Washingtonpost.com:

RICHMOND — Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe said Tuesday that he will phase out a state-sponsored license plate featuring an image of the Confederate flag.

At an appearance in Richmond, the city that served as the capital of the Confederacy, McAuliffe (D) called the symbol “unnecessarily divisive and hurtful.”

The announcement comes in the aftermath of the shooting deaths of nine members of a historically African American church in Charleston, S.C., allegedly by Dylann Roof, a 21-year-old white man who, according to police, wanted “to start a race war.”

It comes just one day after South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) called for the flag to be removed from the grounds of that state’s capitol — and the week after the Supreme Court ruled that Texas is free to reject a specialized license plate featuring the Confederate flag.

We all know that I am a creature of contradiction. This issue is no exception.  I happen to think Terry McAuliffe is simply jumping on the band wagon.  The targeted group here is a fairly revered group–Sons of Confederate Veterans.  The one and only person I know who is a proud member is a man named Bob Perry.  Bob is one of the kindest, most genteel gentlemen I know.  He is one of the least racist people I have ever known.  He honors his ancestors.

Sons of Confederate Veterans is a heritage organization.  They don’t just let anyone in.  Applicants must prove their lineage to a confederate veteran.  It is a rigorous task to prepare the paperwork for admissions.  Members also must be sponsored into their regional group.  It seems to me that this organization has been targeted.  Why?  I don’t think Governor McAuliffe has thought this one through.  Note the “flag:”  It is a metal insignia of this organization, not a flag.

I would be all in favor of removing license plates that are just flags. We have all seen the “Dixie plates.”   However, this flag on this particular plate serves a purpose–it denotes what the group is–the Sons of Confederate Veterans.   Most  of those who fought for the south did so because of where they lived, not for their beliefs or reverence for slavery.  The average person probably hadn’t been 20 miles from their own homes before the war.  Many  died and were buried somewhere far from home, often in mass graves.   Most weren’t bad guys or ancestors we should be ashamed of.

Those who came home from the war often didn’t come home in one piece.  They tried  to reconstruct their world that had been torn apart by war.   Everyone had lost friends or family or property.  Most who came back went on to serve their communities and raise families.  Those of us who are descended from these veterans certainly should be permitted to honor our ancestors.

What started as a movement to remove an actual flag from the state house grounds in South Carolina has metamorphosed into what amounts to stomping out people’s history, heritage  and culture in one day.  Various confederate flags aren’t bad pieces of cloth.  The problem comes about when rednecks misuse that flag that is part of southerners’ collective history.

As much as I really don’t want to join a group of old ladies, I feel like I should  join the Daughters of the Confederacy or whatever the organization is called.   I feel like I have to just to keep overly zealous do-gooders from blasting away my family’s past.  Once again, food for thought has become a full course meal.

So much for historical context. When is some of this going to become a first amendment issue?

 

39 Thoughts to “McAuliffe orders Confederate flag off of Va license plates”

  1. Starry flights

    I support our governor’s decision. The flag represents the right to treat humans as chattel. It dehumanizes and degrades not only blacks but anyone who believes that we are all created equal by God. Times have changed. The time has come to remove this symbol of treason, traitors, tyrants and murderers. I say this with sorrow. It’s unfortunate that folks like Mr Roof chose this symbol to define themselves.

    This is not a first amendment issue. The Supreme Court has already ruled that the state need not be compelled by private citizens to place anything on license plates if it does not wish to do so. The SOCV can still put bumper stickers or whatever it wants on its cars. If you have a problem with that, take it up with the next governor.

    1. Actually I will take it up with this governor. I expect all groups to be treated the same, even those I do not care for.

      McAuliffe is jumping on the bandwagon. He is fighting an insignia.

      Here is my problem. In targeting this one group, the Sons of Confederate Veterans, he is making it “dirty” to be descended from someone who served in the Confederate military. Frankly, I resent that. My son, who was thinking about joining this heritage organization, didn’t get to be the great-great-great grandson of a veteran by himself, if you get my drift here.

      The very word you use indicates that because of my heritage, you believe I am scum. It’s really just that basic.

      As for first amendment, I can tie coon-tails on my car, duct tape on a battle flag and spray paint “born to raise hell” and “the south shall rise again on my car,” if I choose to look like a redneck. the gubbmint can’t restrickt my speech.

      I believe that the general assembly is the only group who can really pull that license plate from those SCV’s.

