Confederate Day

Today as I look out from my window from the 12th floor of a federal building I stare over the top of a picture I hung on my desk as an inspiration.  It is a picture taken not long ago of President Obama sitting in the seat that Civil Rights icon Rosa Parks once occupied on a bus in Alabama when she refused to leave and move to the back of the bus.  He is looking out the window almost as if someone might request the same of him.  It is a sad reminder of a time not long ago when people were not equal in this country.  Yet step by step we move forward yet it is a constant struggle.  It is a lot like a crying child reaching for a candy bar in a grocery store, eventually they will be pulled along and assume a proper course.  It might hurt and embarrass the child's mother in the process but she knows what has to be done and eventually the screaming child will learn as well.

Yesterday our President took such a step in acknowledging that LGBT people have a right to join in marriage just as the rest of us.  Simply the fact that they share the same sex is not a sufficient reason to deny them the legal bonds that come with marriage.  As these rights are obtained they will also soon discover the downsides of such unions when it comes to children, breakup and divorce.  This struggle is truly the Civil Rights struggle of our time and we will eventually look back on it as unbelievable as once forcing people of different colored skin to drink from different fountains or make Rosa Parks sit in the back of the bus.  It is a both a sad and encouraging comment on our society that our children are the ones that will have to explain this to their parents and grand parents.  Most of our children cannot possibly understand why this is even an issue.  They have grown up with minds so much more open than our own.

When my eyes meet the picture of President Obama hanging on the side of my desk they gradually float upward to a window that looks out from the United States Federal Building over the roof tops of Columbia, SC.  Eventually they drift toward the dome of the State Capitol where the Confederate flag still flies in a slightly diminished position.  It once sat atop the dome fluttering in the wind.  Now it graces a monument in front of the building dead center of the termination of Main Street Columbia.  The truth no confederate sympathizer 150 years removed will tell you is that the flag was only added to the dome of the state capitol in 1962 as a response to Civil Rights.   There is no tradition beyond one of repression.

If you call a state office today the Governor has mandated that all employees must answer, "Today is a great day in South Carolina." before they move to take your question.  Unfortunately, should you try, you will not receive an answer.  The reason, today is Confederate Day in South Carolina.  It is a state holiday.  A day to fondly remember the sacrifice of the brave souls that once marched in battle to preserve a southern union of states.  There is a dark truth however, one that has remained unchanged in South Carolinian politics in 150 years.  When southern men went off to war they did so at the behest of an extremely rich, white land owning class.  They did it to preserve the aristocratic way of life for these people, not their own..  They were not the ones who relied on an economic resource of free human labor.  Most were simply poor farmers.  They were lucky to own the land they lived on yet alone a slave.  Yet still, they were convinced that he preservation of the elite white southern economy was in their best interests.

It is ironic that now 150 years later a poor white southern class seems little changed.  Racial politics, fear, religion and ignorance are still used by the southern elite as a way of controlling the masses.  When elections roll around they turn out to vote against their self interests.  They vote against education, health care, fair working conditions and just wages.  They vote to stay poor and stay in poverty.  One hundred and fifty years have passed yet on this day of the Confederacy it is surprising how much is still the same.