What is Memorial Day – really?
Is it just cookouts and picnics or something much more important?
On April 25, 1866, a group of women in Columbus, Mississippi, laid flowers on the graves of Confederate and Union soldiers in the city cemetery. Indeed, such practices were common in the South both during and immediately after the war, in part because most of the dead, on both sides, were buried in the South, where most of them died.
Copying this idea that began in the Southern states, on May 5, 1868, in his capacity as commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, the veterans' organization for Union Civil War veterans, General John A. Logan issued a proclamation calling for "Decoration Day" to be observed annually and nationwide. It was observed for the first time that year on Saturday May 30; the date was chosen because it was not the anniversary of any particular battle. According to the White House, the May 30 date was chosen as the optimal date for flowers to be in bloom. After speeches, Union veterans and the orphaned children of veterans walked through Arlington scattering flowers on both Union and Confederate graves.
For decades, Memorial Day continued to be observed on May 30, the date Logan had selected for the first Decoration Day. But in 1968 Congress passed the Uniform Monday Holiday Act, which established Memorial Day as the last Monday in May in order to create a three-day weekend for federal employees; the change went into effect in 1971. The same law also declared Memorial Day a federal holiday.
Memorial Day is now for remembering all those who died while serving in the country's armed forces.
From a May 2017 Federalist article, “For many Americans, Memorial Day has become a nonchalant occasion to take Monday off work and gather with family and friends at a park or a backyard cookout. There’s nothing wrong with that as far as it goes, but it’s not what Memorial Day is really about.
There’s a lot we can learn today from understanding those early Memorial Days. After four years of a war that took the lives of some 620,000 Americans, Memorial Day was about remembering and honoring all who gave their lives, regardless of which uniform they wore. Recall that this was a time, much like our own, of deep divisions and rancor in America. Yet Americans then were able to honor the fallen of both sides, recognizing that each died valiantly fighting for a cause in which they believed.”
As you know, today the woke crowd is successfully demanding the removal of monuments and memorials commemorating Confederate leaders. Earlier this year an independent commission recommended dismantling the Confederate Memorial in Arlington National Cemetery. Last May a congressional commission recommended the renaming of nine military bases to remove their Confederate names. My guess is very few Americans know who these bases were named after! Earlier this month Georgia’s Fort Benning was renamed Fort Moore and Fort Hood in Texas was renamed Fort Cavazos.
The congressional naming commission recommended these name changes:
Fort A.P. Hill to Fort Walker
Fort Polk to Fort Johnson
Fort Bragg to Fort Liberty
Fort Benning to Fort Moore
Fort Gordon to Fort Eisenhower
Fort Hood to Fort Cavazos
Fort Lee to Fort Gregg-Adams
Fort Pickett to Fort Barfoot
Fort Rucker to Fort Novosel
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin welcomed the proposals saying, “Today’s announcement highlights the commission’s efforts to propose nine new installation names that reflect the courage, values, sacrifices, and diversity of our military men and women.”
The congressional naming commission was created under the 2021 Defense Authorization Act. President Trump vetoed the bill accusing others of wanting to, ““throw those names away.” Congress delivered the first and only vote to override his veto, thus the commission was formed.
Over Christmas break 2022, West Point would “remove, rename or modify assets and real property at the United States Military Academy and West Point installation that commemorate or memorialize the Confederacy or those who voluntarily served with the Confederacy,” according to Superintendent Lieutenant General Steve Gilland. Also noting, “We will conduct these actions with dignity and respect.”
First to be removed from the school’s library was a portrait of West Point’s former superintendent General Robert E. Lee. A stone bust of the general was taken out of Reconciliation Plaza and his quote about honor was removed from Honor Plaza. Various streets, buildings and other areas throughout West Point that are named after Lee and others who served in the Confederacy will be renamed. According to the current superintendent, “Stone markers in the academy’s Reconciliation Plaza that commemorate the Confederacy will be modified with appropriate language and images that comply with the Commission’s recommendations.”
How is placing anything and everything with a Confederate name attached to it acting with “dignity and respect”? What does Reconciliation Plaza now mean? Who or what is being reconciled? General Robert E. Lee played an important role in reconciling the nation, but that part of his history is being erased!
In 1914, President Woodrow Wilson helped unveil a 32-foot statue honoring the Confederate dead in Arlington National Cemetery. The base of the statue bears an inscription attributed to Rev. Randolph Harrison McKim, a Confederate chaplain: “Not for fame or reward, not for place or for rank, not lured by ambition, or goaded by necessity, but in simple obedience to duty, as they understood it, these men suffered all, sacrificed all, dared all—and died.”
Wilson, the first president from the South to be elected since 1848, understood the importance of reconciliation between North and South, even as late as 1914. In his remarks at the unveiling, he said, “My task is this, ladies and gentlemen: This chapter in the history of the United States is now closed, and I can bid you to turn with me with your faces to the future, quickened by the memories of the past, but with nothing to do with the contests of the past, knowing, as we have shed our blood on opposite sides, we now face and admire one another.”
Apparently, this congressional naming commission is not about reconciliation, but instead all about rewriting history to fit their narrative about racial injustice. Why don’t we learn from our history rather than rewrite it. Attempting to erase the Confederacy does a disservice to our nation – the only nation to fight a Civil War to end slavery. Six hundred and twenty thousand Americans died in that war - that is more than enough reparations paid in blood!
Thankfully, those who fought in the Civil War or lost loved ones in the war knew and understood about reconciliation and the need for it in order to once again unify a fractured nation. The “leaders” of today do not understand this as their actions create more of a divide in the country . . . all in the name of “racial justice.”