Robert E. Lee was a racist, white supremacist who knowingly fought to preserve the institution of slavery
Ken Burns, in his 1990 “The Civil War” docuseries, portrays Lee as a courtly aristocrat who disapproved of secession and slavery, yet defended them both at the head of one of the greatest armies of all time.
There are certain truths we hold to be self-evident: Saturated fat causes heart disease, Marie Antoinette said “let them eat cake,” and Robert E. Lee was an honorable gentleman who reluctantly fought for the Confederacy out of loyalty to his home state of Virginia.
There were nine or more colonels in the United States Army from Virginia in 1861, and only one of them — Robert E. Lee — chose to serve the Confederacy.
When Robert E. Lee swore an oath to the United States Army, his oath did not mention the state of Virginia. It was an oath to the United States of America.
The American Civil War cost upwards of 650,000 lives. In the spirit of reconciliation, the North allowed the South to mythologize their Civil War “heroes,” at the expense of its Black citizens and the blood of hundreds of thousands of Union soldiers who died for the cause of emancipation.
Confederate General Robert E. Lee (undeservedly!) developed a reputation as not only the greatest general of all time in the eyes of many Confederate sympathizers, but as the “marble model” of a good Christian gentleman.
As a general, Lee won 10 major battles and lost 4. He compelled the surrender of 0 armies and ultimately surrendered his own. In total, Lee lost 121,000 men — the highest number of any general in the Civil War.
General Lee won his major battles while fighting defensively in his home state of Virginia, where new advances in military technology favored defensive strategies. The rest of the world would not learn this lesson until WW1…
Whenever Lee invaded enemy soil, he was sorely beaten.
Robert E. Lee was married to George Washington’s granddaughter. Lee’s in-laws, as descendants of George Washington, decided to follow in Washington’s footsteps and requested that all their slaves be freed within five years of their death.
George Washington Parke Custis, Lee’s father-in-law, included a provision in his will for the eventual freedom of the slaves he owned. Custis died in 1857, directing in his will that his slaves be freed within five years. This reflected Custis’s evolving views on slavery.
However, the execution of Custis’s will and the emancipation of the slaves were delayed. In 1862, Robert E. Lee, as executor of Custis’s estate, petitioned the court in Fairfax County, Virginia, to extend the period for emancipation.
Ultimately, in April 1862, Lee submitted a deed of manumission to the court, officially freeing the slaves owned by the Custis estate. This action fulfilled Custis’s wishes as expressed in his will, albeit beyond the original five-year deadline. In other words, Lee only freed his slaves because he was legally bound to do so.
Don’t take my word for it. Read General Lee’s letter to his wife in 1856. In the spirit of intellectual honesty, I will not abbreviate the letter with any ellipses or omissions. This is his entire statement on the subject of slavery.
The views of the Pres: of the systematic & progressive efforts of certain people of the North, to interfere with & change the domestic institutions of the South, are truthfully & faithfully expressed. The consequences of their plans & purposes are also clearly Set forth, & they must also be aware, that their object is both unlawful & entirely foreign to them, their duty; for which they are irresponsible & unaccountable; & Can only be accomplished by them through the agency of a civil & servile war. In this enlightened age, there are few I believe, but what will acknowledge, that slavery as an institution is a moral & political evil in any Country. It is useless to expatiate on its disadvantages. I think it however a greater evil to the white than to the black race, & while my feelings are strongly interested in behalf of the latter, my sympathies are more strong for the former. The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially & physically. The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare & lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is Known & ordered by a wise & merciful Providence. Their emancipation will sooner result from the mild & melting influence of Christianity, than the storms & tempests of fiery Controversy. This influence though slow is sure. The doctrines & miracles of our Saviour have required nearly two thousand years to Convert but a small part of the human race, & even Christian nations, what gross errors still exist! While we see the Course of the final abolition of human slavery is onward, & we give it the aid of our prayers & all justifiable means in our power we must leave the progress as well as the result in his hands who Sees the end; who Chooses to work by slow influences ; & with whom two thousand years are but a single day. Although the abolitionist must Know this; & must see that he has neither the right or power of operating except by moral means & suasion, & if he means well to the slave, he must not create angry feelings in the master; that although he may not approve the mode by which it pleases Providence to accomplish its purposes, the result will nevertheless be the same: that the reasons he gives for interference in what he has no Concern, holds good for every Kind of interference with our neighbours when we disapprove their Conduct; Still I fear he will persevere in his evil Course. Is it not strange that the descendants of those pilgrim fathers who crossed the Atlantic to preserve their own freedom of opinion, have always proved themselves intolerant of the spiritual liberty of others.
