>>  John Philip Adams wrote:
>>  It is not fair or just to impose 2012 mores and
>>  ideology on 16th, 17th and 18th century happenings.

> From: Henry Wiencek
> Well, if we can't criticize then we can't praise; and we
> should stop calling those venerable folks our "heroes."
> That's a judgement, too, isn't it?

Good question. Mr. Adams also wrote, "We need to quit fighting the war." It 
seems to me that even omitting, as he does, the nineteenth century -- when 
the country finally rejected slavery -- what this all amounts to is an 
unsupportable charge of presentism. When President Lincoln invoked 
eighteenth-century founding principles at Gettysburg, didn't he affirm what 
all but the deluded and the self-interested had long known precisely under 
the "mores and ideology" of the time, namely, that slavery was a national 
crime? And who's asking to continue fighting? In sesquicentennial engagement 
with the Civil War, isn't the implicit underlying assertion merely that it's 
constructive to continue trying to understand the past? As I've been saying, 
next week Virginia's leaders of both parties are going to further cement 
what I believe is a mistaken understanding by celebrating May 24 at Fort 
Monroe instead of May 23 -- that is, by celebrating something only somewhat 
important in American history (if it's just a white general's reactive 
"contraband decision") as opposed to celebrating something centrally 
important to the meaning of America itself (if it's Black Americans' active 
decisions affirming, in effect, the laws of nature and of nature's god). 
Anyway, even if someone finds my interpretation of that stuff all wrong, the 
May 23 vs. May 24 question illustrates that understanding the past matters 
for making choices about the future.  What story about America's founding 
should Virginia tell the world? To improve upon Virginia's Historic 
Triangle, should we create a Historic Diamond 
(http://ideas.fmauthority.com/fort-monroe-authority-do-you-think-the-peninsula-is-a-great-region/peninsula-s-historic-diamond-full-story-of-america-s-founding)? 
We can't sort it out if we stop probing the past.
Steven T. Corneliussen
http://www.fortmonroenationalpark.org/

______________________________________
To subscribe, change options, or unsubscribe please see the instructions at
http://listlva.lib.va.us/archives/va-hist.html