In April 1926, the New York Amsterdam News[1] and the Pittsburgh Courier[2] simultaneously printed a letter authored by Neval Thomas, a civil rights activist then serving as president of the Washington, D.C. branch of the NAACP.
Thomas’s letter criticized plans to erect a statue to Alexander Stephens, vice-president of the CSA, in the National Statuary Hall of the Capitol Building. The letter was addressed to the Architect of the Capitol, arguing that Stephens “wears the stain of helping to found the only government in the history of the world whose sole purpose was the perpetuation of slavery.”[3] Thomas connected the Stephens monument to specific injustices in the long struggle against racism, proclaiming that Stephens
gave all of his genius to that spirit that murdered Lovejoy, assaulted
Sumner, dragged Garrison through the streets of Boston, placed a price
upon the head of Frederick Douglass and brought infinite sorrow and
suffering to the millions of noble men and women in black.[4]
Thomas also drew a clear line between the myth of the Lost Cause and the evocative power of monuments, writing,
The urge for the admission of these two statues springs from the unrepentant spirit that wants the union to admit that the South was right in seeking to wrong the Union. It knows that cold marble can proclaim its cause, especially when it is placed in the very center and heart of government.[5]
The federal government ignored these arguments, and a statue of Stephens—a gift from the state of Georgia—was placed in Statuary Hall in 1927.
After the statue was installed, another nationally renowned civil rights leader, Mary Church Terrell, wrote an op-ed for the New Journal and Guide condemning the statue. She noted that
In no other country in the wide world would such a scene be possible as was witnessed in the Capitol a few days ago, when the statue of a man who had tried to destroy his government was received with gratitude and praise by one of its highest representatives![6]
The representative Terrell referred to was then-vice-president Charles Dawes, who gave a speech at the statue’s dedication. Terrell warned that this warm “attitude toward a traitor” would teach American youth that the “effort to wreck and ruin the government under which one lives” is worthy of commemoration.[7]
Georgia, Terrell argued, had “added insult to injury” through the act of “giving to the Nation’s Hall of Fame the statue of a man who helped her try to cut the country in two.”[8]
Olivia Haynie
References
Mary Church Terrell. “Up-To-Date: Vice President of Confederacy Lauded.”
New Journal and Guide (Norfolk, VA). December 24, 1927.
New York Amsterdam News. “Neval Thomas Opposes Statue to Confederate Leader in Statuary Hall.” April 7, 1926.
Pittsburgh Courier. “Neval Thomas Fights Statue For Stephens.” April 10, 1926.
New York Amsterdam News, “Neval Thomas Opposes Statue to
Confederate Leader in Statuary Hall.” ↩︎
Pittsburgh Courier, “Neval Thomas Fights Statue For
Stephens.” ↩︎
New York Amsterdam News, “Neval Thomas Opposes Statue to
Confederate Leader in Statuary Hall.” ↩︎
New York Amsterdam News, “Neval Thomas Opposes Statue to
Confederate Leader in Statuary Hall.” ↩︎
New York Amsterdam News, “Neval Thomas Opposes Statue to
Confederate Leader in Statuary Hall.” ↩︎
Terrell, “Up-To-Date: Vice President of Confederacy Lauded.” New
Journal and Guide. ↩︎
Terrell, “Up-To-Date: Vice President of Confederacy Lauded.” New
Journal and Guide. ↩︎
Terrell, “Up-To-Date: Vice President of Confederacy Lauded.” New
Journal and Guide. ↩︎