Jefferson comes down in Oregon

[Ex Lurker]

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/thomas-jefferson-statue-toppled-in-portland-oregon/

A statue of Thomas Jefferson outside a high school named for him in North Portland, Oregon was toppled Sunday after a night of protests, reports CBS Portland, Oregon affiliate KOIN-TV. It was the latest to be vandalized or pulled over in the U.S. and other nations during the racial justice protests that have followed the death of George Floyd at Minneapolis police hands three week ago.

Statues of leading Confederate figures as well as slaveowners and slave traders have been targeted by demonstrators – and in some cases, removed by state and state governments.


The Jefferson statue was the third to be taken down this weekend in Oregon alone: Two at the University of Oregon – the Pioneer Man and the Pioneer Mother – were taken down Saturday evening.

Take them all down.

[riversedge]

1. I lived in Portland many moons ago. I learned Oregon was a Union state but many Confederate

families and soldiers moved to the NW after the war-for various reasons. Hence the statues.

[Beartracks]

5. But this was Thomas Jefferson, not Jefferson Davis.

[cwydro]

7. You do know he was the president of the US, right?

Not sure his connection to the confederacy.

[ananda]

15. He was a southern SLAVE owner.

Take him down.

Take Washington down too.

[cwydro]

17. Oh boy.

Smh.

[Tom Traubert]

19. He owned slaves.

I have an issue with this. Taking down statutes of confederates is one thing. They were traitors. But statutes of founding fathers is another issue. Apart from Jefferson, George Washington, John Adams, Patrick Henry, John Hancock, James Madison, John Jay, and Benjamin Franklin, among other founding fathers, all were were slave owners during their lives. Franklin later became an abolitionist, and Washington later opposed slavery, but the fact remains that they owned slaves. These individuals nevertheless should be recognized for founding this nation, and despite the fact that slavery was an atrocity, should not be held to contemporary mores and standards. They are reflections of the times during which they lived. If there is a need to address the slavery issue, and there is, it can be done by installing educational plaques on the statutes that put their contributions in context and disclose that they also were slaveholders.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

22. Welcome to DU

There should, indeed, be a different response to the glorification of traitors than there is to those you named. Confederates fought to perpetuate slavery.

[SharonClark]

26. Well said. You expressed my thoughts as well.

[SoonerPride]

29. He didn't just own slaves. He raped one or more repeatedly.

[shockey80]

31. John Adams did not own slaves.

[Tom Traubert]

33. You're right.

My mistake. I thought I read he had somewhere.

https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-resources/spotlight-primary-source/john-adams-abolition-slavery-1801

[treestar]

34. +1

They were born into that system and had not created it. Further, their actions led to eventual freedom, first you had the US, then you had the Civil War and the Reconstruction Amendments. Based on the Constitution they came up with.

[kentuck]

2. The Founder of the Democratic Party?

Thomas Jefferson?

Does that mean the Democratic Party was toppled also?

[empedocles]

4. . . . and the name Washington, D.C.?

There is great momentum these weeks to be used.

Hopefully, 'activists' will not waste that momentum energy with the arrogant insistence on, 'DEFUND THE POLICE', and these similar divisive, impulsive, acts.

[Mme. Defarge]

3. "The evil that men do lives after them,

The good is oft interred with their bones,”

[cwydro]

12. He was evil?

[SoonerPride]

30. He was a rapist

So there’s that

🤷🏻?♂️

[Loki Liesmith]

6. Stupid

[rockfordfile]

8. That was stupid. Thomas Jefferson was a great President

[cwydro]

10. And died long before the Civil War.

[superpatriotman]

9. This is ignorant

And needs to stop.

[customerserviceguy]

11. Agreed

It will just hand the election over to Trump.

[superpatriotman]

23. Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory

It's gonna be a LONG summer

[rockfordfile]

13. It seems something else is behind this crap

[cwydro]

14. How about the Lincoln monument?

You want that down too?

[Drahthaardogs]

16. Don't give them ideas

Just saying

[cwydro]

18. I hear ya.

[Ex Lurker]

25. Lincoln had some very problematic views

he would be considered a white supremacist by today's standard. Whether his statues come down should be left up to POC.

[SharonClark]

27. I'm a woman. Men have been historically sexist.

Do women get to decide that all statues of men should be torn down?

If the protesters against racial injustice and police brutality are doing this then they’ve lost the script. I suspect this action to done by radical individuals who really just want to destroy everything.

[treestar]

35. Could be false flags to make the movement

look insane.

[AmericanCanuck]

20. Some people are more anxious to take their anger out at every target

and not realizing the political fallout.

Confederate statues are not in the same grouping as slave owners of 240 odd years ago.

[roamer65]

21. 1619-2020.

There was a LOT of evil done to Africans during those 401 years.

We need to understand the rage and be compassionate.

Statues are simply hunks of metal.

[Goodheart]

24. Fucking stupid!

[SaintLouisBlues]

28. We've got a nice little Jefferson Monument here if anyone wants to have a go...

[DFW]

32. Careful. This is not a Borowitz blog

Some people will take you seriously.

[Goodheart]

36. Just saw that monument in a movie entitled "Interstate 60"