“””Not until we have our picnics beside Robert E Lee and describe him to our children as he REALLY was.””
Oh please, Inform me of who Lee really was. Any black person that does not DEFEND the legacy of Robert E. Lee is either 1. Ignorant, 2. stupid 3. oddly against their own race.
Please by all means tell me who General Lee “really” was? Surely your not one of the countless sheeple that are running around hysteria crazed yanking down statues with ZERO facts about anything?
Because Lee was a man who’s life I aspire to. He inherited slaves and other “property” from his wife’s side of the family and IMMEDIATELY freed those slaves, who chose to stay with Lee and his family on their plantation. This occurred 10 years prior to the war. Additionally Lee and his wife continuously broke the law of the day by continuously educating blacks to read and write. While you were doing your due diligence and researching the FACTS of Lee’s life so as to not slander him did you dig up William Mack Lee? Mack has many quotes about His life as a black man living in Lee’s home:
William Mack Lee — Body Servant of General Robert E. Lee. He stayed with General Lee throughout the war and until the day Lee died in 1870. Mack said of General Lee after his death “I was raised by one of the greatest men in the world. There was never one born of a woman greater than General Robert E. Lee, according to my judgment. All of his servants were set free ten years before the war, but all remained on the plantation until after the surrender.”
General Lee left Mack $360 in his will, which Mack used to go to school and started 14 churches. He became an ordained Missionary Baptist minister in Washington, DC.”
I could go on & on about the amazingly wonderful legacy Mr. Lee left behind. But alas someone will feel really clever and think they debunk all my argument by posing the question “If Lee was so against slavery why did he fight for the south.? Wow your so witty. First off if you people would actually open the history books and due your own due diligence instead of making assumptions or worse blindly follow other ignorant people you would learn first hand that the war was not “about” slavery. For the North it was about keeping the Union intact. For the South it was about state’s rights OVERALL. Yes slavery was an *ingredient* of the war but not what the war was “about.” Even in President Lincoln’s own words “
““If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.” As written by President Lincoln to the New York Times Tribune, August 1862.
So you pose the question “If Lee was against slavery why did He fight for the South.?” Well Lee fought for Virginia. Back then you were not a citizen of America proper. You were a citizen of your sovereign state. Back then the Federal government was what it was intended to be- tiny. To provide protection against a foreign invader and just a few other things. The power was truly the people’s, in their individual states. It could be said Lee was a citizen of the “country” of Virginia so to speak. And that Virginia was a country within a country, so to speak. And He fought for His “country.” It did not mean He agreed to everything that was going on in Virginia.” “Lee did His duty. To Virginia, as a citizen of Virginia.” Let’s say for a hypothetical that, to make a point, these days it was clearly known, world wide, and uncontested that Russia was overall a (far?) more moral country as a whole compared to America. And Russia decides to invade America. I literally would fight for my country. I would fight for the USA. Why? Because THIS (all caps for emphasis, not to represent yelling) is the land that I love. I love my neighbors- both those well behaved and those I would take to the wood shed if I could. Because THIS is the dirt beneath MY feet. Because THAT is the creek I caught my first fish out of. Because though FAR FROM PERFECT I believe in her as a whole. Because perhaps I was born in a wrong era but Im the old world type living today. Chivalrous, Nostalgic, a protector AND LOYAL. And to some of us old school carry-overs ((no longer desired?)) THIS is the moral authority. To defend YOUR OWN. The elderly lady up the road. The young family down the street. AND the a-hole across the way Which is what every fiber in my being believes General Lee did, with constant distaste in his mouth for *some* components of the war. Lee fought for His country. If you don’t like that verbiage I’ll adjust. Lee was LOYAL, and fought for his own. For the neighbor next door and beyond. And come the day, I will also despite the imperfections of my neighborhood, despite the nick of the woods I hail from. Just like Lee did.
Leave Lee alone. Shut your mouths and go actually try to live one-third as good of a life as Lee did. If you want to tear down a statue, then (FIRST) go find your facts about Nathaniel Bedford Forest of the Civil War.