A FITTING TRIBUTE TO A GEORGIA GIANT
Each year, thousands of people visit the U.S. Capitol Building including the impressive Hall of Statues that leads from Rotunda into the chambers of the House of Representatives. Each state may present two statues for display. While there is insufficient space to display all the statues, the others are placed in prominent places throughout the Capitol Building.
One of the most interesting ones is Will Rogers. Widely known for his sense of humor and wit, when Rogers was told that his home state of Oklahoma wanted to put up a statue in his honor his only request was “Just put me where I can keep an eye on Congress.” So while the other statues are lined up on each side of the corridor, Rogers’s statue stands beside the entrance, with his eyes firmly fixed on the entrance to the Congress. It is also considered good luck to rub the foot of his bronze statue, so the toe of his left shoe is shiny as gold.
The individual states have always decided whose statues they wish to represent them in the Capitol Building. Congress has had no control over this. Currently, there are eleven statues honoring members of the Confederacy, nine of whom are portrayed in their military uniforms. In 2000, legislation was passed that allowed states to replace their statues with different ones. Several states, including Alabama, have replaced their Confederate statues with new ones.
Sadly, Georgia has not been one of those states. One statue chosen to represent Georgia in the Capitol Building is that of Crawford Long, a native of Danielsville, Georgia who developed the use of anesthesia. Georgia’s second statue is that of Alexander Stephens, Vice-President of the Confederacy and 50th Governor of Georgia. However, in June of this year, bipartisan legislation was introduced in the Georgia Legislature to replace Stephens’s statue with one of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Respectfully, as there is already a memorial including a statue of Dr. King at The Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial at the National Mall in Washington, D.C., I strongly urge the commissioning of a statue of Representative John Robert Lewis to replace the one of Alexander Stephens.
Georgia now has the opportunity to honor the memory of a giant who lived in our midst. John Lewis was an icon of the Civil Rights movement. He was elected to 17 terms in the House of Representatives and served nearly 34 years. At the time of his death, he was the longest-serving member and dean of the Georgia Congressional delegation. It would be the perfect tribute to keep his presence in Congress, still serving as its conscience.
Governor Kemp and the Georgia Legislature can authorize replacing a Confederate disgrace with the statue of a true patriot who spent his life fighting for the rights and liberty of all people. Not just Georgians, not just Americans, but oppressed people around the globe. Surely there is no justifiable reason for our state leadership not to do so.
President Trump has turned preserving Confederate statues into a major campaign issue, no doubt to appease and appeal to his “Karenfederacy” base. But once again, he has underestimated the political prowess of Nancy Pelosi. According to The Hill, “A new spending bill for legislative branch operations unveiled by House Democrats on July 6th (sic) “would order the removal of statues that depict people who served in the Confederacy or otherwise worked to uphold slavery from the Capitol. …. The House Appropriations Committee is expected to advance the bill Friday for a floor vote later this month.”
This would remove the power of the states to continue to honor a failed rebellion and its failed champions. No doubt there will be an outcry of “but muh heritage” and “you’re erasing history” however, it is time, in the 21st century, to recognize that honoring these men dishonors the legacy of this grand, patriotic experiment we dare call a Republic. The states are free to relocate their Confederate “heroes” to an appropriate museum — or basement.
N.B. — During the editing and prior to the publishing of this piece, Politico published an opinion piece echoing the same sentiments. In the Politico piece, Issac J. Bailey also makes clear there is no one more deserving of memorializing than Representative John Robert Lewis.
