Getting rid of the names and statues that shouldn’t been there in the first place, because they were traitors, like Lee, is crucial. Thomas Jefferson a little bit different, but I don’t mind reducing him. The real issue is the pedestal they stand on, even him. He wrote the Declaration when prompted by four other northern white men because he represented the South and slave owners, and they wanted the country unified in rebellion against the British King so they couldn’t be split and turned on one another. Even then, Tommy J. was used as a symbol. He had the right skill set for writing, an French education in the ideas that they wanted represented, and prompted him with those ideas. He then handed the daft off to an editor, a Quaker form the north (mid Atlantic region), who edited. In other words, it was a collective effort.
The power of the ideas is what was revolutionary, not the worship of the man. Jefferson didn’t fully understand how the ideas he read about in books should come into existence, off the page and into government. We still don’t practice what was preached so to speak.
The editor of the Declaration did. John Dickinson, a Quaker, was also a wealthy landowner with slaves, and the year after editing, in 1777, he freed his slaves of Popular Hall, losing their asset value off his balance sheets. He took an economic hit. Dickinson also helped write the Declaration of Causes in 1775 and the Model Treaty (1776-1777). Tom is not the solitary figure of greatness he has been propped up to be. And the amount of activity and drafts and writing and documents surrounding the declaration showed it didn’t pop out of the head of one guy.
But more importantly, the ideas are critical, and get ignored and not put on a pedestal. In fact, the ideas should be, and the people taken down. Democracy is about inalienable rights, an idea so proud that Lincoln believed you had to look at the Constitution through this and other ideas in the Declaration. Even he saw the flaws of humans and looked instead at the greatness of the ideals.
