Monument Avenue Commission members (from left) Julian Hayter, Ed Ayers, Christy Coleman, Gregg Kimball and Coleen Butler Rodriguez) talk during a work session at Richmond City Hall on Saturday evening. (Photo by Tina Eshleman)
On a day when a British royal wedding watched by millions celebrated the bride's African-American heritage, Richmond's Monument Avenue Commission wrestled with how to reshape our own complicated narrative around race and history.
Reviewing what they'd heard over the past nine months, commission members remarked during a Saturday evening work session at City Hall on the thoughtfulness and emotional power expressed in spoken and written comments from around 2,000 people who shared their views about the future of Richmond's Confederate and Civil War statues.
Wounds remain no matter what side of the battle your family was on, said Christy Coleman, commission co-chair and CEO of the American Civil War Museum.
"I can appreciate the trauma of seeing your entire world turned upside down," she said, adding that Southern women, many of whom were widowed, needed to pick up the pieces, raise their children and find some meaning in the devastation.
"As an African-American woman and understanding that history as well, scientists tell us that that trauma is actually in our genes because of the physical labor, the emotional stresses that play out in our literal physiology. So I get as well what it's like to be constantly confronted with the source of that. ... I try to remain intellectual about it but I simply can't. All of these feelings and all of these things are part of what we've got to figure out."
Describing the Confederate statutes as items that can be "both sacred and profane," Coleman also recalled the first public meeting on Aug. 9, 2017, when members struggled to maintain order of an overflow crowd at the Virginia Museum of History and Culture. "People came armed and ready," she said. "Part of me says maybe it was important to get that out so we can figure out a way to hear each other." At the smaller subsequent gatherings, "I've been most struck by the willingness to [listen] over time."
Gregg Kimball, the other co-chair and director of education and outreach at the Library of Virginia, said he sees an evolution in Richmond from a place where decisions were made by a small group of leaders meeting in a private club "to a city that can have this kind of discourse."
During the public meetings, residents shared stories that haven't been told publicly before, stories such as the experiences of great-grandmothers who were enslaved and raped, said commission member Lauranett Lee, a University of Richmond instructor. "To hear that in the public space and recognize that this is a time when we can really bring those stories to the fore, and do something about it really shows we are taking steps forward." It's important for Virginia, too, she said. "We didn't always do the right thing. This is our moment."
The discussion can also serve as a model for the country, added commission member Julian Hayter, a historian at the University of Richmond: "There's nothing more profound than civil discourse at a time of incivility."
What to do with all the discourse is another matter.
On Saturday morning, as the commission held a final public input meeting at Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School on Richmond's East End, commission member Coleen Butler Rodriguez — who lives on Monument Avenue and serves on the Board of Advisors of Historic Richmond — shared with attendees the spread of responses she was tasked with tallying and recording. Rodriguez said the roughly 1,700 online comments fell into four main groups that are also consistent with views expressed at public meetings:
—Keep the monuments but add context or additional monuments: 26.7 percent
—Keep the monuments and make no changes or additions: 22 percent
—Remove the monuments: 18 percent
—Relocate the monuments: 16.6 percent
(Other responses did not indicate a preference.)
"Clearly the biggest problem is how we reach a consensus on the recommendations," Kimball said during the evening work session.
"We've all seen there's a moral imperative — something needs to be said, something needs to be done," said Sarah Driggs, a commission member, author of "Richmond's Monument Avenue" and member of the City's Public Art Commission.
Members pondered: How can the city respect the past without appearing to be stuck in it? How should the commission respond to the impassioned public testimony? What lessons need to be taught to future generations?
"One side of my head says people need symbols," Coleman said. "On the other hand, what's next?" If Richmond takes steps to add context to, remove or relocate its statues, "Could it really change anything, if there are systemic things affecting the community that keep [people] marginalized?"
The commission doesn't need to solve all those issues, Kimball said. But, "we should make recommendations that fit into the larger dialogue."
