Robert E Lee The Great Emancipator

[Rick Smith]

(06-06-2013 08:50 PM)L Verge Wrote:  Or that Lee was demonstrating that life goes on despite the color of one's skin. He further demonstrated that the war was over, the way of life had changed for the people of Richmond, and that he was acknowledging the change. That's what dignified and intelligent people do - acknowledge change and move on.

Laurie's comments are very much to the point here.

I believe that it is impossible for us to place ourselves into the context of those times and to understand them fully, but it is important to try, even though we are hampered by the burden of being expected to view every issue through the lens of political and social correctness.

General Lee was responding in the way he did not to promote racial equality, but to diffuse a potentially explosive situation. He was also realistic enough to understand that for better or worse, a significant change had taken place in the world in which he lived.

Examined carefully, with an understanding of General Lee's faith, he was responding to the situation, not perfectly perhaps, but as Christian gentleman.

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(06-07-2013 08:19 AM)tblunk Wrote:  

(06-04-2013 09:45 PM)Rick Smith Wrote:  Mr. Lincoln is often referred to as "The Great Emancipator." The credit he received for doing what he did for black people was received as a consequence of political expediency.

Robert E. Lee freed 196 slaves which had belonged to his father-in-law after having educated them so that they would not be set free without some skill to employ.

He defied Virginia state law by educating his slaves and was allowed to do so because they were educated at Lee's expense and by his wife and daughters at Arlington and the state could not at that time interfere in the affairs of a private home.

Lee signed the last manumition papers on the eve of the Battle of Fredericksburg on December 11, 1862.

One man freed slaves, or tried to, for ploitical considerations.

One man freed slaves due to personal conviction.

I was under the impression that the Custis will stipulated the emancipation of his slaves. Is that not correct?

That is correct, but Lee would have agreed whether stipulated or not. Lee considered slavery to be a great moral evil {his words} and that it tended to degrade both master and slave and gave each the view that labor was a thing to be avoided.