Confederate Will Remain in Name of Vanderbilt Dorm

Newspaper article

By: Michael Cass

Date: July 12, 2005

Source: Cass, Michael. "Confederate Will Remain in Name of Vanderbilt Dorm." The Tennessean. (July 12, 2005).

About the Author: Michael Cass is a staff writer for The Tennessean, the major daily newspaper for middle Tennessee.

INTRODUCTION

In 2002, Vanderbilt University proposed to sandblast the word "Confederate" from the frieze of the campus building known as Confederate Memorial Hall. The building was built in 1935 with a $50,000 donation by the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC). Vanderbilt's proposal set off a firestorm of protest over the best way to commemorate its Southern past.

Vanderbilt University, along with other Southern colleges and universities, seeks to recruit African American students, faculty, and staff. Such recruitment efforts have sometimes been hampered by Confederate symbols. While the descendents of Confederates view their ancestors as heroic, African Americans regard the Civil War as an effort by the South to continue the slave system, and symbols of the Confederacy are seen as part of a hostile climate for blacks instead of an effort to remember the past.

In 2002, Vanderbilt Chancellor Gordon Gee cited the need to create a welcoming environment as part of diversity efforts when he decided to remove the word "Confederate" from Memorial Hall. The issue had been a topic of debate at the private university since the residence hall was renovated in 1988. The UDC wanted the name to remain to honor the men from Tennessee who died in the Civil War, and successfully pursued the matter in court. While frustrated in its efforts to make the physical change, "Confederate" has been dropped from all maps and literature that refer to the building. The university has also established an annual lecture series to address diversity topics.

PRIMARY SOURCE

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SIGNIFICANCE

The Civil War remains the bloodiest conflict in American history, killing more people than all other American wars combined. During the Civil War, 112,000 Union soldiers and 94,000 Confederates were killed in combat. Another 197,000 Union men and 140,000 Confederates died of disease. Prison claimed 64,000 Union soldiers and 26,000 Confederates. The 633,000 total deaths do not reflect the men who were physically or psychologically wounded.

In this light, it is not surprising that the war is also the most commemorated in American history. Even before the war ended in 1865, Americans struggled over how to memorialize the experience. Since then, remembrance of the war has produced a vast set of monuments, speeches, poems, reenactments, films, and other works. In this commemoration, Americans have created a kind of public art that addresses issues of nationhood, race relations, gender roles, and multiculturalism. The response to this art has changed over time. The birth and flowering of the civil rights movement led to challenges of commemoration that celebrated the Southern side of the war. In clashes over the display of the Confederate battle flag and other Confederate memorabilia, African Americans have argued that the portrayal of the war should not celebrate a South that sought to enslave blacks. As the continuing debate indicates, issues surrounding the war continue to play a role in American society.

FURTHER RESOURCES

Books

Blight, David W. Beyond the Battlefield: Race, Memory, and the American Civil War. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2002.

Fahs, Alice and Joan Waugh, eds. The Memory of the Civil War in American Culture. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004.

Neff, John R. Honoring the Civil War Dead: Commemoration and the Problem of Reconciliation. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2005.