I changed my opinion this week.
Robert E. Lee is probably the most famous Arlingtonian in history.
This is his house. The mansion on the hill overlooking Arlington National Cemetery.
The County Government uses his house in its official seal.
My children attend Washington-Lee high school, and they are called the Generals.
Some of my favorite stores and restaurants here are located along Lee Highway.
I never drive on it, but the stretch of Route 1 that runs through town is called Jefferson Davis Highway.
All this stuff seems as normal as breathing the air. It's part of the language that I use. I speak Lee's name hundreds of times a year as I talk about the places around town.
I had always heard that he was reluctant about his involvement in the Civil War. That he opposed slavery. That he was a very honorable, pious man. I knew he owned slaves, but had heard that he freed his slaves and those slaves founded a church that I used to attend here in Arlington. I viewed him as a human being who was a product of his times. That he was doing his very best in the times that he lived.
Then a couple of days ago, a friend of mine posted on FB that she was going to ask the School Board to change the name of my kid's school. She was looking for people to join her. I was tempted to respond that I would be opposing her, because these names are part of our history here. But instead I remained silent and actually started reading up about Lee so I could explain things to her.
Turns out he was a fucking prick.
He didn't say much about slavery. There is one letter he wrote where he says slavery is evil. That is quoted a lot by people who want to make him out to be the nice guy. But the quote is taken out of context. The whole quote has him saying basically that slavery is evil, but that its good for blacks and that they are lucky to have whites taking care of them. And slavery should end when God decides it should end.
I'm paraphrasing.
He married Mary Custis, and when her dad died, he got that big plantation in Arlington where the house is. Lee was named the executor of the estate. The will dictated that all the slaves working at the Custis estate be freed upon the death of Mary's dad. It used some legal phrase that basically meant "as soon as possible" upon death. But the estate was in debt and was not profitable. Lee felt that he had to make the estate profitable before he could honor that instruction in the will. So he didn't free them. Instead, he split up the slave families, against the precedent set my Mary Custis's dad when he ran the place. Lee rented out the slaves to various other plantations in the area. At one point, two slaves who believed they were supposed to be free upon the death of their former master escaped. They made it to northern Maryland before they were captured and returned to Lee. Lee ordered them both (a bother and sister) stripped to the waist and tied to a pole in the barn. The overseer bound them, but refused to obey Lee's command to whip them. So Lee got a local constable to come in and do the whipping. (There is a receipt of this payment to the constable.) The constable whipped them both so bad their skin was broken, and then Lee (this is where I lost any empathy for him) ordered that salt be pour on their open wounds. He felt he had to make an example of them to the other slaves who thought they were free.
Here.
So then a couple years go by, and Virginia secedes from the Union. Lee didn't want there to be a Civil War. He thought the South would lose. But he broke his solemn oath to uphold the Constitution of the US, and took up arms against his country. He felt it was too important to defend Virginia. (Which only wanted the ability to hold human beings in slavery.)
He "defended" Virginia by invading the North and attacking Pennsylvania and killing thousands of people.
So I changed my mind. Lee was literally a traitor who took up arms against his country. He was a racist who thought whites needed to beat the slaves to help them improve. He was an unusually cruel slave owner who meted out punishment more severe than the overseer thought was appropriate.
I don't think the school, streets, and seal should have anything to do with him. There are hundreds of books about him and he won't be lost to history, but he doesn't deserve to be mentioned in every day conversation when I talk about schools and streets.