  2. Scout

    I find myself getting a little leery of all this focus on the flag, although I understand and support the idea that South Carolina should stop flying it at its seat of government. But, at this point, the anti-flag furor and its constant media coverage in the aftermath of the shootings in Charleston is beginning to strike me as a cheap alternative to talking about the real problem: angry, hateful, ill-informed, under-educated self-radicalizing and/or simply looney people with ready access to guns. If we pour all our mental and emotional energy down the flag hole, what is left to address the common theme that runs through the Colorado, Connecticut, North Carolina, Charleston, Oslo, phenomenon (I use the singular because I consider all of these to be facets of the same problem – the inability of people of little analytical skill to manage the flow of information and propaganda they get off the internet coupled with the ease with which they can get instruments of mass murder – Even ISIS recruitment has elements of this). The flag issue is there, to be sure, but it’s a distraction. That kid would have killed with or without the flag flying in Columbia.

    1. Totally agree, Scout.

      The flag furor is a knee jerk reaction by those who want to curry favor with someone or lots of someone’s. I would boycott Amazon if I could stand the withdrawal. As it turns out, I will just write Governor Carpetbagger an angry letter.

  3. Lyssa

    Perhaps our culture of blame is out of control. Lack of trust, lack of respect, lack of self control and lack of accountability. We spent several decades medicallizing bad behaviour now we’re blaming Fox News, MSNBC, Democrats, Republicans, Police, and flags and guns for bad behaviour. All I see is a ripping down of everything. We’ve taken on the responsibility to judge others is a horrible way; I don’t think that’s our role.

    No wonder we have hate filled monster youths prowling our country. We created them. We should stop. Turn down the volume if not just turn it off.

    1. There is merit in your words, Lyssa.

  4. Cargosquid

    Moon-howler :
    Actually I will take it up with this governor. I expect all groups to be treated the same, even those I do not care for.
    McAuliffe is jumping on the bandwagon. He is fighting an insignia.
    Here is my problem. In targeting this one group, the Sons of Confederate Veterans, he is making it “dirty” to be descended from someone who served in the Confederate military. Frankly, I resent that. My son, who was thinking about joining this heritage organization, didn’t get to be the great-great-great grandson of a veteran by himself, if you get my drift here.
    The very word you use indicates that because of my heritage, you believe I am scum. It’s really just that basic.
    As for first amendment, I can tie coon-tails on my car, duct tape on a battle flag and spray paint “born to raise hell” and “the south shall rise again on my car,” if I choose to look like a redneck. the gubbmint can’t restrickt my speech.
    I believe that the general assembly is the only group who can really pull that license plate from those SCV’s.

    THIS. Exactly.

    All of this fake outrage deflects stories that detracts from the narrative.

    A) Roof was not “right wing.”

    B) Roof could not find “fellow racists” and complained about that…. thus this outcry against a
    “culture of racism” is manufactured.

    C) This “scandal” allowed the press to cover this instead of the reality of Roof’s singular evil, the GOP Senate giving a dishonest President MORE power and probably the key step before passing this secret trade bill, the complete and utter disaster of the hacking scandal in which NO ONE is being held responsible, the disaster of the Iranian nuke talks, the failures in Iraq.

    This flag controversy allows the press to A) attack conservatives B) denigrate southerners C) put Republicans on the spot D) evade other stories. It enables the Democrats to motivate the base and lets them hide the reality of their failures with minorities. Symbolism always trumps reality in politics.

    This controversy will be milked for months.

    1. I am a left leaning centrist. *I* feel put out. It isn’t just Democrats and Republican leadership. Its big business also.

      The flag issue on Capitol grounds has been brewing a long time–probably since the flag was first placed there in 1962. I think the flag needs to move on. It’s time. As for the Georgia and Mississippi flag, that’s not my concern. Roof didn’t shoot anyone because of that flag. They are unrelated issues. That is not to say that the flag was misplaced.

      Moving on to more broad-brushing by businesses and Governor Carpetbagger (on this issue)…There are about 50 various flags. Which ones are they refusing to sell? The Bonnie Blue? Stars and Bars? Which of the many others or is it just the battle flag of the army of Northern Virginia?

      I don’t like being made to feel like the great unwashed because half of me is southern. That’s how I do feel after the past 48 hours.

      This is how people become radicalized.

  5. Cargosquid

    Also, isn’t this license plate in existence due to an actual statute? CAN T-Mac arbitrarily remove it?

