Years ago, I worked at an office in Washington DC, and one morning, while drinking my coffee, I noticed there was a yellow duck in the painting that was hung outside my office. I had been working there for a few years and had never noticed the duck. Apparently, the same thing happened with members of the Library Board.
The WWII memorial plaque that now hangs in the “WWI Memorial Library”, which has been around since the 1920s, is at the center of a broiling battle pitting woke Social Justice Warriors against intelligent advocates of history, perspective, and common sense.
The bone of contention is that the plaque breaks out the list of war casualties by race. One list has white casualties of World War I, the second list has the names of African-American casualties. The term “colored” appears at the top of the African-American list. The offense that is taken not only pertains to the separation by race but that the “colored” list appears below the Caucasian list.
At the May meeting of the Cape Charles Library Board, member Nancy Vest asked to add a discussion about the appropriateness of the WWII memorial plaque displayed in the Library. That item was placed on the May agenda so that the library’s Grand Poobah, Chris Bannon could be in attendance.
The Shore Daily News reported that board member Cathy Fox has come prepared with a scorched earth policy, noting that the state code makes it a crime to move a war memorial from its original place, adding “It values the whites. It undervalues the blacks…Essentially it should have stayed when we moved”, and that it would be “the town’s problem.” Fox also said she is ready to take this fight to the next level if need be, and that she would use the courts to obtain an opinion on where the final resting place for the memorial should be.
Advocating for common sense and perspective, Town Council member Chris Bannon countered that given the time period, the plaque actually shows that the town was fairly progressive since it put both black and white names on the same memorial (even as the schools were still segregated).
Will the plaque have to move back to confines of the Civic Center? Town Planner Larry DiRe has contacted the town attorney to review the issue.
Below are some opinions by the Attorney General on the subject:
ATTORNEY GENERAL OPINIONS
2015 AG Opinion (2015 WL 4850422) – § 15.2-1812 applies to monuments for any war or conflict, including an engagement in such war or conflict, or for war veterans, but not to memorials or markers erected to recognize the historical significance of buildings.
2017 AG Opinion (2017 WL 3901711)
· Question Presented: How § 18.2-1812, or other legal restrictions, impact the authority of a locality to remove or relocate war or veterans monuments on property owned or controlled by the locality?
· Three Considerations: (i) the application of § 15.2-1812, (ii) whether monument subject to individual Acts of Assembly governing their construction and maintenance, and (iii) whether monument subject to restrictions in documents transferring ownership of monument to locality or restrictions imposed as a result of subsequent actions of the locality.
· Regarding application of § 15.2-1812:
o Does not apply to any monument or memorial constructed prior to 1904.
Also does not apply to a monument or memorial erected on any property other than the “public square” at the county seat prior to 1997. [Unclear if this applies to the Cape Charles Plaque.]
o Also does not apply to any monument or memorial erected within an independent city prior to 1997.
2018 AG Opinion (2018 WL 4945133)
Question Presented: Whether the Dickinson County Board of Supervisors would violate § 15.2-1812 if it authorized the demolition of a former high school (DMHS), given that the building was constructed in memory of the soldiers, sailors and marines of Dickinson County who lost their lives in World War I?
Conclusion: DMHS not subject to § 15.2-1812.
As originally codified in 1904, § 15.2-1812 had a much more limited scope, applying only to “the erection of a Confederate monument upon the public square of [a] county at the county seat thereof,” when so authorized by joint action of the county’s board of supervisors and circuit court. It was not until 1930 that the General Assembly extended these statutory protections to monuments to the “World War,” and not until 1997 that the requirement of joint action of the county’s board of supervisors and circuit court was eliminated.
· Applying the above principles – DMHS subject to § 15.2-1812:
When DMHS was constructed in the 1920s, the statute protected only monuments that had been erected by joint action of a county’s circuit court and its board of supervisors. DMHS was not constructed pursuant to that statutory scheme.
