A Confederate Memorial in Arlington National Cemetery has been removed as part of an initiative by the Department of Defense to eliminate Confederate iconography from the U.S. Military.
A Trump-appointed judge lifted the injunction against its removal, and contractors have taken it down. This action is based on recommendations from a Pentagon commission, formed after the murder of George Floyd in 2020, to address the presence of Confederate monuments and street names.
— Patriot Ranger (@MAGA_Ranger) December 20, 2023
Conservatives online have expressed a variety of perspectives regarding the removal of statues, highlighting their concerns over the matter. Some have compared the removal of statues to actions taken by extremist groups like ISIS or the Nazis, while others have highlighted what they perceive as irony in the fact that the Democratic Party, historically linked to the Confederacy, is orchestrating these removals.
… But, today’s Republicans are far more like the Confederates of the 1860s than Democrats – And that’s exactly why many are seething about the monument’s removal.
The political landscape in the American South has undergone a significant transformation over the years. Historically, the Democratic Party held sway in this region, with even influential figures from the Confederacy being affiliated with it.
However, a pivotal turning point occurred when Lyndon Johnson, a Southern Democrat, enacted civil rights legislation in the 1960s. This landmark event led to a shift in allegiance among many Southern whites towards the Republican party at both national and local levels since.
The controversial monument in Arlington National Cemetery, originally intended to honor Confederate Army veterans, has faced significant criticism for its association with the divisive “Lost Cause” narrative surrounding the Civil War. This narrative portrays the Confederacy as a noble resistance against a tyrannical federal government while downplaying and distorting the true horrors of slavery. As a result of these concerns, there has been a call for its removal to ensure a more accurate representation and understanding of history.
“It speaks volumes that the neo-Confederate crowd chose to embrace a memorial, that mythologizes and dehumanizes African Americans, as a symbol of reconciliation that *they* could rally around in 2023,” commented Kevin Levin, a historian of the Civil War. “And they wonder why they lost…again.”
The Confederate Memorial was a memorial in Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington County, Virginia, in the United States, that commemorated members of the armed forces of the Confederate States of America who died during the American Civil War.
Authorized in March 1906, former Confederate soldier and sculptor Moses Jacob Ezekiel was commissioned by the United Daughters of the Confederacy in November 1910 to design the memorial. It was unveiled by President Woodrow Wilson on June 4, 1914, the 106th anniversary of the birth of Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederate States of America.
