As President Donald Trump makes clear his intention to run for re-election as America’s second Confederate president, and as the social justice protests following the killing of George Floyd have renewed efforts to eliminate monuments to the Confederacy, Republican senators find themselves in a hard place indeed as a movement grows to re-name military bases that honor rebel generals. It seems that GOP senators kind of, sort of might be on board — except that they fear angering Donald Trump, who recently tweeted his outright opposition to this cause in the face of a proposal by Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren. Warren’s amendment to a defense police bill “would require the Pentagon to strip the names of Confederate generals from all military assets — such as bases, aircrafts or ships — within three years,” and “also calls for a commission that would review how the Confederacy is being honored through military property and develop a plan to remove those names.”
Don’t get me wrong — there was in fact some outright opposition among GOP senators to strip the Confederacy of its grotesque military honors. Such an attack on the Confederacy was unpalatable to North Carolina Senator Thom “Because spelling it ‘Tom’ makes too much damned sense” Tillis and Missouri Senator Josh Hawley, who both objected to Warren’s amendment. But even senior GOP senators who seem to see which way the national wind is blowing couched their positions in language that almost seemed like a deliberate parody of senatorial bombast. While Mitch McConnell slyly indicated he would not object to the final outcome of the renaming debate (way to be on the right side of history, Mitch!), North Dakota Senator John Thune went full senatorspeak, declaring, “I’m not wedded to the idea that those names of those military installations are eternal. I think that you reevaluate, given the timing and circumstances and where we are in the country, who we want to revere with, you know, by naming military installations or other national monuments. And so I think you have to periodically take a look at that. And in this case, it’s perhaps time to do it.” “Perhaps,” “revere,” “timing and circumstances,” “eternal,” “wedded”: reading this word salad, I’m not sure if Senator Thune wants to divorce the Confederacy or marry it.
Since President Trump tweeted his opposition to renaming bases named after Confederate traitors, other Republican senators have also gone full hem-and-haw in their desperation to avoid taking a stand on whether the Confederacy was actually an enemy of the American people (news flash: it was). Texas Senator John Cornyn averred that a discussion and a commission’s recommendations would be informative. Georgia Senator David Perdue likewise embraced the idea of not taking a stand, preferring like Cornyn to kick the decision over to a commission.
Compared to Cornyn and Perdue, Iowa Senator Joni Ernst sounded like a radical abolitionist, boldly asserting, “I guess my personal opinion is just, you know, I’m okay — if they change, I’m okay. I don’t want people to get hung up on a name. I guess my thought is because everybody talks about, ‘Oh, the history behind these bases’ — the history behind those bases is still there.” Not to be outdone by Ernst’s firm stand against the honoring of Confederate generals, Maine’s Senator Susan Collins not only indicated she supports “reviewing” the names of bases, but observed that “our country has had many extraordinary military leaders, heroes, and Medal of Honor recipients since the Civil War who could be honored.” So true — America is a land of heroes who did not commit treason! So many heroes that there’s no point in outright condemning and repudiating those who committed treason — I mean, the heroic American post-Civil War situation just speaks for itself, right?
I am cautiously optimistic that the GOP has badly misjudged this moment, when more Americans than ever seem open to undoing the misbegotten honors bestowed on treasonous generals and a traitorous cause. Republican senators may think that appeals to obfuscatory processes will preserve the support of that minority of voters who still believe the Confederacy worth praising, while appearing open-minded to the rest, but the lack of leadership is glaring. This is not a close call. Having military bases named after those who engaged in treason and insurrection against the United States is an affront to the American military, a slap in the face of African-Americans, and an unspeakable endorsement of a traitorous movement.