Member-only story
Our Schitzo Country
Heading into July, the House of Representatives voted to remove monuments from the Capitol Rotunda’s Statuary Hall that honor Confederate heroes. Of the 120 members who opposed the bill, all of them were Republicans.
At this point in the American democratic experiment, the approach to our Revolutionary Independence Day holiday comes with the occasion of some heavy pivotal Civil War history; namely, the battle of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, and the fall of Vicksburg, Mississippi. With federal forces repelling Lee’s second and final invasion of the North on July 3rd and the culmination of Grant’s siege of Vicksburg securing the waters of the Mississippi River on the 4th, effectively cutting the Confederacy in half, either event can arguably be characterized as a turning point in the war but both together seal the point. Since 1863, there was no holiday in Vicksburg on July 4th again until after World War II when Gen. Dwight Eisenhower gave a speech there on the date and the city began slowly coming to terms with the Fourth of July holiday until it fully returned with the Bicentennial celebrations in 1976.
“Let me state a simple fact,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, one of the 67 Republicans that voted in favor of removing the statues, said. “All the statues being removed by this bill are statues of Democrats.” Fair point, Mr. Minority Leader. But what the House roll call vote…