moral superiority here, but we ain't buyin' it.

Rocco said...

loudogblog said...
“There should be a rule that if a community names something after someone, they're stuck with name until the place is demolished.”

The convention used to be you never named anything after a living person until their full legacy was written. The politicians in Cincinnati openly pooh-poohed that idea and renamed 2nd street after Pete Rose. Then it came out he bet on baseball, had gambling debts,and became a convicted felon. Ooops. When they rebuilt the riverfront a few decades ago, they kept Pete Rose Way as a short connector road that most people would never use under the new alignment, and built a brand new 2nd Street right next to it.

Aggie said...

@William said, 13:31: "What the statute of limitations on slave holding? ..."

Is there one? There's usually no 'statute of limitations' on murder - and yet, I've never seen a dead person put on trial for the offense, nor more importantly, I've never seen their descendants put on trial for a murder that happened 160 years prior - have you?

Our history is the one thing about our country that cannot be changed. The shame belongs to those who would pretend they can, by erasing what they don't like, instead of explaining it to their children constructively.

Rich Rostrom said...

Quaestor said...

>...what is the non-insane explanation of the fact that
>the senior command of the Union Army was first offered
>to Robert E. Lee...

This in a myth. Army C-in-C Winfield Scott suggested Lee as commander of Union forces in Virginia only.

In any case, at the beginning of the war, Lincoln mnade it absolutely clear that he would fight to uphold the lawful authority of the federal government against criminal rebellion - a principle supported by a great many people who were not opposed to slavery, and even many slaveowners. The war became a "crusade against slavery" only when commitment to the Union cause was settled, and it was clear that slavery was the mainspring of the rebellion.

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

> Lee never owned slaves.

Lee and his brothers inherited slaves from his mother. They sold most of them and divided the money, but Lee retained a few whom he employed as servants, including his wife's lady's maid. These had all died or been manumitted by the 1850s.

> The slaves at Arlington were inherited by his wife from
> her father, a slaveholder.

George W. P. Custis owned three plantations, including Arlington, with over 100 slaves. When he died in 1857, he left the plantations to Lee's three sons, with life tenancy at Arlington for Mrs. Lee, and $10,000 apiece for Lee's daughters. He also directed that the slaves be emancipated, once all bequests and debts were settled or after five years. So no one inherited any of them.

However, the estate was heavily indebted when he died (in part due to Custis letting his slaves slack off). Lee as executor cracked down, extracting full effort from the slaves to raise the needed money - even having a runaway tracked down and punished.

So while Lee did not personally hold title to any slaves in 1861, he was functionally a slave owner. This ended in late 1862, when Lee issued the required writs of emancipation.

Howard said...

O J Simpson battered women's shelter has a nice ring to it.

This post should be filed under Democrats we like.

MountainMan said...

Here is a link to a very good summary of Lee's relationship with slavery. This is at the NPS website for Arlington House.

Everyone would do well to read this and end a lot of the speculative misinformation many are posting here. Lee and Anna never owned the slaves of her late father. Robert managed them as per the will with the goal of paying off the estate's obligations and freeing them within 5 years, that is by 1862. This was achieved, with some difficulty. I believe I had read several years ago in a new Lee biography I have (and, regretfully, have not finished) that Anna hated slavery, wanted nothing to do with it, and pressured her husband to meet the terms of the will, even with his obligations to the War effort. He completed all the manumissions by December of 1862.

As discussed in the NPS article Lee may have had only a very distant relationship with the few slaves he had inherited. In the end he may have just "let them go":

"What happened to all of people owned by Robert E. Lee? We do not know. There are no records of Lee freeing or selling any of them. Lee may have sold or freed them, or they may have died. Dr. James Leyburn interviewed Robert E. Lee after the Civil War and Leyburn claimed that Lee “had freed most of his Negroes before the war” and sent some to Liberia.[7] Lee’s son, Robert E. Lee, Jr., claimed that he “inherited three or four families of slaves and ‘let them go . . . a long time before the war.’”[8] He also suggested that there were no official manumission papers as he wanted to prevent the former enslaved people from being forced from the state, which was the law at the time. This is all we know of Lee as a direct owner of enslaved people."

Drago said...

Robert Cook: "I hear whispers that Germany is considering whether (and if so, when) to reinstall Adolf Hitler to public acknowledgement and honor for his achievements as one of the notable heads of state in their history"

If Stonewall and Lee et al were so absolutely terrible and beyond the pale all by their little lonesomes, why would you feel the desperate need to drag in Hitler?

Just go with the horrible-ness of your targets.

Spoiler: we already know why Li'l Stalin Boy.

Drago said...

"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 a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." - A. Lincoln

One Fine Day: "This is the way. Words to live by unless you're a liberal."

Not to worry. The lefty/dems/antifa/LLR-democraticals are tearing down statues of Lincoln, Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt etc too.

n.n said...

How many people housed slaves until emancipation? This is akin to the role of an orphanage or church until a child is independently viable by nature, or under the law.

RMc said...

To ensure that there can be no political incorrectness (and thus the need to change names every so often), all schools will named after strings of random characters, such as zyFIa@tyUt8 Elementary and 7fFU#1t9zA High School (home of the Fighting 9fl1x5u5xGs!).

The Godfather said...

The Civil War could have ended in either of two ways: One nation restored, or two nations conjoined by force. In accordance with Lincoln's dream, we became a nation restored. Part of that meant that the victors showed respect for the losers' MILITARY heroes.

Later, when the US military was recruiting troops to fight the Indians (native Americans), or the Spaniards, or the Huns, the military found that the South was a good source for recruits.
Braxton Bragg may not have been a successful military leader, but he was Southern, and that helped to bind the members of the AMERICAN military together, whether they were from the North or South,

Robert Cook said...

"Democrats and liberals want to deny history.

"They are ashamed of their racist, slave-owning legacy so they with to bury the evidence."


Ha! The southern Dems in the Civil War-era became Republicans in the late 60s and into the 70s.

William50 said...

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

-Shakespeare

effinayright said...

Robert Cook has always chafed at his school being re-named to honor Ronald Reagan, after years of being "Commie Martyrs High."

Wince said...

Is it truly controversial to say there were good people on both sides of the debate?

Rusty said...

Freder Frederson said...
"So, while I think we should go cautiously when un-honoring people from the past who did great things, but not always seen to be the correct thing, I also wonder if there are just some people who should not be honored - Lenin (statue in Seattle), Hitler, Etc.

So where can you find a statue honoring Hitler? "

Did he fight for the South too? It's not surprising that you don't know your own history.
And yes. There shouldd be a statue of Hitler in Germany. Some place you can take your children and remind them that tyranny comes in many guises. Here we should put up a statue of Biden.

Joe Smith said...

'Ha! The southern Dems in the Civil War-era became Republicans in the late 60s and into the 70s.'

The slaves they owned were free by then dummy...

And how do you explain the Jim Crow South, Bull Connor, George Wallace, the KKK?

All Democrats in good standing.

I could do this all day.

glacial erratic said...

A bit of sane flotsam floating on a rising sea of insane wokeism.

Eva Marie said...

Robert Cook said
“ Ha! The southern Dems in the Civil War-era became Republicans in the late 60s and into the 70s.”
Civil War-era Dems were dead in the 1960’s and 1970’s and dead voters are a specialty of the Democratic Party.

Rusty said...

Just for Robert I would like to see a statue of a Stoypin Train Car in the town where he lives. With a placque describing what it is and why it was so important to Russian socialism. With the addition of how many millions of "criminals" were sent east to the gulags.