Angry Reader Sam Davidson<\/strong><\/p>\n Victor,<\/p>\n I enjoy reading your articles in the National Review. I never understood why this country has statues that honor people that took up arms against the United States. I do not think there are any statues honoring Lord Cornwallis, General Santa Ana, Ludendorf, Tojo, or Hitler. The Confederates were lucky President Johnson was a Southerner and every officer over the rank of captain wasn\u2019t shot. In my opinion this isn\u2019t about slavery or state\u2019s rights, it is about treason.<\/p>\n Best Wishes,<\/p>\n Sam Davidson<\/p>\n ________________________<\/p>\n Dear Kinda Angry Reader Sam Davidson,<\/strong><\/p>\n To answer you, question why are Confederate statues somewhat different from those of a few monsters you list?<\/p>\n 1) Not all statues of Confederates are the same. Gen. James Longstreet\u2019s career was different from that of Nathan Bedford Forrest or Jefferson Davis, to take one example; yet we lump them all together as equally culpable. Note Erwin Rommel fought for a bad cause but he did so in a way differently from Sepp Dietrich or Joachim Peiper or Otto Skorzeny, and is recognized as such in Germany today\u2014in the manner that a Gen. Halder of OKH was working with the U.S. after the war on the theory he was different from Gen. Keitel of OKW who was hanged.<\/p>\n 2) Most Confederates were born American citizens; so rightly or wrongly they were seen after the war as reprobates, but not foreign enemies, and thus to be forgiven as wayward Americans rather than killed as hostiles (but given even the very few death sentences at Nuremberg were mostly later commuted or reduced, your suggestion of shooting en masse thousands of Confederate officers seems a tad extreme?).<\/p>\n 3) The statues often were allowed to remain as tokens of reconciliation; the fear during the waning Civil War (see Lincoln\u2019s Second Inaugural), and after, was that the killing (eventually 620,000 dead) had been so tragic and brutal that the country could never reunite. Forgiving secessionists and recalibrating them as noble fighters for an amoral cause (slavery was sometimes forgotten and the Lost Cause was substituted) was seen as both magnanimous and advantageous. I note that empirically, not approvingly, necessarily.<\/p>\n 4) In 1861, the North struggled to find a constitutional writ enabling it legally to coerce the South back into the Union, given that the Supreme Court would not find secession unconstitutional until after <\/em>the war (1869), and the Constitution had no explicit clause about leaving the Union. So many in 1861 in the North were befuddled whether it was legal to depart peacefully, and, if so, how exactly was it done?<\/p>\n The Union argued, inter alia, that the individual states could not autonomously appropriate the responsibilities of the federal government (national defense, tariffs, etc.) as spelled out in the Constitution, but there was nothing explicit about what would happen if the states peacefully left the Union entirely since it was believed none ever would be so foolish.<\/p>\n So one way of forcing them back in was to declare that they could not appropriate federal property inside their boundaries (forts, arsenals, post offices, e.g., such as Fort Sumter.), which they did by force and which became one writ for forcible reunion.<\/p>\n So the answer whether Confederates were treasonous seems obvious on its merits, but not so obvious when the legality of secession is carefully examined in the context of 1861. In a larger sense, Lincoln knew that a North American continent with a variety of states, as in Europe, was a prescription for endless wars\u2014as in Europe.<\/p>\n 5) My complaint about statue smashing is twofold: one, it is often done by violence and street thuggery and thus illegal, and city officials panic and issue executive orders without ratifications of councils or plebiscites, and then also do it by night; and two, it is a distraction from real problems. Murder epidemics in the inner-city are cause for national concern in a way knocking off the head of Robert E. Lee or renaming the USC mascot is not. We always go after the irrelevant misdemeanor when we cannot address the existential felony, largely to virtue signal rather than to admit our weakness and timidity.<\/p>\n Best Wishes,<\/p>\n Victor Hanson<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 09\/15\/2017 From An Angry Reader: Angry Reader Sam Davidson Victor, I enjoy reading your articles in the National Review. I never understood why this country has statues that honor people that took up arms against the United States. I do not think there are any statues honoring Lord Cornwallis, General Santa Ana, Ludendorf, Tojo, or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-2KK","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10643,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/10643-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":10586,"position":0},"title":"From An Angry Reader: Dear\u2026","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 3, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"From An Angry Reader: Dear Mr. Hanson, I\u2019m a black Ivy-League educated liberal raised in NC and something in me snapped last week. Have no fear, I\u2019m still in the liberal camp, but it perturbs me greatly to see all the hoopla over Confederate memorials. This is so not important\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Angry Reader"","block_context":{"text":"Angry Reader","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/angry-reader\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12591,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/angry-reader-08-28-2020\/","url_meta":{"origin":10586,"position":1},"title":"Angry Reader 08-28-2020","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 28, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"From An Angry Reader: Victor, So what are you and your powerless conservative \u201cthought leader\u201d ilk going to do about our Revolution? Keep writing your pathetic articles stating the obvious, keep bloviating on your self satisfied talk shows, keep preaching to your social distanced conservative choir as they sing themselves\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10386,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/10386-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":10586,"position":2},"title":"From an Angry Reader: Hello\u2026","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 13, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"From an Angry Reader: Hello Dr. Hanson, While it's hard to argue with \"be happy day by day\", our current form of capitalism - which Hoover seems to endorse - makes that near impossible. Over the last 30 years, Friedman's nutty idea of maximizing shareholder value as the only responsibility\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Angry Reader"","block_context":{"text":"Angry Reader","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/angry-reader\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10410,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/10410-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":10586,"position":3},"title":"From An Angry Reader: You\u2026","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 24, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"From An Angry Reader: You need some serious help. Robert Millsap \u00a0 Victor Davis Hanson's Reply: Dear Angry Reader Robert Millsap, \u00a0 In some sense, you are right. I have an acre yard that I tend myself and often could use some quite serious help in mowing, pruning, weeding, and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Angry Reader"","block_context":{"text":"Angry Reader","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/angry-reader\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10968,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/02-12-18-angry-reader\/","url_meta":{"origin":10586,"position":4},"title":"02\/12\/18 Angry Reader","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 14, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"From An Angry Reader: I was surprised this morning. Usually when I read your column I want to throw up. But today\u2019s column was absolutely brilliant Nice job Mike Benbrook Oakhurst CA \u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013 Dear Reforming Angry Reader Mike Benbrook, Vomiting is not healthy. If I were to do so each\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12592,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/angry-reader-08-29-2020\/","url_meta":{"origin":10586,"position":5},"title":"Angry Reader 08-29-2020","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 29, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"From An Angry Reader: dang dude you\u2019re racist Jacob Kovacs-Goodman ______________________________________________________________________________ Dear Angry Something or Other Jacob Kovacs-Goodman, It is not wise to level an ad hominem charge of racism against someone without producing any evidence whatsoever to support your smear. Somehow your slang \u201cdang dude\u201d rings falsely, more likely\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10586"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10586"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10586\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10589,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10586\/revisions\/10589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Victor Davis Hanson’s Reply:<\/h3>\n