Thousands Call For The Removal Of A Statue Of Abraham Lincoln With 'Degrading Racial Undertones'

[appalachiablue]

25. This DC original has a copy in Boston

also under scrutiny. Both works are titled, the 'Emancipation Statue.' Lincoln is shown in the process of 'emancipating'-- freeing a slave to become a 'freeman' is how I interpret it.

In view of the title, and on closer look, the sculptor may have intended to portray Lincoln in the act of 'emancipating' and the slave coming out of a state of bondage...

The statue isn't named 'Lincoln and the Freedman' which would likely have shown a more positive and confident figure of the black man.

Although stereotypical and somewhat undignified-- 'great white leader grants freedom'-- the image of the black man-- submissive, shacked and powerless could have been the sculptor's way to emphasize the horrible state of slavery which the man was leaving.

Such depictions, and much worse have been around for years- demeaning and offensive portrayals of blacks as servile or ignorant, whether visual, in print or otherwise.

50-50, tough call in some ways. *I would have preferred a sculpture of Lincoln with a proud, strengthened
and more dignified 'freed' black man and former slave.
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*Article Excerpt: (Boston Copy of 'Emancipation Statue' also found offensive, under threat of removal):

...'Goodwin and the signatories on the petition are not the only ones who have expressed frustration over the statue’s subservient image of a formerly enslaved person. Goodwin was inspired by a similar petition started recently in Boston, which has a copy of the Emancipation Statue. That petition has more than 11,000 signatures, and Mayor Marty Walsh has said he’s open to moving it.

“I’ve been watching this man on his knees since I was a kid. It’s supposed to represent freedom but instead represents us still beneath someone else,” wrote Tory Bullock, the author of the Boston petition.

When he heard about the Boston effort, Goodwin, a native Washingtonian, went to Lincoln Park to examine the original statue for himself. “You really see when you get that close to it … just how terrible the positioning is of the freed slave,” he said.