Walter Williams Against Erasing Confederate History

The economist Walter E. Williams was a great defender of liberty, and, in that context, he also defended the right to self-determination and the right to secede. But his reasons for opposing the removal of Confederate monuments were not confined to his support for independence movements. He was also against the vandalism and pointless destructionism of the social justice warriors. 

In an op-ed titled “Liberals in a tizzy over statues,” he argued against what he termed “statucide”—which he described as a craze to destroy Confederate statues, memorials, cenotaphs, and flags. He included, in this discussion, the threat to destroy the Confederate engravings on Stone Mountain.

Many blacks and their white liberal allies demand the removal of statues of Confederate generals and the Confederate battle flag, and they are working up steam to destroy the images of Gens. Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee and President Jefferson Davis from Stone Mountain in Georgia. Allow me to speculate as to the whys of this statue removal craze, which we might call statucide.

His argument drew upon a theme he addressed in his book on race and economics, namely, that economic progress does not come from political power or political interventions. Instead, material progress for black people is achieved in the same way, and by the same methods, as material progress for white people or people of any other race—because economic science does not vary based on race. Progress cannot come from erasing history, from racecraft, or from waging a culture war. The summary of his book states that:

Walter E. Williams applies an economic analysis to the problems black Americans have faced in the past and still face in the present to show that free-market resource allocation, as opposed to political allocation, is in the best interests of minorities. He debunks many common labor market myths and reveals how excessive government regulation and the minimum-wage law have imposed incalculable harm on the most disadvantaged members of our society.

He explicitly drew upon lessons from economic science in order to explain his reasons for rejecting statucide. The motive behind the removal of historic monuments is ostensibly rooted in the conviction of social justice warriors that there is something tangible to be gained—some material benefit—from erasing Confederate history. If that proves not to be the case, and there is in fact nothing to be gained from their destructionism, then it is plainly pointless and indefensible. Williams urges them to recognize that they will gain nothing from their chosen strategy.

So more political power hasn’t worked. Massive poverty spending hasn’t worked. Electing a black president hasn’t worked. What should black leaders and their white liberal allies now turn their attention to in order to improve the socio-economic condition for blacks?

It appears to be nearly unanimous that attention should be turned to the removal of Confederate statues. It’s not only Confederate statue removal but Confederate names of schools and streets. Even the Council on American-Islamic Relations agrees. It just passed a resolution calling for the removal of all Confederate memorials, flags, street names and symbols from public spaces and property.

In focusing on the economic arguments, Williams was attempting to appeal to reason and rationality to thwart the Cultural Marxists. In another article titled “Were Confederate Generals Traitors?” he turned his attention to analyzing historical facts. He addressed the justification put forward by the destroyers that Confederate monuments venerate traitors and therefore deserve to be destroyed.

Williams pointed out that secession is not treason—if nations have a right to secede, then secession cannot be regarded as treason. He also highlighted the fact that this was not merely a partisan view held by no one other than the Fire Eaters. Williams explains,

Northern newspapers editorialized in favor of the South’s right to secede. New-York Tribune (Feb. 5, 1860): “If tyranny and despotism justified the Revolution of 1776, then we do not see why it would not justify the secession of Five Millions of Southrons from the Federal Union in 1861.” The Detroit Free Press (Feb. 19, 1861): “An attempt to subjugate the seceded States, even if successful, could produce nothing but evil — evil unmitigated in character and appalling in extent.” The New-York Times (March 21, 1861): “There is a growing sentiment throughout the North in favor of letting the Gulf States go.”

Another important historical fact highlighted by Williams—in an essay on his website—is that Confederate history is not just white history, but the history of all races of the South. Echoing the point made by the historian Ervin L. Jordan Jr., Williams argued that “blacks served as soldiers, freemen and slaves on the side of the Confederacy.” Erasing Confederate history is erasing their history too. He added:

Black civil rights activists, their white liberal supporters and historically ignorant Americans who attack the Confederate flag have committed a deep, despicable dishonor to our patriotic Southern black ancestors who marched, fought and died not to protect slavery but to protect their homeland from Northern aggression. They don’t deserve the dishonor. Dr. Leonard Haynes, a black professor at Southern University, stated, “When you eliminate the black Confederate soldier, you’ve eliminated the history of the South.”

In appealing to logic and historical facts, Williams was well aware that Cultural Marxists are impervious to reason. This is less a history debate and more a power struggle. In his article “Removing monuments is an effort to rewrite American history,” he invoked George Orwell’s caution concerning despots who attempt to erase history in order to control people’s thoughts and opinions, and thereby crush opposition to their preferred narrative. He refers to this as a form of “culture cleansing.”

The job of tyrants and busybodies is never done. When they accomplish one goal, they move their agenda to something else. If we Americans give them an inch, they’ll take a yard. So I say, don’t give them an inch in the first place. The hate-America types use every tool at their disposal to achieve their agenda of discrediting and demeaning our history. Our history of slavery is simply a convenient tool to further their cause.

He further asked—in a question framed rhetorically—whether the iconoclasts would attack the United States Constitution in an attempt to purge history of any association with slavery.

At least half of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence were slave owners. Also consider that roughly half of the 55 delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia were slave owners. Do those facts invalidate the U.S. Constitution, and would the history rewriters want us to convene a new convention to purge and purify our Constitution?

Unfortunately, just as progressives seem to view Orwell’s 1984 as an instruction manual, they treat rhetorical questions as good suggestions. There have been some attempts stealthily to rewrite just such a new purified constitution, by portraying Charles Sumner as the “true” Founding Father and the first person to “truly” grasp the meaning and intention of the Constitution. According to the New York Times,

Sumner saw the Constitution as an implicitly antislavery document that inclined the government toward ensuring freedom and equality for all, despite the founders’ own complicity with human bondage.

That would certainly have come as surprising news to Abraham Lincoln, who said in 1862, “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.” Lincoln had not forgotten that all original states of the Union were slave states, which would make a nonsense of the idea that they all just failed to understand, or at any rate to respect, the true meaning of their own constitution.

The message of Walter Williams concerning the relevance of historical facts, in the context of opposing the statucide of Confederate monuments, is that we ought not to abandon reason and logic for emotionalism and destructionism. Reason dictates that progressives should focus, instead, on methods that will actually work in improving the lives of the disadvantaged.

Improving the material conditions of the disadvantaged has always been the goal of liberalism in the classical tradition. To this end, the correct means must be chosen, a point emphasized by Ludwig von Mises in his book Liberalism,

Historically, liberalism was the first political movement that aimed at promoting the welfare of all, not that of special groups. Liberalism is distinguished from socialism, which likewise professes to strive for the good of all, not by the goal at which it aims, but by the means that it chooses to attain that goal.