Alright, I told myself I wasn't going to weigh in on this subject, but after it came to my hometown, I feel as if I must. Let's get one thing straight before people start commenting that I am un-American for my opinion. A majority of the Confederate statues were erected in the age of Jim Crow and the Civil Rights Movement, therefore, they are not about history but oppression.
The small town of Franklin, Ohio was filled with outrage when they realized that the city had removed a memorial to General Robert E. Lee overnight.
The monument was erected in 1927, 62 years after the civil war had ended. Furthermore, the very first family to settle in Franklin had a son that served as Major General for the Union Army. If we should have any monument dedicated to the civil war it should be one commemorating him, which we don't.
The group that donated the statue is called the United Daughters of the Confederacy. If you go to their website you will see that in their list of goals, one of them is, "To assist descendants of worthy Confederates in securing proper education."
When you look further into the website you see that in order to even apply for a scholarship you have to send in a picture of yourself. Additionally, you must provide proof of an ancestor that served "honorably" in the confederate army.
With all the information given, I think it is evident that the statue is not a reminder of history but in fact a symbol of oppression and hate. I understand not wanting to erase history but there are other ways to preserve it and better places. Museums still hold artifacts of the confederacy and textbooks still teach of it. By removing these monuments we are moving closer to a hate-free world and away from our cloudy past.