Stage 4 - Yet Another Confederate Debate

Recently, in the wake of the events in South Carolina, there has been much debate about symbols and representations of the Confederacy in this country. One of these representations, a monument named Confederate Dead, was erected at the Texas state capitol in Austin in 1903. As discussed in a blog post by R.G. Ratcliffe in Burkablog, the monument was said to honor the lives of the Confederate soldier fighting for the the south’s “constitutional rights”, or so that’s what was said at the time. Was this really an “homage to the Confederacy?” Ratcliffe thinks so. Inscribed in the monument are the words, “Died for State Rights Guaranteed Under the Constitution The People of the South animated by the spirit of 1776 to preserve their rights withdrew from the Federal compact in 1861.” He thinks that the Confederacy, while fighting for state rights guaranteed in the constitution, were mainly fighting for slavery. Ratcliffe offers a solution to the controversial monument — inscribe new words along the lines of “This monument was erected in 1903 as part of an effort to perpetuate the myth that Texas secession was about state’s rights and not slavery.” Ratcliffe is speaking to anyone who takes offense to or even defends the statue.

I agree completely with Ratcliffe; he seems credible, contributing many posts to the website. I believe that the actual message behind this monument is to recognize the Confederate States. In fact, fixed atop the monument is the President of the Confederate States himself, Jefferson Davis, and in his hand, supposedly the Confederate constitution. The South was fighting for their “State rights”, which I think is way of disguising the world, slavery. Opponents of this argument claim that slavery wasn’t the main driving force towards succession and that the South was fighting for their rights. Yes true, there were a handful of factors leading up to secession but slavery was the bulk of it. I also agree with his solution of replacing the plaque and not dismantling the statue. Statues like this have a place in our history, they shouldn’t be destroyed and “sweeping our dirty past under the rug,” as Ratcliffe says, isn’t valuable to our true learning experiences. We can honor the statue by letting it honor the lives of the soldiers who died and all the lives slaves who gained their freedom because of the war.