    1. I don’t think he can but I really don’t know. The Virginia governor, regardless of whom it is, is one of the most powerful offices in the United States.

  6. Starryflights

    Alabama removes Confederate flags as backlash spreads from Charleston slayings
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    Demonstrators rally against Confederate flag
    Social video captured the scene outside the state Capitol in Columbia, S.C., where demonstrators rallied against the Confederate flag. (The Washington Post)
    By Jeremy Borden and Brian Murphy June 24 at 12:15 PM
    COLUMBIA, S.C. — The fast-growing backlash against Confederate symbols gained more momentum Wednesday with Alabama removing flags at its capitol and protests swelling in South Carolina as mourners gathered for pastor-politician whose church became a killing field a week ago.

    The firestorm again the images — on flags, license plates, clothing and elsewhere — has spread quickly across the south and spilled over to major national retailers since last week’s slayings in Charleston.

    Many protesters hope to drive the debate deeper into issues such as gun control and entrenched racism. But, at the moment, the opposition to Confederate symbols has galvanized emotions on the streets and in state legislatures.

    At South Carolina’s statehouse, workers placed a black drape over a second-floor window — blocking the view of a Confederate battle flag at a nearby Civil War memorial — before thousands of mourners were expected to view the body of slain state senator, the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, who was among nine African Americans killed in the June 17 massacre.

    Nine uniformed pallbearers carried carried Pinckney’s coffin into the statehouse from a horse-drawn caisson, which passed directly under the Confederate flag.

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/south-carolina-flag-debate-sharpens-as-mourners-stream-to-capitol-grounds/2015/06/24/b02e676e-1a59-11e5-bd7f-4611a60dd8e5_story.html?hpid=z1

    I am disgusted that Senator Pinkney’s casket had to pass under that flag.

    Good for Alabama.

  7. Cargosquid

    @Starryflights
    That flag had nothing to do with her death. I’m disgusted that you are spreading manufactured outrage.

    The entire “controversy” has been created to cover for the fact that Roof FAILED to find cultural racism and any supporters. This is an invented controversy.

    1. Cargo, are you saying that there is no racism? Roof was a lone wolf. Period. He didn’t look very hard. If he goes to prison, and he will, at least for a while, he will find all sorts of racism–more than that boy can deal with.

      I think both Cargo and Starry are in a state of denial, for different reasons but still denial.

      The internet is full of racism. I expect roof got the reinforcement he needed from that. I seriously doubt that a flag made him commit those heinous acts.

  8. BSinVA

    I was listening to some progressive radio station. Some guy from Sparta, Tennessee called in and said he was a liberal, voted for Obama twice and his family detested slavery. He said many of the Union soldiers who fought in the Civil War to free the slaves then went West and participated in a genocidal war against indigenous Americans (Indians).

    He is right! He then explained that the Southerners would probably feel a whole lot better about removing their sacred flag if the United States would admit the travesty against the native Americans and blast the faces of the Presidents off of Mt. Rushmore since that land is considered sacred by the Lakota Indians.

    1. It depends on what is meant by removing the flag. I am all for removing it from state house property. It is a relic and shouldn’t be flown other than to commemorate soldiers who died and who fought for the confederacy.

      I am not history expert but I have listed to more dumb ass people the past 48 hours who really should just keep their ignorant yaps shut. The media is enraging me. From what started as sensitivity has rapidly turned into all southerners and everything southern is bad. I am becoming enraged at the insulting tones.

  9. Rick Bentley

    The tide turned quickly on this. I’m glad. It doesn’t belong flying anywhere, or on anyone’s car.

    Did you know that in parts of Europe, where the swastika is banned, white power groups walk around with Confederate flags? Closest they can come to the swastika.

    As to what it stands for :

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornerstone_Speech

    The Cornerstone Speech, also known as the Cornerstone Address, was an oration delivered by Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens at the Athenaeum in Savannah, Georgia, on March 21, 1861.

    Delivered extemporaneously a few weeks before the Confederacy would start the American Civil War by firing on the U.S. Army at Fort Sumter, Stephens’ speech explained what the fundamental differences were between the constitutions of the Confederacy and that of the United States, enumerated contrasts between U.S. and Confederate ideologies and beliefs, laid out the Confederacy’s causes for starting the American Civil War, and defended slavery.

    “Our new Government is founded upon exactly the opposite ideas; its foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition”.

