White Police Officers or ex Police Officers, as well as the protests around the world, calling for systemic change in a koning for the simple symbols of White Supremacy, many of which relate to the civil war era. Had thisve already conversation, five years ago in fact. Think back to where you were in the summer of 2015. Vernon and ed now, you graciously gave us your time back then, and we spoke in the wake of a Confederate Flag being taken down in South Carolina, following the murder of nine parishioners at southern annual church in charleston at that time. Edna, i would like to start with you. One of the things he said in 2015 was you were encouraged by the change and the flight coming down, its indra. Movementi think this we are seeing at the moment, at the moment, im afraid it is not permanent. You continued as im afraid that it is the right thing to do because the shooting was so horrific but we will forget and go back to where we were, the underlying issue. I would like to start by asking you, what has been permanent, what has changed in those five years, and have we made any progress on these underlying issues . I think a lot has changed and a lot has remained the same as well. What has changed is that africanamericans and people very much concerned about the conditions of people of color and poor people in general have come together to try to make changes in a way that i think will be difficult for anyone to intervene and stop the momentum, but things have gotten much worse as well. Timelds concerned at the that they would be a backlash because there were certain changes moving in the right direction, and certainly we had experienced that backlash. The last five years have been very difficult, especially for people of color and folks attempting to help turn us in another direction, the right direction i feel. But i think that i am encouraged, this time, as well because we know the last time changes occurred because of the shooting in charleston. Things are changing quickly this time because of a similar kind of violence, but i think it has been, the response to it has been sustained for much longer period of time than i had anticipated, and i was looking the other day at just an image of the people out demonstrating, who were protesting what had happened in this country, what continues to happen, and i was struck by the fact of how diverse the group was. I am encouraged by that, but again, as i was five years ago, i am a bit concerned that it is the flavor of the moment, that people have been galvanized because they saw the death of a man on camera. Many people have died since 2015, and it did not have this kind of outpouring. There was a bit of it, but to see someone lose his life on camera i think is what has made the difference. I dont know that that will be enough to sustain this moment. I hope it does. I hope this is real change, but im not sure that this is what we are going to see within the next two to three years. Thanks, edna. Vernon, i would like to hear your take on that, and you also brought up the concern about a backlash last time, both in this country but also, you know, given what you were seeing on the campus where you teach as well. Well, actually, i am very hopeful, and perhaps even more hopeful than last time. You might remember that i argued flights coming down was not just a massacre. As horrible as that was. Because your legislature, which had to vote on this with the heritage act, with two thirds or three fourths majority, i forget which, had been the same one. All of these things they heard and said before, i think what made the difference and why was worried it may not last is that the families of the people who had been massacred actually spoke about grace and forgiveness. And, ironically, i think that really resonated across a culture of religions as one of the few things that blacks and whites really shared, in many ways, though they use it differently in the south. So what i think now i see is exactly what edna said, and that is people saw george floyd die. It reminded me of the Civil Rights Movement. I actually think this is different than the charleston massacre, which sort of began it and we saw charlottesville and other things along the way, but i really think, like with Civil Rights Movement, this could be a revolutionary moment in a revolutionary time. Part of it is something that has been going on since i went to graduate school before most of you were born. That is that we are getting our history better. And places like the Lincoln Cottage are conveying that history better. People have been misled in extraordinary ways in their interpretation of history. And we now have close to release close to at least of 10 or 20 years of Public High School teachers. And these Public High School teachers are doing gods work, bless them, that they have taught history about not just slavery but particularly reconstruction, this period of interracial democracy, being much more the truth of what had happened than what people have been told. That is, white southerners, former confederates, or children of former confederates and others, wrote a history that was not truthful, but it became the history. It was accepted. That became part of the klansmen and birth of a nation. As Woodrow Wilson said through gone with the wind. And that was generation after generation. And now we are beginning from the rewriting of history, which is not actually rewriting or revising it, but the correcting of the story, looking at what the evidence is an telling it. And telling it. I am more hopeful, and actually think this, like the Civil Rights Movement, is a special time. Im not sure how to compare it with five years ago. That was a massacre. But this is a time, i think, of change. It started then, but i think we really now are beginning to put it all together in a way that we can understand how we got to where we are. That is not just slavery ending racism. That the Voting Rights