What would Robert E. Lee say about the removal of Confederate statues?

Another one from today.

Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis opposed Confederate memorials in their lifetimes.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/robert-e-lee-opposed-confederate-monuments

--“I think it wiser,” the retired military leader wrote about a proposed Gettysburg memorial in 1869, “…not to keep open the sores of war but to follow the examples of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife, to commit to oblivion the feelings engendered.”

The majority of Confederate statues were erected decades after Lee's death, between the 1890s and the 1920s, at "the height of Jim Crow, of state-sanctioned segregation, disfranchisement, and lynching."

The more you know.

Do we need monuments to remember history?

Do we need monuments of Hitler?

Only one of us here is going to primary sources and actually engaging with what these historical figures did and said.

Good thing one of us here remembers it.

"Bob"...?

"BOB"?!?

Hey, nice try at being faux-folksy.

Anyway: Lee's "fold it up and put it away" quote appears to be apocryphal, but it is in the spirit of a letter we know he wrote:

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

Turns out Lee's feelings on Civil War memorials were echoed by others at the time!

--The New York Herald and other Northern papers were down on perpetuating the memory of Gettysburg. The Democratic Watchman, (Pa.) expresses their sentiments in short, which for its succinctness and pith, we copy below:

--"Another big fuss at Gettysburg. A lot of officers are there for the purpose of fixing definitely the positions occupied by the troops on the first day's battle. Better take Gen. Lee's advise and let the darned thing die out of remembrance."

So... nice try?

I get tired of saying nice try.

I got it from here.

https://web.archive.org/web/20140719043133/http://washingtonandleespectator.com/2014/07/15/cox-honoring-lee-anew/

Now, do you understand the difference between an apocryphal quote and an invented quote — i.e. what you did the other day with Dr. Fauci?