    1. Abe Lincoln also thought that.

  10. Cargosquid

    @Moon-howler
    No…I’m saying that there was no “culture” of or “institutional” racism. There was one lone bigot that committed this crime.

    Roof found sites that directed his thinking in certain ways. In fact, his entire manifesto sounds like a left wing critical race rant.

    That flag had nothing to do with driving him to commit murder. Notice…he was NOT wearing a confederate symbol even though those are very easy to buy. He wore the flags of Rhodesia and apartheid South Africa.

    This is a manufactured controversy to rile up the base.

    1. I think we would have agree on what institutionalized racism really is.

  11. Ed Myers

    The DMV (reports to the govenor) has the authority to replace any vanity license plate it issued that it no longer “likes”. It has done it before and it didn’t require legislative action. Legislative action is required to authorize a new plate, not to remove a plate from circulation because the message is offensive.

    1. I am trying to figure out why the Sons of Confederate Veterans is an offensive message. Can you give me an example?

  12. Scout

    I’m waiting for some good commentary and analysis on the similarities between Roof and Breivik. These “manifestoes” for people with small minds are ironic, to say the least. But they are very revealing of how maladjusted young males can sit in their basements in front of a glow tube and get themselves completely self-radicalized, sufficiently so to commit mass murder.

  13. Emma

    McAuliffe clearly had no issue with this symbol until all of this excitement happened. I have a problem with our elected leaders making hasty decisions based on nothing but pure emotion, political opportunism, and an obvious desire to embarrass and isolate political opponents. And when did the public schools start teaching that the Civil War was fought solely over slavery? Maybe Starry can enlighten us.

    Although, as I said, I have no attachment to that flag, having been born and raised geographically on the winning side 😉

  14. Lyssa

    The only monument I recall seeing growing up referred to the Civil War as the The Great Rebellion.

  15. Wolve

    Once we finish erasing every last symbol of the Confederacy from sight and mind, we should certainly address all those other symbols of American shame. We could start by demolishing the Alamo, which must certainly be disturbing to Mexican-Americans in Texas — along with the monument at San Jacinto. Then we change the names of Austin and Houston for good measure.

    After that, we tear down the statues of Buffalo Soldiers at Fort Leavenworth, KS; Fort Huachuca, AZ; and Lawton, OK. Those Army fellers, free Blacks and ex-slaves, did a right nasty job of killing our Native Americans just so the rest of us could steal their land.

    And then we go out to San Francisco and get rid of anything there that smacks of the Irish, including St. Patricks’s Day. Well, I mean, back in the day, the Irish immigrants in Frisco so feared losing their jobs that they harassed physically, sometimes even to death, the poor Chinese who landed on our shores looking for a new life.

    So many things. This group memory cleansing could replace baseball as our national pastime. We might even be able to surpass the job ISIS did on ancient Nineveh and is starting to do on Palmyra.

    Crazy ass country.

    1. For a second there I thought you might be getting ready to suggest that we get rid of the US Flag, you know, the one under which we took homes away from US citizens during WWII and slapped those Americans into Japanese interment camps. It was the same flag that killed many native Americans throughout our history.

      Will US Grant also be South-shamed? His family owned slaves until after the Civil War. That emancipation proclamation didn’t touch him.

      How many slave-holders are in your wallet? That’s a tricky one.

  16. Wolve

    Crap! Almost forgot. I suggest we chop down every last one of those Japanese cherry trees at the Tidal Basin and replace them with huge monuments to the victims of Pearl Harbor and the Bataan Death March. Those damned trees make me mad whenever I see them, I tell you.

    1. Supposedly those cherry trees had to have armed guards after Pearl Harbor. People kept trying to chop them down or set fire to them.

      That was before my time.

  17. Starry flights

    Moon-howler :
    I am trying to figure out why the Sons of Confederate Veterans is an offensive message. Can you give me an example?

    The organization isn’t offensive; rather, it’s the flag that they adopted to display on their license plates with state sanction that many find offensive. They can still have their own license plate. Let the Dylan Roofs of the world have it.

    Incidentally, that particular flag is not the flag of the confederacy, so I don’t get why they selected it as their emblem.

    1. Maybe because it was the flag of the army of Northern Virginia and therefore the association with Lee.??? I don’t know.

      I believe that organization began in 1890. I expect the adopted their emblem long before its resurgence in the 60’s.

