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Robert E. Lee questions

Posted on 5/18/17 at 1:56 pm
Posted by The Levee
Bat Country
Member since Feb 2006
11789 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 1:56 pm
A. Would he be confused why his statue is even in NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana?

B. Having been as intelligent as he was....he had to know that someone would probably make a statue of him at some point...and further down the road people would want to knock it down. Do you think he would really care?

C. Did he feel remorse for joining the CSA? I know the answer is going to be that he was just defending his state of Virginia.

Just trying to make myself feel better about all of this.
Posted by Displaced
Member since Dec 2011
33054 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 1:57 pm to
quote:

Did he feel remorse for joining the CSA?


I actually asked him this yesterday. He said "nah, dog."
Posted by Carville
Sunshine, LA
Member since Jun 2014
5321 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 1:57 pm to
Nice try. This whole thing is sickening.
Posted by theGarnetWay
Washington, D.C.
Member since Mar 2010
27510 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 1:58 pm to
I doubt he thought there would be statues.

Even if he didn't regret fighting for the CSA and for Virginia specifically, he still fought for the losing side. I've never read much about his life after the Civil War, so maybe someone else can enlighten me on what Lee was thinking in his final days. Specifically, I'd like to know what he thought about his time in the Confederacy.

And the whole erection of statues and the "Lost Cause" came up many decades after his death. I don't think a lot of Confederates and Southerners were eager to talk or think about monuments during their time.
This post was edited on 5/18/17 at 2:05 pm
Posted by fightin tigers
Downtown Prairieville
Member since Mar 2008
79818 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 1:59 pm to
quote:

Do you think he would really care?



According to him he didn't want a statue or to be remembered. So he probably wouldn't fight to keep it up.
Posted by Topwater Trout
Red Stick
Member since Oct 2010
70176 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 1:59 pm to
quote:

he had to know that someone would probably make a statue of him at some point...and further down the road people would want to knock it down.


i would think an intelligent man would think time heals all wounds...not that people get more offended as time goes by
Posted by BilJ
Member since Sep 2003
163111 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:01 pm to
the issue is you're needlessly fricking with a New Orleans landmark and making it an eye sore just because
Posted by fightin tigers
Downtown Prairieville
Member since Mar 2008
79818 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:01 pm to
quote:

would think an intelligent man would think time heals all wounds...not that people get more offended as time goes by



Still can't hunt Pokémon at Auschwitz without pissing people off.
Posted by theGarnetWay
Washington, D.C.
Member since Mar 2010
27510 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:03 pm to
quote:


i would think an intelligent man would think time heals all wounds...not that people get more offended as time goes by


Except the much of the monuments were put up as some kind of retrospective glorified version of the Confederacy.

That flag that was taken down in front of the SC state house last year was put up in the '60s or so specifically to symbolize our resistance to segregate.
Posted by RedPop4
Santiago de Compostela
Member since Jan 2005
15336 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:03 pm to
quote:

Did he feel remorse for joining the CSA?

It has widely been discussed that common sentiment and identity in those days was that people considered themselves residents of their towns and sovereign states FIRST and U.S. citizens a distant second.

Lee and Beauregard, while proud of their U.S. Army positions, and their connections to West Point and the army, were Virginian and Louisianan above even that.The Civil War profoundly changed that, and the 10th Amendment has been weaker since. I don't have all the history on that, but many mark the Civil War as the beginning point of the much more powerful government in Washington than previously.
Posted by Tiger Prawn
Member since Dec 2016
26332 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:05 pm to
quote:

Still can't hunt Pokémon at Auschwitz without pissing people off.


Why would you want to hunt Pokemon at Auschwitz anyway? Probably catch nothing but Gastly all day
Posted by theGarnetWay
Washington, D.C.
Member since Mar 2010
27510 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:06 pm to
quote:

I don't have all the history on that, but many mark the Civil War as the beginning point of the much more powerful government in Washington than previously.