Lee referred to abolitionism as an “evil course” and called abolitionists “intolerant of the spiritual liberty of others.”
Robert E. Lee broke his oath to the U.S. Army and fought in the bloodiest war in the history of the Western Hemisphere to preserve slavery, because he believed ending slavery was intolerant of the spiritual liberty of others.
Let that sink in.
Allow me to clarify a common misconception. The southern states seceded not because President Lincoln pledged to end slavery (he didn’t), but simply because Lincoln was opposed to allowing slavery in America’s newly conquered territory in the West. Lincoln’s position was that he vowed he would not interfere with slavery in the states where it already existed.
The Southern states seceded nevertheless, because they did not want to be part of a country that would someday end slavery and promote equality for people of all backgrounds.
While Robert E. Lee initially spoke out against leaving the Union, he eventually sided with the Confederacy when Virginia voted to join the Confederate States of America.
In 1862, after nearly two years of bloody battles, Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. It was meant as a warning to the Confederacy that if they continued to rebel against the United States, then on January 1, 1863 the United States would forever abolish slavery in the rebellious states. There was still slavery in the United States in 1862, and Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation did not affect the slave-holding states that had remained loyal to the Union.
Let’s see how Lee reacted to the Emancipation Proclamation.
“In view of the vast increase of the forces of the enemy, of the savage and brutal policy he has proclaimed, which leaves us no alternative but success or degradation worse than death, if we would save the honor of our families from pollution, our social system from destruction, let every effort be made, every means be employed, to fill and maintain the ranks of our armies, until God, in his mercy, shall bless us with the establishment of our independence.” — Robert E. Lee’s response to the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863.
Whenever Lee’s army captured former slaves from the Union army, he would exclude them from prisoner exchanges with the United States.
In 1864 he wrote to United States General Ulysses S. Grant about a prisoner exchange. In his response to Grant’s request to include black prisoners, Lee said “negroes belonging to our citizens are not considered subjects of exchange and were not included in my proposition. If there are any such among those stated by you to have been captured around Richmond they cannot be returned.”
Negroes. Belonging. To our citizens. Wow.
Perhaps Lee was still bitter about having to free his in-laws’ slaves?
After his surrender in 1865 until his death in 1870, General Lee did absolutely nothing to help freed slaves integrate into society, and he never spoke out against the Ku Klux Klan, an organization that formed to carry on Robert E. Lee’s struggle to “save the honor of our families from pollution.”
The Klan has always considered Robert E. Lee to be their greatest hero. Why? Well, I’ll let the General explain:
“Though climate, government and circumstance have produced changes in the character of people, yet in all essential qualities they resemble the races from which they are sprung; and to no race are we indebted for the virtues and qualifications which constitute a great people than the Anglo-Saxon.” — Robert E. Lee, May 21st 1866
Sources:
- Robert E. Lee’s Views on Slavery:
- Lee, Robert E. The Wartime Papers of R. E. Lee. Edited by Clifford Dowdey. New York: Bramhall House, 1961.
- Lee, Robert E. Recollections and Letters of General Robert E. Lee. Edited by Captain Robert E. Lee, Jr. New York: Doubleday, 1904.
- Secession and Civil War:
- McPherson, James M. Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.
- Foner, Eric. The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2010.
- Military Record of Robert E. Lee:
- Freeman, Douglas Southall. R. E. Lee: A Biography. 4 volumes. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1934.
- Gallagher, Gary W. Lee and His Generals in War and Memory. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1998.
- Post-War Actions and Legacy:
- Pryor, Elizabeth Brown. Reading the Man: A Portrait of Robert E. Lee through His Private Letters. New York: Viking, 2007.
- Emancipation Proclamation and Lee’s Reaction:
- Various collections of Lee’s letters and dispatches, available in libraries and archives, such as the Library of Congress or the National Archives.
- Views on Race and Anglo-Saxon Virtues:
- Lee, Robert E. Various speeches and writings compiled in historical collections and biographies.