Is Jefferson Next?

Unless people are willing to start defending something? Probably.

Jun 14, 2020

One item of note? Backwards independent and former Republican state senator Amanda Chase (I-Chesterfield) chose to “moonwalk” back her comments about white history, stating that she merely intended the phrase to be provocative…

…this was of course before she attempted to fundraise off of “white history” followed up with calling those who did not respond to her call to arms as “eunuchs” and critics as “ankle bitters” (sic).

It was only after TRS took her to task and over 1,000 + comments on social media made her feel the consequences of poor decision making that Chase folded like a cheap tent. Or burn out like a tiki torch. The metaphors are endless.

But good work holding her feet to the fire, dear readers. Identity politics is abhorrent when we see it on the left; it cannot (and will not) be fought with an identity politics of the right.

Alexandre Auguste Ledru-Rollin is not a household name. His comments during the Revolution of 1848 might be, and they are certainly applicable today:

"There go the people. I must follow them, for I am their leader."

Of the things most embarrassing about today’s political environment, watching Democratic politicians and grifters pander in order to get in front of their activist base has to be the most eyerolling of activities.

Top of the list? Virginia Governor Ralph Northam remains the most feckless and entertaining of this bunch solely because he has no chance of actually getting in front of his mob.

Northam is being used until he can be cancelled.

Of course, the same is true for most of the liberal left now awakening to the idea that their progressive and “woke” successors hate them as much as they hate conservatives and populists to the right.

The New York Times — once considered the gold standard of journalism — succumbs to the mob and fires an editor after publishing an op-ed from Senator Tom Cotton (R-AK). Liberal commentator Andrew Sullivan finds himself censored by 20-something editors. Digital streaming media sites are now cancelling shows such as the Dukes of Hazzard, removing entire episodes of the UK-comedy Faulty Towers, and even going so far as to removing Gone With The Wind.

Is the stupid in this country that strong?

David Henninger at The Wall Street Journal (perhaps the last bastion of free thought in an overwhelmingly leftist media environment) put it best in an op-ed that no NYT staffer would have tolerated:

“The issue here is not about the assertions that racism is endemic in the U.S. The issue is the willingness by many to displace the American system of free argument with a system of enforced, coerced opinion and censorship, which forces comparison to the opinion-control mechanisms that existed in Eastern Europe during the Cold War.”

Yet where does it stop?

A few years ago, a portrait of Robert E. Lee was removed from its long-standing place inside one of the halls at the University of Virginia. Indignant at the time, I brought it up to several alumni of this institution, who naturally disagreed with the move. What was remarkable was the heavy sigh of resignation.

“Well,” this septuagenarian said, “if no one is willing to defend them, maybe it should come down…”

One looks at the graffiti covering the Lee Monument in Richmond and the series of depredations done to other memorials — Maury, Columbus, Churchill (who is literally Hitler now), Robert the Bruce, even anti-slavery figures and the memorial to the vaunted 54th Massachusetts Volunteers in Boston.

Jefferson will be next. As will Washington, Henry, Mason, Lighthorse Harry Lee, and all of our Virginia heroes. Count on it, because there is nothing that Old Glory stood for that Dixie didn’t stand for.

The question arises.

Jefferson was by no means a perfect man. Nor was Washington. Neither was Napoleon, Mandela, Caesar, Churchill, Kennedy, FDR, Nathaniel Bacon, Michael Collins or Martin Luther King, Jr. for that matter.

Are we asking these men to be saints? Or instead, are we honoring in them the solitary fact that the arc of history does not bend towards justice, and yet through their own act of will — albeit imperfectly — they gave us the chance to make a more perfect Union?

Jefferson could have retired to Monticello and enjoyed the system. He didn’t.
Washington could have remained at Mount Vernon. He didn’t.
Nelson Mandela could have stayed silent in South Africa. He didn’t.
Martin Luther King Jr. might have had a lucrative career as a televangelist. He didn’t.
Winston Churchill could have remained a backbenching MP. He didn’t.
Nathaniel Bacon might have remained a planter. He didn’t.

The list goes on of heroes who chose to change their world (even in small ways) rather than recline comfortably in their own station. Those are the heroes who saw a better world rather than the grifters who choose to ride the wave if only to save their own skins — which quite frankly, is most of humanity.

Insofar as I am aware, there was only one perfect person in this world. We all know what we did to Him. As for the rest of us? Small acts of heroism will have to do, and that starts and stops by standing up to the mob in small, definitional ways.

J.K. Rowling and Dave Chappelle (NSFW) have made their own small strides, and though no memorial will be built to you?

Consider making your own small strides as well. They aren’t a majority, and no matter how much they yell and scream and riot? They aren’t the majority.

But unless we are willing to defend our own heritage and history? Be prepared to be defined by those who are — either by the iconoclasts of the left or by the gutter identity politics of Amanda Chase and Corey Stewart.

Alone in Berlin by Hans Fallada
Though published in the United States as Every Man Dies Alone, the book is a fictionalized account of the lives of two people — Otto and Anna Quangel — based on the real life martyrdom of Otto and Elise Hampel, executed by the Nazi regime in 1943 for hand writing over 200 postcard poems entitled Frei Presse! and distributed in public places all over Berlin. If you haven’t seen the film, the parallels to the present day could not be more alarming.

Lee: The Last Years by Charles Bracken Flood
The classic hagiography as Lee transitioned from general to president of Washington College (now Washington & Lee University). Though Lee tried to separate himself from politics, Lee’s admirers simply would not permit him to remain in the shade, with Northern Democrats insisting that he lend his reputation to the White Sulpher Manifesto of 1868. I’d encourage you to read it.

Ethics in the Conflicts of Modernity by Alasdair MacIntyre
A very abrasive and short summary? Our roles play a tremendous part in our ideas of moral action. This claims to be written for the “well educated layman” but unless you have a great deal of patience for jargon and nuance? Pack a lunch.

Chancellorsville by Stephen Sears
Having grown up in Spotsylvania County, there are a number of quibbles one might draw about this book. Nevertheless, Hooker comes off much better than the soundbite historians would have preferred, Lee’s role in the battle consisted of getting out of the way (which due to a previous heart condition, may not have even been a choice) and Jackson’s route around Catherine Furnace and behind Hooker’s lines was as much the fault of Stoneman’s Federal cavalry as it was Stuart’s Confederate cavalry. Might be the best in-depth history of a battle I have ever read.

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Shaun Kenney
Senior Editor
The Republican Standard