  18. Second Alamo

    The government is always telling us that a few radical Muslims don’t represent the entire Muslim population yet a single radical white guy now is the poster boy for all Southern whites. Another scary term being banded around is referring to the South’s actions during the Civil War as in support of white supremacy, a modern term generated to include all whites and not just those who are members of the KKK. This all coming from a horribly racist nation (according to those in the “White House”) that elected a black man president for two terms in a row. Go figure!

    1. The earth is shuddering and erupting. I am going to agree with Second Alamo.

      Tell me SA, have you been feeling like the red-headed step child recently?

  19. Frequency

    I see two issues. 1. Should the government be flying any flag except the state or national flag on public grounds? Why not fly the Union Jack? That’s “heritage”. Short answer is no. Fly Old Glory or your state flag and leave it at that.

    2. What about individuals and the “heritage not hate” argument? Hey, it’s a free country. I don’t think you’re going to get many takers on that line of thinking but if you want to fly some other flag, go for it.

    As a practical matter, the battle flag is just too tightly intertwined with a vile institution – slavery. Just like the swastika (which was around a looong time before Hitler picked it up), it will probably never escape its use in the Civil War and hate organizations since.

    1. I agree with #1 with the exception of confederate cemeteries. It is appropriate to fly confederate flags in confederate cemeteries. It is also appropriate to have period flags displayed in Civil War battlefields and museums.

      I find it strange to compare the American Civil War to Hitler ad Nazi Germany. I am not a big fan of the battle flag. I find it has been used wrongly by people with a bad message. I also feel confident the same sentiments would be used about any flag associated with the south, such as the Stars and Bars or the Bonnie Blue.

      Maybe te Tea Party should be asked to put the Gadsden Flag “back” and not adopt that flag for its message.

      No one is still addressing the negativism directed towards southerners this past week. Not a single person has mentioned how despicably Southerners were treated after the Civil War. The USA built up other countries following WWI, WWII, Korea, but both blacks and whites were left in a state of poverty and starvation for decades following the Civil War. My family lost almost everything they owned. People don’t just hate in a vacuum.

  20. Censored bybvbl

    I don’t think the same negativity would be directed at other flags associated with the South if they were merely viewed as historical relics. The battle flag of NoVa has negative connotations as anyone growing up in the Fifties/Sixties South knows. It was an in-your-face racist taunt to African-Americans – and Northerners. I was proud to see so many South Carolinians and others call for its removal within the last few days. I feel better about the South for seeing the resistance to the “Confederate flag” flying on public property. This race discussion could have been handled beautifully if everyone appreciated that a bi-racial man had become President. Instead, the Republican Party dug in its heels and made the worse of the situation. It was a missed opportunity for this country. Maybe a lot of people realize that and are using the removal of the flag as a gesture to move forward.

    1. I have no problem with the battle flag coming down over institutions and state edifices. I don’t want any other southern relics to take its place either. It shouldn’t have gone up in the first place. There is no point or need. It makes the entire state (which ever one has it) look redneck.

      Reading around the internet, however, that’s not where people want to stop. I was so irritated at Jon Stewart, I felt like bitch xlapping him. You know he is almost a sacred cow in my world. Not last night.

      I feel a really nasty sense of regionalism that covers a broad area and goes back many generations. It’s like how I felt when I moved to NJ as a kid and the doctor just assumed we all had hook worms because we were from Virginia.

      We did not.

  21. Censored bybvbl

    I think you need to look positively at the people in the South who know that a change needs to be made. My husband’s relatives – and probably yours – were not part of recent problems. You and I know which elements are mainly to blame. Problems have existed longer than need be because politicians find a needed base to which they can pander. It helps them personally gain by splitting the electorate. And the closer the race, the nastier the tactics.

    I wouldn’t feel discouraged by reading comments in newspapers or on the internet. Some of the dumbest twits (sorry, I need to self-censor)) are the most prolific posters. Ignore them.

  22. Second Alamo

    Well, Moon, I don’t know if I feel like the red-headed step child, but I sure do feel like I’ve been framed! It’s funny how some are outraged when stereotyped yet have no problem stereotyping others. If they’re trying to remove everything that reminds us of slavery, then what about todays ancestors? I never think of slavery until someone blames me for it for no reason other than their own racism.

    1. I have stereotype of others in my own mind but I try to keep it to myself. It isn’t just about southerners.

      Slavery is nasty. I try not to think about it also, even though it has been practiced all over the world since the first people came to be.

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