Marissa's musings about liberty, individual rights, justice, grief, loss, and other random things
President Trump signed a presidential proclamation honoring this important moment in history.View this post on Instagram
This isn’t something that I can picture Joe Biden or Kamala Harris doing, because neither liberty nor history is something that they value. Although he is not perfect, it is things like this that make me glad we have Trump as our president.View this post on Instagram
I recently came across an excellent article by David McCallister at the Abbeville Institute, entitled, “A Modern Bill of Attainder?” In it, he argues that the despicable “Naming Commission,” which erased all diversity from the names of military bases and also completely destroyed Arlington National Cemetery, is unconstitutional because its actions constitute a Bill of Attainder:
Removals of base names, ROTC battle streamers, just to name a few constitute honors granted but removed pursuant to a Congressional Act meant to stigmatize a group’s progeny into perpetuity. By the passage of section 370 of the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act, Congress did just that when they adopted Elizabeth Warren’s Naming Commission provision based on her contention of universal, and individual guilt for treason, acting as judge, jury and executioner, with a complicit Congress behind her, despite President Trump’s veto of the troublesome Law. The Law singled out a deemed group unworthy to have any honors based on their military service, over 150 years after the fact, and saddling their descendants with hereditary shame and stigma. No trial, no treason. No treason, no condemnation. No condemnation, no cancellation.
(emphasis added by me)
These sentiments really resonate with me and articulate what is so wrong with the statue genocide in a way that I hadn’t thought of before. The sentiments expressed by McCallister apply not only to the disgraceful Naming Commission, but to all atrocities committed against Confederate historical figures and Christopher Columbus as well.
Essentially, removing a historical figure’s statues, monuments, public art, holidays, names, and other honors constitutes giving that historical figure the death penalty. Yet there was never any grand jury convened to charge the historical figures (and in many cases, no particular crime that they’ve even been accused of committing), no due process, no speedy and public trial (or any trial at all, for that matter), and no jury. And because historical figures are no longer alive, they are not able to be confronted with the witnesses against them, to obtain witnesses in their favor, or to have the assistance of counsel for their defense. In short, what has happened with statues and monuments over the past few years constitutes giving historical figures the death penalty without a trial. And this violates the Fifth and Sixth Amendments of the Constitution. Plus, the atrocities committed against statues are the very epitome of cruelty. If these sickening actions are not “cruel and unusual,” then nothing is. Therefore, the statue genocide violates the Eighth Amendment as well.
Check out this positive article about Christopher Columbus – a rare thing in today’s society. Written by Canadian pastor and columnist Rob Weatherby, it outlines six types of danger that Columbus faced and triumphed over: the risk of encountering sea monsters and/or falling off the edge of the earth (both considered serious possibilities at the time), the risk of violent storms, the risk of running into a wind-free spell and getting stuck, the risk of encountering rival Portuguese explorers, the risk posed by hostile native tribes, and the risk of mutiny by his own crew.
As the author points out, these factors “underscore the immense courage of Columbus.” Sadly, to many people in our society, courage such as that which Columbus displayed, is not valued. Being remarkable, standing out, and doing magnificent things is not valued. Instead, the only thing that is valued, for so many in our society, is compliance, sameness, and mindless conformity. That is what is motivating the atrocities that have been committed against Christopher Columbus over the past five years.
Dear Governor Youngkin:I am writing to respectfully ask that you please veto bill HB1699. This bill is mean-spirited, cruel, discriminatory, and hurtful. I am on the autism spectrum, and my special interest is history. What makes history so important to me is that it includes stories and perspectives from a wide array of different people. Confederate history is part of history. People who fought for the Confederacy deserve to be honored just as much as anyone else does. Their stories deserve to be told, and their history preserved, just as much as anyone else’s. It is unconscionable that, after years of the most brutal and vicious attacks imaginable on Confederate historical figures, a bill would be introduced that would hurt lovers of Confederate history even more than we have already been hurt. Bill HB1699 would personally hurt me as an autistic person who loves history. It’s beyond upsetting that a bill such as this would even be under consideration. Please, please veto this horrible bill.Sincerely,Marissa
On Wednesday, President Trump signed a truly awesome executive order.
The order establishes a task force to plan an “extraordinary celebration” in honor of America’s 250th anniversary, on July 4, 2026. If Trump’s campaign speeches are any indication, the festivities will begin on Memorial Day 2025 and will include a “Great American State Fair” in Iowa, and a “Patriot Games” for high school athletes from across the country.
Additionally, the executive order re-establishes the plan to create a National Garden of American Heroes, a statue garden filled with statues of 250 historical figures. The order goes so far as to commission artists for the first 100 statues, indicating that the statue garden isn’t just an abstract hope, but is actually on the path towards becoming reality. “The National Garden will honor American heroism after dozens of monuments to Americans, including Presidents and Founding Fathers, have toppled or destroyed and never restored,” said a press release.
Speaking of statues that have been topped or destroyed and never restored, the executive order reinstates Trump’s order from 2020 that was aimed at protecting existing statues from destruction at the hands of bigots and bullies. This policy directs the Attorney General to prosecute people and groups responsible for vandalizing and/or destroying statues to the fullest extent of the law. It also withholds federal funding from state and local law enforcement agencies that fail to do the same. The AP describes this order as “reviving efforts to harshly punish those who vandalize or destroy existing statues and monuments.” This is true, and there is absolutely nothing bad about it, because harsh punishment is exactly what such people deserve.
As alluded to above, you might recall that both the plans for the statue garden and the policy strengthening punishments for anti-statue bullies existed previously thanks to an executive order that Trump signed during a dark time that feels simultaneously like yesterday and like a million years ago. (I blogged about it here.) Unfortunately, within his first few days of taking office, Biden mean-spiritedly and cruelly signed an executive order rescinding both of these policies, thereby cancelling plans for the statue garden and deliberately declining to punish the people in our country who are the most deserving of punishment. Although this new executive order doesn’t undo the unspeakable atrocities that were done, I am heartened that Trump has once again chosen to stand up for the statues.
I will never stop fighting for statues, I will never stop advocating on their behalf, I will never forget or forgive what happened to them, and I will never stop writing about them. This is what is truly important. This is what matters. And I’m truly glad that President Trump, to a significant extent, feels the same.
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Yes, it was.
Good news: President-Elect Trump plans to change the name of North America’s tallest mountain, currently known as Denali, back to its original name of Mt. McKinley.
At a recent rally in Phoenix, Trump said he wants to return president William McKinley’s name to the Alaskan mountain because “he was a great president” and “I think he deserves it.” (source)
The mountain was given the name Mt McKinley in 1917 but was changed to Denali, the indigenous word for “High One,” in 2015 by the Obama administration. Obama’s Department of the Interior alleged that McKinley lacked any “significant historical connection to the mountain or to Alaska.” The name originated from a gold prospector who, upon learning that McKinley had won the Republican nomination for president, named the mountain in his honor.
In my opinion, this is great news because it signals Trump’s willingness to take the side of historical figures rather than the politically correct bullies who aim to obliterate them from existence. The renaming of Mt. McKinley took place well before the horrific genocide that erupted in the spring of 2020, so Trump’s plan to restore the name can’t really be counted as reversing any part of this genocide. But it’s cool to see an honor (hopefully) being returned to a historical figure who, as Trump points out, didn’t really deserve to have it taken away. Erasing historical figures – whether in the form of names, holidays, statues, plaques, memorials, or other public art – is something that is rarely reversed. Hopefully the plan to return Mt. McKinley to its rightful name is a sign of similar things to come.
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