act in 1965, the great john lewis has just passed on, and think about this. John lewis would not have been allowed to vote. He could not go to troy university. I mean, this was 1965. I like to tell people, i talk about the 14 generations, figuring 25 years as a generation. We have had 12 generations of White Privilege laws. And two generations of not. Some of that is coming together in a very excitingly. I do think some of that is taking a fact and coming together in an exciting way. I think things are going to happen. The media helped publicize is ae floyd, but there media empire that spends things in ways, and if you are only looking at that one media outlet, you are getting a very different story. You cant even make up your own mind without having the facts presented to you. Its the best we can do and be objective, the media works in other ways, too. We will have to see, but i am more hopeful than i have ever been. Ms. Mast thats great. That is good perspective. I would like to pickup on something that you just talked about, vernon, that also came up in your comments edna. And it is this talking about the dialogue that we can and need to have, but also how our perspective can change, and then you also mentioned, vernon, this idea of, you know, the history that has been taught for years, and years ago, we all talked about how the north was likewise complicit. So, one of the common refrains you here when people call for taking down monuments or memorials or renaming things is that doing that is the racing erasing history or that attempts to maybe to tell a more complete story that might contradict that version, that that is revisionist history. As highly respected historians, how would you respond to that . We can start with you, edna. No, i dont think that removing a symbol is the erasing history. I dont believe in destroying these monuments. I think you remove them, put them in a proper and a proper location. You put them in a museum and you create a park just for them, that does exist in this country or elsewhere. It gives us all the opportunity to look at the history of the se symbols in a different way. If you have a monument on the sidewalk or on public property, people are not going to stop to read what might be on this thing. They are going to pass it, and theyre going to assume, ok, this is a monument to a great person. They are not going to take the time to find out what this person did that he would be celebrated in this way. But if you take it down, you put it someplace where you can actually explain the complete history of this, that is very different. But i dont believe in destroying. I was taken aback recently when i learned that there was this attempt in washington to remove the freedmans memorial from lincoln park. I thought that was very ill advised, to say the leaf say the least. That is an understatement. People need to understand first the history of that monument. It was built by formerly enslaved peoples, many of them veterans who had fought for their freedom and for the freedom of their people. They paid for that monument. Does the monument represent black people the way i would like to see it . No it does not. Did the people who paid for it have a say in how it looked . No, they did not. But it is supposed to be a celebration of freedom and i dont think you take that down. You cannot see that in the same light that you would a monument to a confederate general. They are two very Different Things. But, if people are concerned about what that monument seems to suggest in terms of the role of black people in their own liberation or lack thereof, then you put Something Else beside it and you show what the true story is. That one you dont take down. The others you can take down and put elsewhere. Destroying them serves no purpose, from my perspective. And you are certainly not shortchanging history by removing them. You are not erasing history at all. You are acknowledging that there is a problem with this symbol in a country that is supposed to be wedded to the idea of liberty , justice, and equality for all people. Ms. Mast thanks, edna. Vernon, your thoughts . Prof. Burton i agree with everything edna said. I think each monument must be looked at separately. Each plaque, each historic house. And i have said this before i think i said it the last time we talked. You know, people dont learn their history from the books that we historians right or i would have a larger educational fund. But they do learn it from the Lincoln Cottage, from the monuments we put up, from the public history we tell. That is where it comes from. That is why i have such an affinity for illinois, because it is the land of lincoln. I think that is a great message versus the land of calhoun in South Carolina or clemson. But you need to look at each one and i am reminded of the judge when he went back and sort of pardoned the friendship nine these were the first students that went to jail and did not take bail in rock hill, South Carolina. They accuse them of rewriting history. He said, you cannot rewrite history, but you can right a wrong. And i think that is a good distinction we need to make. You have to ask at each memorial, what was it about . You have to look if youre looking at people i was part of that generation that helped destroy the idea of heroes in history. And we mightve been wrong. When we learned that jefferson at that time, we were not even sure, probably had a mistress who was underage. That is, what else can you call it . Then we sort of started throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I think you got a look at the total contribution of an individual. What was the arc of their life like . Take the good with the bad. The other thing is when people are talking about art very few of these confederate monuments are true art. Believe me, they had plaster of paris, little forms and pumped about as fast as they could and sent them out. There may be some that truly