The statutory protections in place in 1920 covered only Confederate monuments, not World War I monuments. When the General Assembly revised the statute in 1930 to protect World War I monuments, it omitted any intent to extend protections to existing monuments.
At the time of DMHS’s construction, the statute protected only monuments constructed “upon the public square of [a] county at the county seat thereof.” Even though DMHS was constructed to “stand as a monument and memorial to soldiers, sailors and marines” who died in World War I, the nature of a high school facility distinguishes it from the type of war monument that the General Assembly authorized county boards of supervisors and circuit courts to construct “upon the public square.”
2018 AG Opinion (2018 WL 6929178) – The placement of a proposed Emancipation Proclamation monument in a county’s “Civil War Park” does not implicate § 15.2-1812.
About the Author
The monument shows the loyalty of Black Americans to the US at a time when that loyalty should not be taken for granted. More Blacks died fighting in WWI than Whites – that is the message I read from the monument, and that in the days of the worst Jim Crow.
Speaking of “the worst Jim Crow,” in 1924, the state of Oregon required electors to read the Constitution in English and write their name.
There is an example of what is considered “Jim Crow” in America.
In Washington State, a constitutional amendment passed in 1896 requiring electors to read and speak English.
There is another “Jim Crow” law for you.
And in Washington Sate in 1912 a statute was passed noting, “If naturalized, must furnish satisfactory evidence that he is capable of reading and speaking the English language so as to comprehend the meaning of ordinary English prose.”
And that is a Jim Crow law as well.
Check it out at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Jim_Crow_law_examples_by_state#Virginia
Well, it looks to me like we have a rather simple situation here. We have a plaque that someone is questioning where it should hang, depending on exactly when it was made, and why. Apparently it’s birthday MAY dictate if it’s allowed to be moved from it’s original location. Also, I’d guess a dedication ceremony took place and records exist of that. That ceremony would tell us the intention of the creation of the memorial, which also helps define and apply the correct laws that dictate the proper place for this item. We need to abide by the law, correct ? Then finally, the uproar over the top and bottom, whites coloreds question. Were the whites privileged and the coloreds insulted ? Hey, I don’t know the original intention. I can’t ask the folks that created the plaque. HOWEVER, if the plaque offends we can simply put the blacks on top by hanging it upside down. By use of properly mounted mirrors, we can still read the names. THEN, perhaps a week or a month later we can turn the plaque over again to make sure whites aren’t offended. Does that work ?
I am amazed at this continuing fixation people have in here with counting up what people have white skin, versus how many people had black skin in any given situation, as if it actually meant something, when it meant nothing at all.
Take the black folks who served in WWI, and thanks for your service, dudes, for example.
If somehow a lot of them died in France during WWI, it was because they were serving this country faithfully as SOLDIERS!
They were not conscripts.
To the degree that anyone in the military is not a slave to duty, they were all free men.
And in war, men die, and that is not rationed by skin color, but circumstances and leadership.
When you fought in regiments in France in WWI as the black folks did, and it was your regiment’s turn to get stuffed into the meatgrinder, then a lot of those dead would have to be black, given everyone in the regiment was, and those “colored” regiment were put under French command, which is probably why a lot of them died.
Colored soldiers, known as the Buffalo Soldiers, had initially as their main duty to support the nation’s westward expansion by protecting settlers, building roads and other infrastructure, and guarding the U.S. mail.
They served at a variety of posts in the Southwest and Great Plains, taking part in most of the military campaigns during the decades-long Indian Wars –– during which they compiled a distinguished record, with 18 Buffalo Soldiers awarded the Medal of Honor.
This exceptional performance helped to overcome resistance to the idea of black Army officers, paving the way for the first African-American graduate from West Point Military Academy, Henry O. Flipper.
Buffalo Soldiers played significant roles in many other military actions.
They took part in defusing the little-known 1892 Johnson County War in Wyoming, which pitted small farmers against wealthy ranchers and a band of hired gunmen.