While some have separated the Confederate statues on Monument Avenue from the long-buried history in Shockoe Bottom, they are related by slavery, Lee said. "How can we draw lines to connect those two areas to show history is not limited to one space?"
"Our recommendations have to reflect that one thing is not going to fix this," said Ed Ayers, president emeritus of the University of Richmond. "it needs to be a suite of actions."
Now, the 10 commission members will work on a report and recommendations to be submitted to Mayor Levar Stoney. Saturday evening, the commission decided to each prepare individual recommendations, along with guiding principles, and compare notes to see what kind of consensus emerges. (Update: The report, which will be made public, had been expected by the beginning of June, but on May 29, Stoney approved an extension until July 2.)
Monument Avenue Commission members listen Saturday morning as Coleen Butler Rodriguez summarizes comments received from the public. (Photo by Sarah King)
Two speakers at the morning meeting, which drew about 40 people, offered a sampling of the divergent public comments:
William Turner, a college-age speaker, said that although his grandparents grew up in the Deep South and had relatives who fought in the Civil War, they support removing the statues.
"My grandfather was a Baptist preacher and preached against oppression, violence and hatred. … After being violently threatened by the Klan and fear of their house burning down, they fled to Alabama where they felt safer," he said. "If your heritage is based on the oppression, violence and enslavement of an entire race of people, then leave it behind and work against it to create a better heritage for future generations."
Bob Jacobs, on the other hand, said he's originally from Milwaukee, but moved to Richmond with his parents in 1945 and graduated from Thomas Jefferson High School. "What I learned is that we have heroes — Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson and so on, and they were fighting because our state was invaded by the North," he said. "They didn’t realize they were fighting because of the slaves. They were fighting to save Virginia ... Lee and his generals kept Richmond safe. He is a hero to me."
Coleman spoke to those at Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School about some of the challenges in addressing the issue, which has become more prevalent in communities across the country in recent years.
“My phone started ringing off the hook as early as 2013 or ‘14, with communities saying, 'Can the American Civil War Museum take our statues?' and the answer was, 'Well, no, we can't,’ ” Coleman recalled. She added that although there are more than 35,000 museums across the country, most have budgets under $1 million.
“The vast majority of them do not have the space or the financial resources or the expertise on their staffs to care for monuments of these sizes, scopes and scale,” Coleman said. “We simply do not.”
Another common criticism Coleman reiterated had to do with state and local laws governing individual communities. She pointed to high-profile examples — many following the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville last August — where residents, activists and local government figures simply took down monuments in their communities.
“[People might say], ‘'Well, they didn't have any problems, they just took them down!' — well, they went through a process in those communities, too,” Coleman said, emphasizing the differences between local jurisdictions.
Richmond has an extra layer of complexity to consider with the statues on Monument Avenue because the state of Virginia owns the Robert E. Lee Monument; thus, removing it would require General Assembly approval.
“I'm a big advocate for more context and more stories as we continue to have this conversation," says Chelsea Higgs Wise, a city activist who works with Initiatives of Change. (Photo by Sarah King)
Attendee Chelsea Higgs Wise, who has been to three public meetings, said after the Saturday morning session that she's thinking about the long-term impact of the commission’s work.
“It's really interesting to see the crowd die as the months go on, so I imagine there will be another excitement level as the report comes back,” Higgs Wise said. “I think the commission has done a really good job of framing the historic narrative in a complete way that's not skewed.”
Higgs Wise says she is also closely following the building of the Virginia Women's Monument at Capitol Square, which includes Confederate Capt. Sally Louisa Tompkins.
“She's a Confederate soldier as well, so we're still continuing to build Confederate monuments and monuments to Confederate soldiers — we've even framed her as 'the angel of the Confederacy,' ” Higgs Wise says. “I'm a big advocate for more context and more stories as we continue to have this conversation. I'm disheartened with the crowd not as big as it could be, but I also understand this is a long process.”
