Signatures are appreciated.
With all these news stories focused on Confederate memorials being removed from public parks and college campuses, the question grows. When will the City of Brownsville catch up? An event organizer, going by Ember Phoenix Lumina, created what seemed to be a joke event focused on our own monument to white supremacy. I felt it would be a great opportunity to remind people that it exists, and neo-Confederates are still defending it.
City of Brownsville, TX - Municipal Government, the time to remove the Jefferson Davis monument from Washington Park is now. The Confederacy lost the Civil War 152 years ago, and there is no way that any part of their slavery-supporting heritage can or should return in an age where people of all skin colors should be treated with respect.
Jefferson Davis' belief that the African race should be recognized as "our inferior, fitted expressly for servitude" [1] was discriminatory and only served to maintain equality along white men. [2] As president of the CSA, he led the fight for freedom to own slaves. Even the vice president, Alexander H. Stephens asserted that "As a race, the African is inferior to the white man..." and "The great truth... upon which our system rests, is the inferiority of the African." [3]
Though our city's history is stained by its participation in the Civil War, it is nothing to celebrate, and we have no reason to keep a monument that glorifies someone who was a white supremacist to the end. [4] Not even Confederate general Robert E. Lee would agree with erecting monuments to the leaders of this rebellion, stating that it would only perpetuate the conflict long after the war was over and make it more difficult for everyone to move on. [5] [6] [7]
Local Confederates, some of whom attended a city commissioners meeting in uniform, have called for its relocation to Veterans Park, by the Brownsville Public Library on Central Blvd, and are planning to defend this unnecessary monument at a proposed town hall This is not acceptable. Brownsville public officials cannot pledge allegiance to the American flag before every government meeting while sanctioning the maintenance of a memorial that glorifies a racist who rebelled against the country for which that flag stands.
If anything, the plaque on this rock should be moved to a museum where it can be used for proper education over the events that occurred. As anyone can open a history textbook and read that the Confederacy failed to secede, history is not being erased, as Neo-Confederates and Confederate sympathizers claim.
If anything, the plaque on this rock should be moved to a museum where it can be used for proper education over the events that occurred. As anyone can open a history textbook and read that the Confederacy failed to secede, history is not being erased, as Neo-Confederates and Confederate sympathizers claim.
Make the right choice. Let us progress past this dark time in Brownsville history. Letters to the Editor and messages to our public officials would greatly help the cause.
[2] http://www.confederatepastpresent.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=117:speech-of-jefferson-davis-before-the-mississippi-legislature-nov-16-1858q-where-he-advocates-secession-if-an-abolitionist-is-elected-president-&catid=41:the-gathering-storm
[3] http://www.confederatepastpresent.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=127:alexander-h-stephens-speech-before-the-virginia-secession-convention&catid=40:secession
[4] http://www.confederatepastpresent.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=131:jefferson-daviss-white-supremacy-and-pro-slavery-in-his-memoirs-published-in-1881&catid=38:reconstruction-and-fusion
[5] http://www2.vcdh.virginia.edu/saxon/servlet/SaxonServlet?source=/xml_docs/valley_news/newspaper_catalog.xml&style=/xml_docs/valley_news/news_cat.xsl&level=edition&paper=rv&year=1869&month=09&day=03&edition=rv1869/va.au.rv.1869.09.03.xml
