Letter to Editor: Confederate Statue Unfit to Stand on Public Land

Editor’s Note: The following is a letter to the Montgomery County Council about the Confederate memorial in Rockville from local resident Marco Simons. He shared a copy with Patch.

As a current resident of Silver Spring and former resident of Rockville, I applaud the efforts of Montgomery County to remove the Confederate memorial from the Rockville courthouse lawn. I echo many of the concerns expressed by Council member Tom Hucker and by the Department of Parks concerning most of the relocation options proposed. I believe that the only sensible option is to transfer the statute into private hands, and only if this can happen without expense to the County.

Reasons for removing the statue, and the historical context of its donation

It is worth reflecting on the reasons for removal of the statue from the courthouse. The primary reason is that it is inappropriate to maintain symbols that honor the Confederacy on public land in Montgomery County. Although the statue may not evoke the visual references of the battle flag or other more well-known symbols of the Confederacy, in many ways its historical symbolism is worse.

The statue honors Montgomery County residents who defied Maryland’s refusal to join the Confederacy and crossed over to Virginia to fight against the Union, a deplorable cause at the time. Unlike soldiers from states of the Confederacy, these soldiers’ actions cannot be explained by loyalty to their homes and families. Instead it is more likely explained by ideology – loyalty to the cause of slavery that motivated the rebellion, a practice that Maryland shared with the Confederacy. Montgomery County should not honor those who left their homes and their state to voluntarily fight for this cause.

This is compounded by the historical context in which the statue was donated. This was not an immediate postwar recognition of sacrifice – it came nearly 50 years after the end of the Civil War, as part of an effort by neo-confederate organizations (such as the United Daughters of the Confederacy and the United Confederate Veterans) to burnish the legacy of the Confederate cause and deny that the rebellion was motivated by slavery.

These views are perhaps best exemplified by Mildred Rutherford, who was the historian of the UDC in 1913, when the statue was dedicated. Rutherford’s pro-slavery views were apparent, and she expressly tied the monument-building campaign to the rehabilitation of the image of the Confederacy and its cause. Rutherford’s 1913 speech to the UDC, “Thirteen periods of United States history,” is available on the web (http://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/009582850); in it she first defends slavery and the secession of the South:

Seward and other Northern politicians . . . arranged to so legislate that no slaves should be in this newly acquired territory. This naturally made the South indignant . . . . The hiding of runaway slaves, and believing their representations of plantation life rather than the representations of the Christian men of the South caused increased resentment. Thirty thousand of our negroes, the property of the planters, had been encouraged to run away and hidden from their owners by means of the so-called “Underground Railways” at the North, and sent across the line to Canada.

As in family life, a child is punished if disobedient, so in plantation life a disobedient and unruly negro had to be punished. . . .

A Georgia lawyer, Thos. R. R. Cobb, brought out about this time a book, “The Law of Slavery,” which really is a most remarkable production. Every available authority upon the subject of slavery among all nations was carefully studied and quoted. Coming about the time of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” it was suppressed in the North, and the war coming on prevented a second edition in the South. When William Lloyd Garrison heard that this book proved that the institution of slavery was defended by the Bible, he said, “Better then destroy the Bible,” showing to what length his fanaticism led him. Fourteen Northern States passed “Personal Liberty Bills” and were violating the Fugitive Slave Law which was included in Henry Clay’s Omnibus Bill. The South feeling that this Omnibus Bill was unjust to her, accepted it, hoping to bring peace, when these same Northern States, violating the law, urged the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, and he was elected without a single electoral vote from the South, the Southern States felt no right would be respected and it was full time to secede.

And then Rutherford ties the monument-building effort, led by Confederate women, to the rehabilitation of the Confederacy’s image:

This was the time when those women of the Confederacy showed of what stuff they were made. . . . They began to collect the bodies of the Confederate soldiers scattered over the battle fields, placing them where they could care for them, and where they could deck those graves with flowers. Then they began to erect monuments over them. . . . Ben Butler, in Louisiana, said we should not build monuments to our Confederate dead, and so said Meade, in Georgia, but we did it anyway, didn’t we? They did not know Southern women. More monuments stand to the Confederate soldier today than to any other soldier of any other nation who ever fought for any cause.

Had not Lincoln been assassinated, all would have gone well even then, for the negroes still loved their old owners, and did not wish to leave them. . . .

The Ku Klux Klan was an absolute necessity in the South at this time. . . .

The record of the Confederate soldier, the heroism of the Confederate women, the monuments erected to Southern valor have caused the whole world to be lost in admiration and wonder.

This was the context in which the Rockville statue was erected. It was part of a calculated national effort to rehabilitate the cause of the Confederacy, not the result of local sentiment toward the sacrifice of Montgomery County residents.

The secondary reason for removal, at this point, is that the statue has become a magnet for vandalism. While this should not deter maintaining a monument to a worthy cause, Montgomery County should not subject its public lands to vandalism, nor commit resources to defend against and clean up after vandals, for a cause that never should have been promoted to begin with. In any open-air, public-access location, the statue is likely to draw the same vandalism that recently occurred in Rockville. No park or community should be forced to bear that.

Proposed relocation options

Given these reasons for removal, several of proposed relocation options make little sense. The Parks Department has already recommended against any of the MNCPPC parks proposed, and I agree with their assessment, although for additional reasons. None of these park locations would serve the purpose of removing the statue from a public display which its cause does not deserve, and none of them would eliminate the statue as a target for vandalism in our public spaces.

Councilmember Hucker has commented further on the inappropriateness of placing the statue in Jesup Blair Park, and I agree with his sentiments. It is particularly inappropriate to place the statute in a park which, whatever its historical connections may be, is primarily used by children for its playgrounds and athletic fields. I regularly pass by or run through this park, less than a mile from my house, and placing the statue there would be unacceptable to this community.

But, given its history and symbolism, it should be unacceptable to any community in Montgomery County. Yes, Montgomery County sent soldiers to fight for the Confederacy, and many slaves were held here. This is a history that we should not forget. But neither should we honor those who left their state to defend slavery, or continue to be complicit in the effort to burnish the image of the Confederacy.

The Parks Department recommends Beall-Dawson House as one of two potential options after all MNCPCC parks are ruled out. While I agree that this location might be preferable to the parks, it would be an insult to the legacy of these Rockville families. Although slaveholders, the Beall daughters were no Confederate sympathizers; as the Historical Society itself notes, when General McClellan spent the night at the house, he described the Beall sisters as of “strong Union sentiment.” The Dawsons likewise “favored the North,” according to Peerless Rockville. Placing a monument to their neighbors who left to fight for the Confederacy would dishonor their legacy.

Use of County funds

I strongly agree with Councilmember Hucker’s position that no public funds should be used to move the statue. The statue was donated with private money; if private donors are not interested in preserving the statue, so be it. But this is an additional reason that the statue should not be placed in any public location. Even if private funds are secured to move the statue, and to make the necessary improvements identified by the Parks Department for placement in any park, surely some public funds will be needed for upkeep – especially if the statue remains a target for vandalism.

This leaves donating to private custody as the only viable option. If there are those who still wish to honor Marylanders who fought for the Confederacy, let them keep the statue. It was a mistake for Montgomery County to allow its public space to be used for this purpose a century ago, and long past time for us correct that mistake.

Sincerely, Marco Simons