They also fought in the Spanish-American and Philippine-American Wars, and played a key role in maintaining border security during the high-intensity military conflict along the U.S.-Mexico border during the Mexican Revolution.
In 1918, the 10th Cavalry fought at the Battle of Ambos Nogales, where they assisted in forcing the surrender of the Mexican federal and militia forces.
So perhaps all of these woke folks out there feeling sorry for where some names on a plaque should stop feeling sorry for these people and give them the respect they deserve for actually standing up for THEIR country to protect it, which is a hell of a lot more than some of these woke folks seem to do, no offence intended.
And people of any skin color do not take on military discipline so that they can be treated nice.
So don’t whine about how they were treated in the military.
It is what comes with the job, which happens to be a hard one requiring hard people.
As to the plaque, melt it down so that nobody’s name is at the top any longer, and then respectfully bury it and put the whole matter to rest.
They’ll all be equal then, as it should be.
Why not just hang it horizontally ?
Because then the woke crowd will be complaining if the black dudes (colored”) end up on the left side, as if that accuses them of being COMMIES or Democratic Socialists, and they’ll complain even hard if the black dudes end up on the right side, as if they were Kluckers, or something right-wing like that, so either leave the plaque where it is and honor the black dudes for their service, or get rid of the thing for once and for all, so the children don’t have a toy to fight over any longer, which is the simplest solution.
And if these woke crowd people want to see America as it is today, not yesterday or not in 1952, or 1825, or 1492, they should take a moment to watch this YouTube video of Willy Nelson and a bunch of REAL AMERICANS standing on their feet and singing “America, the Beautiful,” and in that group they will see a lot of black dudes, including Muhamed Ali, and they are all standing together, because today, not yesterday where these woke crowd people have their minds stuck, that is the way it is, or can be, anyway:
Willie Nelson and Ensemble – America the Beautiful (from “America: A Tribute to Heroes”)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y1fihSpdEx8
I t seems logical that a “Memorial Plaque” should remain in the “Memorial library”, wherever it is relocated. Most people take their home furnishings with them when they move. If the old building had been demolished, would all the contents have been buried at the site?
As far as objections to the content of the plaque, I oppose the current movements that advocate the erasure of this nation’s history. We need to educate future generations how things were, if they are to know how we improved, or failed to improve, our culture.
It seems there are some people who are having a difficult time distinguishing history from present day. They want to try and rewrite history to fit their twisted ways of thinking. Surely there are other pressing matters in their life that need attention???? You cannot change what happened in history, it happened, get over it and yourself.
I still think this is so stupid, after going back and reading it again.
Black folks today refer to themselves as “PEOPLE OF COLOR.”
That plaque identified black folks as “COLORED,” which is exactly how the black folks refer to themselves today, and the point is, THEY WERE HONORED BY A GRATEFUL NATION for their service.
As we go into Memorial Day, these woke crowd people should give some thanks to these black dudes for serving the nation.
I’m a veteran, and I intend to do so.
And when did the duck come into that picture?
Same here Paul! United We Stand!
Amen, David Moore!
And may they all finally get some peace to rest in!
United?
Ditty Mo, we are more divided, as a nation, right now than we were before The War of Northern Aggression.
On the question of honoring veterans for their service?
Oh, right, you’re right!
We were already divided by 1830, long before the War of Northern Aggression, and except for that period during the administration of James Monroe known as the Era of Good Feelings, we have always been divided.
RIP Clarence Bell, Alfred W. Davis, Thomas S. Edmonds, Juber Evans, George Giddings, Booker T.W. Griffin, Charles W. Jackson, Willie Johnson, Charlie Thomas Kellam, Custis Savage, Emerson Spady, John H. Spady and King Ward, and thank you for your service!
‘Woke’?
Another word from the Ebonics dictionary. Not a good look.
And I am still waiting for some further clarification as to how the duck came to be in that picture, and why a duck?
‘Him’s Woke’…
Dem din do nufins…