are art, and those i think should be preserved. We have to remember, these are put up and here is something i started talking about recently and put in the recent book that im writing what does it mean in nearly every Courthouse Square in the south, in front of the courthouse is a statue to the confederacy, often with words that ring out White Supremacy . Clearly, they were erected with that in mind. But what that is basically saying is, as i was saying john , lewis could not vote in 1955 or to go into the courthouse register may have to getting in trouble, even if it was good trouble for john lewis. That is still a symbol for many people to say, dont expect to get a fair share hearing of justice here. This is built, there is a symbol here of White Supremacy. Nowhere on public land should there be the kind of statues that send that message. Now, i perfectly happy if people am want to buy the land and put it somewhere or in a graveyard that is kept by the daughters of the confederacy, they put it up. I am not saying not to display it. But there are many of them that have rather offensive language. Some dont, but there are some of them that are very explicit what it is about and i think that when you are paying taxes as a citizen and that is offensive to you, it shouldnt be there. Im not talking about a personal offense, but to you as a group of people, as citizens in a democracy. I think those are some of the things you want to think about when we look at and im happy to elaborate. Ms. Mast vernon, i think that is a great thing to elaborate on. There are two Different Things and there are many different ways to look at meaning. But you raised both the context of where it is if it is in front of a court, for example or the legislature, public land versus private and also when it was put up. Prof. Burton and why. Theyve made it clear why it was put up. Ms. Mast yeah, so when, why, and where. Can you talk more about the themes of that behind a lot of these monuments and memorials and the naming of things that are coming up now . Prof. Burton oh, absolutely. One of the things and let me point out the confederate monuments, and you can deal with all of these you have native american and so many other things but they are not just about honoring our dead soldiers, which is what was what we hear. They were also a part of the American South, white south, refocusing the narrative of the civil war. They died defending southern liberty and freedom from a n oppressed Central Government in washington. They were all put up at the height of jim crowe 1850s through the 1920s was the height of it. Its the reconciliation of north and south at the expense of , particularly, African Americans, leaving out the africanamerican soldiers who lincoln said made the difference in winning that war. The reunion of the soldiers. It is ironic to me that robert e all letss for furl the flag, never fly again, lets build no monuments. There was to be a monument of robert e lee, they should say this is the man who said lets dont have monuments and lets listen to him, maybe. But thats not the way, ironically, his monument has been put up. And people were explicit about what they were doing. This is where people learn their history. Ive looked at all the Southern State houses the South Carolina one, have to be careful on that because i have a 50 minute lecture on that, but every single statue of an individual there, there is not one africanamerican, and every one of them either argued strongly for White Supremacy, owned slaves, and were against the Civil Rights Movement and v. Board. Own i used to give a lecture saying nowhere is there the name of an African American on the statehouse grounds. I had to change that because i think it was an appropriate thing to do, and they should be credited for it. Strom thurmonds family added his africanamerican daughters name to the list of children. So there is an africanamerican name, but it is not exactly the way that we we have people like the great Benjamin Mays or the wonderful congressman, Robert Smalls who made so many contributions. And children, like i said, i was a generation that worked so hard to get rid of the idea of heroes, but i changed my mind. We need role models. At least alternative role models. I dont want to tell people how to think, but how do we know they were always blacks and whites in the Southern States and every state ive ever looked, at every place i have ever looked, who stood against the grain. It goes against this idea too, well, that was a different time. You will find some of the most and temp antiracist right people white People Living courageous lives at that time, so what does that say about the excuse that well, that was different time . You should know better. Did i go off track on you there . Ms. Mast i like your comments on that too, about how the place and the why and the where affects the meaning of these things. Prof. Burton again, i do want to say i not against people am having for what it means to them and i am not even doubting we need to be sensitive to this that it is important to people and they believe this. You are not going to stop them from believing it from yelling at them, actually. And we need to engage in dialogue of what it means to others. I love harvey gantt, the later mayor of charlotte. He integrated clemson. He once said, if you cannot appeal to the morals of a south carolinian, you can appeal to his manners. I say, do you know that this is hurting other peoples feelings . Do you really want to do that on public property . You can do what you want to other places, but when it is public property, taxpayers property, then that is a very different thing than you having the personal right to be wrong. Ms. Mast i like that. The personal right to be wrong. Edna, go ahead. Prof. Medford i should point out that vernon was one of my very first graduate professors , and i remember distinctly we had a conversation in class once wher