Indeed. Like you, I don't have a bunch of research right here in front of me to present.

But if I'm not mistaken, the South actually had a pretty legitimate legal argument for a state's ability to secede from the Union. After that, it was made much more difficult by design.

Also, during the war itself Lincoln imposed things like the first ever income tax and habeas corpus.
This post was edited on 5/18/17 at 2:09 pm
Posted by Perrydawg
Middle Ga Area
Member since Jan 2014
5159 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:06 pm to
Plus if I am not mistaken Lee designed portions of the levies and other structures around New Orleans when he was in the predecessor to the Corp of Engineers before he took over VMI before the start of Civil War.
Posted by Cajunate
Louisiana
Member since Aug 2012
3574 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:06 pm to
quote:

the issue is you're needlessly fricking with a New Orleans landmark and making it an eye sore just because


Annnnd.... making up lies about statues running off smart people to other cities. When it's the poor schools, high crime, pathetic infrastructure and crooked politicians.
Posted by fightin tigers
Downtown Prairieville
Member since Mar 2008
79818 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:09 pm to
quote:

Plus if I am not mistaken Lee designed portions of the levies and other structures around New Orleans when he was in the predecessor to the Corp of Engineer


Should be really erect monuments to these people?

I don't think the lower 9th is building a GW Bush statue anytime soon.
Posted by Napoleon
Kenna
Member since Dec 2007
74884 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:17 pm to
The thugs would like Lee if he had a "choppa" (an AK-47 for those who don't know ghetto terms) on his statue.

Posted by PJinAtl
Atlanta
Member since Nov 2007
14708 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:17 pm to
quote:

It has widely been discussed that common sentiment and identity in those days was that people considered themselves residents of their towns and sovereign states FIRST and U.S. citizens a distant second.
Exactly. As Shelby Foote said in the Ken Burns documentary, before the Civil War, people the phrase was "The United States are..." afterward it became "The United States is..."

After the war, Lee believed that the issues that caused the war had been settled - and that God had made his decision and passed judgment.

He asks his former soldiers to lay down their arms, and they do. Many believe that if Lee had not been as prestigious as he was, and held in such high esteem by his men, the great peace that followed the war would not have happened.

He still believed that his loyalty was to his state, telling a friend ""I cannot desert my native state in the hour of her adversity. I must abide her fortune, and share her fate."

But he also wanted the country to remain united. During his time as president of Washington College (now Washington and Lee University) he wrote to a bitter Confederate widow, "Dismiss from your mind all sectional feeling, and bring [your children] up to be Americans."
Posted by Napoleon
Kenna
Member since Dec 2007
74884 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:19 pm to
Bush was the president. That's it.

Lee was credited with helping to prevent the river from shifting it's banks away from the city.

Literally he helped save the city of New Orleans,

What drives me nuts is all the idiots who said "history is boring" are the ones calling the shots now.

Posted by rickyh
Positiger Nation
Member since Dec 2003
13189 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:23 pm to
Mitch has single handedly destroyed a great part of the Legacy of a once great city. People are starting to hate part of our own state. This could be the straw that breaks the camels back. The sad thing is, he is doing it for what he sees as his own political gain. He is being paid. And he has his eyes set on running for a national office.
Posted by doubleb
Baton Rouge
Member since Aug 2006
43068 posts
Posted on 5/18/17 at 2:32 pm to
A- They needed a statue in Lee Circle so they put one there.

B- indeed Lee believed they would one day erect a statue of him and for that reason he always wore his dress greys. He didn't know how long the statue would be up, but he believed it would outlast Beauregard's. Being a smart man like you say, he was tight.

C- He was torn between staying in the Union or joining Virginia in the Confederacy. He could not reconcile the situation, and thus Virginia was split in two. Now we have West Virginia and Lee Virginia (now shortened to Virginia).

The rest is histoire as we say down on the bayou.
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