Take down Andrew Jackson statues. But don’t let vandals decide which KC monuments must go
History buffs have a valid point when they lament the sometimes willy-nilly tearing down of statues in the wake of George Floyd’s killing. The recently toppled sculptures have included not just figures of a fallen and disreputable Confederacy, but also those of Union leaders and abolitionists who fought with all their might against slavery. It makes no sense.
Still, as blindly rage-filled as some of the statue removals have been, this spontaneous but long-in-coming movement isn’t about forgetting history. It’s about purging the present of some of its most haunting shadows.
Kansas City should do just that, but in a more thoughtful, reasoned and civilized way: with a regional commission to reassess area names and memorials.
Such a commission, similar to one proposed at the federal level by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, could elevate the discussion, educate the populace and provide for reasoned decisions the community can buy into.
It started, in large part, with a second look at J.C. Nichols’ place in history, and the noted segregationist’s name on the Country Club Plaza’s most prominent fountain and street. Jackson County Executive Frank White followed with a call Thursday to remove the monuments to Andrew Jackson from outside both of the county’s courthouses, calling the seventh president “a man who owned hundreds of slaves, opposed the abolitionist movement and caused thousands of Native Americans to die when he forced them out of their homeland for white settlement.”
We second White’s motion, but would broaden it to include an area commission that could take a comprehensive and cool-headed approach.
“We must ask ourselves, and those individuals from all communities, if our policies, practices and symbols truly reflect both the type of inclusive community we are and more importantly the type of community we want to be,” White said in a statement to The Star endorsing such a commission. “One important component of these discussions is the people and symbols we choose to elevate and honor. As such, I fully support the formation of a nonpartisan bistate commission that is empowered to openly and honestly assess the impact that the naming of our streets and public spaces, as well as the monuments we display, has on our residents.”
Mayor Quinton Lucas also expressed his support.
It sure would be better than the self-appointed mobs we’ve seen in other cities who have haphazardly appointed themselves the arbiters of propriety.
U.S. military bases named for Confederate leaders?
Kenya Cox, executive director of the Kansas African American Affairs Commission and Kansas NAACP State Conference of Branches president, says such a commission would have to reach a delicate balance between wiping out history and eradicating images and icons that represent a racist place and time in which Black people in our country were enslaved.
“I get real concerned when we go in, and we do things that will sanitize that history,” she says. “As a Black woman, I feel personally that I have suffered because of so much of the sanitation of history.”
Nonetheless, mindful that her father served with distinction on military bases named after Confederate leaders, when Cox saw their statues coming down, “Emotionally, I was just like, ‘Let’s just rip ‘em down!’ Then my reasonable mind starts to talk and says we want to be careful of the unintended consequences. We don’t want to kind of go in and then sanitize, and then folks think that this didn’t happen.
“We’ve got to be thoughtful and strategic and deliberate in our intentions. I think we have to start with, what is the goal in mind? I don’t think it should be something to just pacify. It should be a commitment to building a more perfect union.”
Communist regimes have purged their countries’ history, Cox notes. “They go in, they pull all the statues down, they try to erase this history. And I don’t want to erase it. I want people to know that this happened. This horrible atrocity happened. And we are still living in the residuals of that today.”
Andrew Jackson’s place in history can change
Perhaps one answer can be found in Eastern Europe, where painful memories have been removed from their places of prominence and move to museum-like settings. That’s one option for a Kansas City commission to consider.
We understand the attachment many feel toward our famous forebears. And, as Pelosi noted, it’s not necessary or even advisable to condemn all who came before.
And yet, these statues and names are far from sacrosanct. They don’t represent religious icons — let’s not act as if they do. On the contrary, through the clear lens of race and time, it turns out that many of those honored by previous generations were wholly undeserving of adulation.
It must be said that, while reassessing names and symbols are vital at this moment, we can’t stop there. It won’t mean much to remove Andrew Jackson’s likeness from outside the courthouse if the justice inside isn’t blind. There is yet much to accomplish to create the just society so ornately drawn in the words of our nation’s founders.
But taking a measured and undoubtedly difficult look at the names and memorials that adorn the city, and which denote the things we purport to value, is a pretty healthy start.
Yes, indiscriminately tearing down statues with no regard for what the honoree did or represented is a madness unfit for a civilized society. But neither should the contemptible forever cast its shadow over this or future generations.
It’s time to have a rational, inclusive and empathetic discussion of who is truly so worthy of our admiration that their names or images greet us every day.