It has already been a busy year for the Lincoln Memorial, where both sides have been congregating, eager to claim the symbolic space
With America in turmoil and largely trapped at home, it promises to be a strange Fourth of July. That will mean overtime work for America’s national symbols, stressed even more than usual by the culture wars. Park rangers are prayingsurvive the orgy of pyrotechnics planned there for President Donald Trump’s visit on the night of July 3. And in cities and towns across the country, our statues—still standing or not—will remind us, once again, that we come from a complicated place.
For both sides, it might help to take a step back. The Lincoln Memorial has a long history of allowing Americans to approach from all directions. An understanding of American conflict was woven into the memorial from the start, along with a creative ambiguity that helped to bridge our many divides. Long after the Civil War, it was built so that Southerners as well as Northerners could approach it together. That strategy proved useful again in 1970, another year of anger.
Marian Anderson sings at the Lincoln Memorial on Easter Sunday, 1939. | Universal History Archive/Getty Images For all of these reasons, it was disorienting to see those steps blocked by National Guardsmen—who were there not to air out their views, but to prevent the public from doing so. The steps are important to the memorial: They lead visitors steadily upward, where they can approach Lincoln, read his words, and gaze back at the Capitol. The stunning visual panorama is a well-calibrated effect, consonant with Lincoln’s belief that our democracy must, somehow, spring from the people.
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