The Left’s Crusade Against Statues Is About Destroying America

On Tuesday, the Commonwealth of Virginia installed a new statue to represent the state in the U.S. Capitol. Virginia is one of the most storied states in the union. Some of the most prominent Founding Fathers were Virginians, and four of the first five presidents hailed from the Old Dominion. Out of countless worthy figures, Virginia chose … Barbara Rose Johns. Never heard of her? Well, don’t feel bad. Practically no one in America had heard of her either until five minutes ago.

The statue of Johns replaced a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee that had stood in the Capitol for 111 years before it was shamefully removed in December 2020. The usual suspects sneered and celebrated, and some spineless Republicans joined in as well, desperate to appeal to activists who loathe them.

“You can’t tell the story of Virginia, or the story of how our nation overcame segregation, without telling the story of Barbara Rose Johns,” Gov. Glenn Youngkin, R-Va.

Yes, you can tell the history of Virginia without telling the story of Johns, actually. You can’t tell the history of Virginia, or America, without Lee.

He’s perhaps the archetypal antebellum American. He came from a family of landed gentry that fell on hard times, had a classical education, joined the military, had a large family, went West, thought deeply about many of the most pressing issues of his time, and was ultimately forced to choose where his loyalties lay. Lee has inspired millions, likely tens of millions, to live lives of honor. He treated others, including his enemies, with honor his entire life.

Generations upon generations of Americans, including progressive icons like FDR, recognized that Lee was worth honoring. Even the Republican-controlled Congress immediately after the Civil War respected Lee enough to address him as general (a rank he only achieved as a Confederate — he was a colonel in the U.S. Army) during his appearance at an official congressional hearing. And many Unionists spoke and wrote about Lee and other Confederates with respect and honor.

I could go on for thousands of words on why Lee is worthy of honor as an important historical figure, and many excellent books have been written in praise of Lee’s character, his military ability, and his worthiness to be counted among the greatest Americans. I could make the typical arguments that modern morals shouldn’t be applied to the past, that many Americans in the antebellum period held higher loyalty to their state than to the federal government, that Lee felt like he was protecting his home and his family, or that he held complex views on slavery. All of those arguments are true, but none of that matters to the leftists.

Reasonable people with the ability to see nuance can recognize that, though he may have ultimately made a mistake, he was a supremely able commander and honorable man, and that he is therefore worthy of being honored as an important figure in our nation’s history. Again, this was the view that the vast majority of Americans, including their enemies on the Union side, held about Lee and other Confederates until the last decade or so.

But the gay race communists have worked tirelessly to make this a wedge issue to divide Americans and poison them against their own history.

Those on the left who call Robert E. Lee a traitor and call for statues of him to be torn down have no interest in the historical facts or good faith debate. They only want to sow strife and division within America, so it’s not worth it to engage them on the merits of the argument. It’s all a ploy anyway. They wish to leverage the destruction of statues and American history into political power. Historical nuance and complexity are inconveniences to these people, roadblocks on the path to their political goals.

Leftists don’t really care about racism or slavery or justice. They only care about tearing down America’s history and its heroes, about destroying the common history and identity that make America what it is. A nation without a common history or identity is no nation at all, and that’s the left’s ultimate aim.

The same people who celebrate the mass slaughter of babies via abortion and support the mutilation of children in the name of so-called transgender liberation want to be the arbiters of who is worthy of honor and remembrance in our history. They’ve had a decades-long monopoly in academia to push their version of our nation’s past, and the recent Ken Burns documentary on the American Revolution showed that they are still determined to propagate a deeply twisted view of our country’s history.

As they’ve continued their work of tearing down statues, the left has begun the work of tearing down people. The assassination prep pushed by leftists comes from the same vein as their anti-statue rhetoric.

The fact that the left can see nothing to honor about Lee means they can’t see anything to honor about their enemies, that is, conservatives. They’ll treat us with the same viciousness if they win. By demonizing the past, the left demonizes those who still honor it, giving deranged lunatics an open invitation to commit violence against conservatives. We saw that pattern result in two attempted assassinations against Donald Trump and the cold-blooded murder of Charlie Kirk.

It’s no secret that the left wishes for the destruction of the American people. Mass Third World migration, abortion on demand, and the transgender insanity all represent policies pointed toward that end. Tearing down statues also represents an attempt to destroy the American people, to sever the links between the American people and their forefathers.

The left has done a very good job of infecting America with an existentially dangerous strain of cultural nihilism. Millions of American students have been taught to hate themselves and their ancestors, and some people believe that taking pride in their heritage is no different from white supremacy. It may seem convenient, perhaps even wise, to compromise on something like statues of Robert E. Lee. But remember, when they go after statues of Lee, they’re not trying to right historical wrongs or give a voice to the oppressed. They’re trying to destroy American history and the American people along with it.

Hayden Daniel is a staff editor at The Federalist. He previously worked as an editor at The Daily Wire and as deputy editor/opinion editor at The Daily Caller. He received his B.A. in European History from Washington and Lee University with minors in Philosophy and Classics. Follow him on Twitter at @HaydenWDaniel