The backlash against all symbols, names, and places relating to the Confederacy are unnecessary.

I would argue that a large percentage of people did not want slavery. In fact the Mason-Dixon line is the line in the sand between free and slave states. It is a representation of the difference in ideology. This is not to say that the Union was any less racist than the south. But we are not here to debate that. I have 6 states seceding after the election of Lincoln; his platform was no new slave states. Maybe slavery wasn't the main purpose, but it kind of was. The Cotton business was booming for the South, it was their one trick pony. People, generally, don't take to kindly to you messing with their livelihood; or for the Union, freedom. Notably the Union tried different legislation to make slavery unprofitable; it was an opportunity for industry to innovate. I wonder if private industry could have prevented a war? There was opportunity for an entrepreneur to step in; there were several instances to improve upon. We had the cotton gin, which greatly increased the processing of cotton. Yet no one tried to innovate the gathering. Sadly, I think much of the south was too dumb, literally, to do so. The economic difference between slave states and free states is astronomical. Education, income, standard of living, etc were better in free states. Free states were a glowing example of how to be a successful state. Plans for emancipation later, really? Why not now? Politician are good talkers. Doing and saying are two different things, and often have very different outcomes. There were thousands of free blacks in the south, many also owned slaves and fought on the side of the confederacy. Slavery was a culture in the south. All this history is irrelevant to whether the backlash against symbols of the confederacy are justified. At the heart of the confederacy was the want to deny others freedom under the veneer of states' rights. States' rights are irrelevant in the wake of people's rights; in this arena states don't have rights people have rights "I will end with this, if you take a people's history and steal their symbols, you have sown the seeds of your own destruction as is witnessed throughout history." When has this been true? History does not need to be on public display and supported by public funds ( involuntarily, I might add) to be prevalent the minds of individual who subscribe to it. "The slave must be made fit for his freedom by education and discipline, and thus be made unfit for slavery. And as soon as he becomes unfit for slavery, the master will no longer desire to hold his as a slave." This is a false cause to assume that because someone was a slave that they will be unsuited for life once freed. This reeks of progressive ideology. Confederate history and Southern history are not mutually exclusive. My previous point is sustained. "there are implications [to] a government implicitly supporting an ideology." The blacklash (hahaha) is justified. These symbols are owned and protected by a government whose constitution is in direct conflict with the Confederacy. These symbols can be kept and maintained by private institutions, I am okay with that.