We've all heard the opinion expressed in our church that the Confederate statue issue is a simple one and that the moral imperative is clear. Edwin M. Yoder in today's N&O elaborates on a viewpoint that is quite at odds from that easy simplistic view. Since Yoder is one of the true giants of North Carolina journalism (Rhodes Scholar, Pulitzer Prize, long time editorialist for Washington Post), his views merit serious consideration. His closing sentences are particularly worthy of contemplation ...
“Nothing,” remarked the historian Macaulay, “is so disgusting as the English in one of their periodic fits of morality,” and such sanctimony is all too familiar on these shores. We are in the throes of such a fit today, and the one certainty is that history, properly understood, will be the loser.
Edwin M. Yoder: Tributes to the Fallen or to Jim Crow?
“Nothing,” remarked the historian Macaulay, “is so disgusting as the English in one of their periodic fits of morality,” and such sanctimony is all too familiar on these shores. We are in the throes of such a fit today, and the one certainty is that history, properly understood, will be the loser.
Edwin M. Yoder: Tributes to the Fallen or to Jim Crow?