“No, ‘Virginia,’ General Robert E. Lee should not be canceled” Would you be surprised to hear that a person after 40 years chose to go back for the first time to a reunion at an alma mater where they began but they did not finish? How is that possible? Who chooses to do that? Why would they do that? It may have everything to do with the personal experience that a very young and vulnerable 18-year-old goes through in the very first days, the ‘dog days of summer’. At West Point they call it beast barracks.
So, you’re a young woman and you’re super excited because it’s 1978 and you feel so empowered and enthusiastic about your appointment to the Academy. Your confidence is high in your abilities to compete with some of the top male candidates in the country at the United States military Academy. You believe you can prove yourself physically and academically and especially among future leaders of our military.
But circumstances along the way get in your way, interrupt your plans and divert your dreams. You don’t understand why and you are wholly disappointed but for some reason you are not going to graduate and you’re not going to become a second lieutenant. You have a lot of company. The class began with 1400 and graduated 780. However, you forged bonds that are so deep they last forever. You have stayed in contact with some of these special people in your life and 40 years later they encourage you to come back and participate as a member of “the select few” ’82, as a former member of the Corps.
Do you think it was different for Robert E Lee? Do you think it was different because it was 1825? Do you think the bonds that he formed with his classmates on the parade ground and in the classroom were different than they were in 1982? Maybe the only thing that was different was the absence of female cadets. But back in 1825 that wasn’t our culture. Our country wasn’t ready for that concept yet. Slaves weren’t yet free and technically, neither were women.
But what did exist was a young, aspiring, new nation of states. That man Robert E Lee, who hailed from the South, was just as eligible and just as qualified as the rest of his classmates. He didn’t just get commissioned in the United States military he excelled in the United States military. He advanced rapidly and earned a reputation of a man of honor, integrity and character. He served as Superintendent of West Point in 1852 for three years. States’ rights were a critical and continuing debate from the very day our Constitution was ratified. Lee did not support secession, but he would not fight against his native state. Three of his Virginia born sons joined the Confederacy. What would you have done?
So, these former members of the Corps maybe couldn’t go back for their 10th or their 20th reunions because it was still too raw. It was still too soon. Maybe their classmates would not welcome them yet. Maybe their ego wasn’t ready yet to accept the circumstances or MAYBE they didn’t yet believe their shared life experiences and their shared life accomplishments had reached a point where their shared life wisdoms had blended into a shared harmony of life, love and happiness enough to rise above petty failures, redirections, different goals and different paths.
Robert E. Lee didn’t choose fate, it chose him. Dwight D. Eisenhower took the time, in 1960, ironically, to respond to a concerned citizen, who asked the question of why President Eisenhower could possibly have a photo resting behind him in the White House of such an unworthy individual? President Eisenhower thoughtfully wrote,
“Robert E. Lee … was a poised and inspiring leader, true to the high trust reposed in him by millions of his fellow citizens; … Through all his many trials, he remained selfless almost to a fault and unfailing in his faith in God. Taken altogether, he was noble as a leader and as a man, and unsullied as I read the pages of history.”
Robert E. Lee didn’t “own” slaves, he inherited them upon the death of his father-in-law with a clause to free them in five years of that man’s death.
Today, there exists some random commission of woke individuals in 2021/2022 who are not qualified and more importantly not capable of getting inside the head of Robert E Lee from 1860. They are additionally wholly unqualified in deciding in 2022 that this man and his name should be eliminated from our shared history. Those same kinds of individuals have weighed in on the renaming of a high school in Mechanicsville Virginia despite the populace voting to maintain the name of Lee Davis High School.
The same types of individuals overruled the popular decision and eliminated the name anyway. Similar woken individuals were involved in the tearing down of a great monument of Robert E. Lee in Richmond Virginia upon land that was donated by the Lee family. If we are to remain as a country of principle then most if not all of these decisions should be based on principle and not some flippant, whimsical notion of a perceived negative in the present time that won’t hold water 20 or 30 years from now.
I say, “woah!” to the individual who believes himself so great and so qualified 160 years later to pass judgment on a great and grand individual and their decision making based on woefully challenging times and woefully challenging circumstances. Would you take all the accomplishments from that individual? Would you take from them their greatness as an elite leader? Their greatness as a general who led their people to the best of their ability and used profound judgement when it was time to surrender?
A former selected superintendent of one of America’s iconic universities? No one can answer these questions properly because never in time has one individual ever been faced with the kind of dilemma Robert E. Lee faced. Please let’s cease making these decisions in haste. Let’s pray never in the future does one great individual ever have to face this decision again.
Kudos to the United States Military Academy non-graduates who came back 40 years later to remember their shared experiences with amazing classmates who welcomed them with open arms. And may the United States Military Academy continue to produce great leaders like Robert E. Lee and Dwight D. Eisenhower.
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The Cultural Cleansing of Lee from USMA and the Army Fort in Virginia is Cultural Marxism on the march. It’s what Human Secularist Totalitarians do. The people who are trying to tear Lee down are much smaller than him. No one will remember their names. Lee will stand tall in history and military science from centuries to come like the other Great Captains in Military Art. Likewise, Virginians, Southerners, and other good Americans who value character will continue to hold him in high esteem and hope their sons live up to his legacy of duty, honor, and country.
Robert E. Lee should be emulated not cancelled, but then in today’s wokeness, purity of position outranks honor in action. Discussing this issue with Libtards is similar to trying to teach a hog how to use a wristwatch. Frustrates you, irritates the hog.