Intellectual Takeout
..."For a short season in my life, I, too, struggled in a similar way. It was uncaring and uncompassionate not to feel for my great aunt’s great loss and pain. But when Christ gave me eternal life and His heart to forgive, I learned that forgiveness is life, and love is more powerful than hatred." Thomas Kaufmann
. . . "April 9 marks the 160th anniversary of the end of the Civil War, but practically no one is talking about it. The Civil War has been banished, exiled – practically erased from cultural memory today."That’s a shame, because just as I should not hate the German people and German things – including my Volkswagen, Von Braun, the Interstate Highway system, Krups appliances, and much, much more – so should American citizens not hate and seek to erase portions of our entire historical narrative as a nation, especially the story of the Civil War.
"Everyone these days is talking about Civil Rights, and rightfully so; the story bell of Civil Rights should be rung and rung and rung.
"But so should the story bell of the Civil War.
"After all, the Civil War was the “Morningstar” of the Civil Rights Movement since it achieved the first freedom from slavery for black Americans, fulfilling the promise of the Emancipation Proclamation. Truly, it was a decisive first victory for Civil Rights. Done.
"It’s amazing to me that so many scholars have missed this critical point – or maybe they are in willful denial of the truth of it. Trying to erase it only makes things worse in the end; this history is as important as the rest of the history of our great land.
"It was very unfortunate that many Civil War statues were destroyed during recent uprisings – and also very sad that key military installations were renamed due to “wokeness,” as they were great teaching tools for learning about the past, in every respect – good and bad. Likewise, the controversy over the Confederate Battle Flag does not erase it from the story of the war and its appropriate places for display and use.
"We urgently need to begin telling the complete story of the Civil War once again in all schools, colleges, and universities. It deserves to be written about and discussed in films depicting it’s richly textured history so that the account may be known today and preserved for future generations. All historic Civil War battlefields, museums, landmarks, sites, and places – on both sides – should be venerated, while the stories of all the actors in the Civil War should be told, restored as significant candidates for research and study. Parents, teachers, and all citizens would do well to become students of its full history, as well as patrons of Civil War museums, battlefields, landmarks, sites, and battle re-enactments in order to teach the next generation about how this critical event helped forge our nation.
"So tell the story of the Civil War. Tell it in its fullness, letting history speak for itself. Tell about how providential it was as an agent for freeing black Americans from the evil of institutional slavery. Tell it alongside the story of Civil Rights, letting these two great stories inform each other, enriching the story of America, and why America’s greatness has survived and overcome suffering, injustice, bloodshed – and even war against itself."
Thomas Kaufmann is an author and a Fellow Emeritus of the Institute of Classical Architecture and Art. He lives in Montgomery, Ala., and may be contacted at artisthistorian@gmail.com.
