The Starry Cross

In his first inaugural address Abraham Lincoln concluded with these memorable words: " Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield, and patriot grave, to every heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."

The newly elected president did not know, could not know, how the decisions that he would make, as well as those of the new Confederate government, would take the nation to an unimaginable maelstrom of death, destruction, and metamorphosis. But clearly, what he did understand, even standing at the precipice, was that the only glue that could hold the country together was the common experience, the shared travails, the respect for the sacrifice of ancestors, the continuities between the generations, the love and respect for one's own parents and grandparents.

The current vitriolic and hysterical attack on the emblem that the soldiers and civilians of the Confederacy affectionately called "the starry cross," is nothing less than an assault at the heart of those "mystic chords of memory." But as an anonymous French philosopher once said, "the more things change the more they stay the same." For long centuries British imperialism tried to obliterate the heritage, language, and culture of the Irish. It was a punishable crime to speak Gaelic or play the harp in 18th-century Ireland. Some in this country will no doubt not be content until displaying the Confederate flag in public is classified as a hate crime punishable by stiff jail sentences or deportation to Tasmania.

No people is perfect, not now, not ever. The generation of the 1860s paid a terrible price in blood and treasure. What unparalled hubris to sit in smug judgement a hundred and forty years after the fact. Joshua Chamberlain bravely fought for the Union and abolition and barely survived his numerous battlefield wounds. Yet, when he was asked by Grant to receive the surrender of the defeated Confederates at Appomattox, he ordered his proud and hardened veterans to salute the men in gray and the flag they held. If he who bore the battle could find it in his heart to show his respect and affection for this tattered emblem, this "starry cross," who are we to do less?

Lincoln closed his second inaugural with these words, which we may do well to reconsider at this over-heated moment of self-righteous political correctness.

"With malice towards none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan – to do all which may achieve a just, and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations."

Black and white Americans have a common heritage. The generation that lived through the crucible of secession, slavery, and war is our common ancestry. Their sufferings, their tribulations, their grief and their joy – all of it belongs to all of us. Today's passions may strain, but must not break our bonds of affection. Each of us alive today knows that we have known these bonds of affection in our own lives. Who are those who seek to take the revered emblems of our ancestors to distort and disgrace and degrade them – to take these cherished cloths to be used as rags with which to smother these bonds?

When we no longer respect the fiery abolitionists like Harriet Beecher Stowe and Frederick Douglass; when we no longer revere Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, the real men, not the legends, and the hundreds of thousands who fell at their side – when our hearts can no longer beat with the compassion and understanding of a brave heart like Chamberlain's, when we can no longer embrace Lincoln's mystic chords of memory, we are no longer fit to call ourselves free men.

May 16, 2000

Ron Maxwell, film writer, director, and producer, is best known for his landmark film “Gettysburg.” Ron is currently involved in preproduction work for his next two feature films, “Gods & Generals” and “Last Full Measure,” the prequel and sequel to “Gettysburg,” altogether comprising an epic Civil War Trilogy.