Editor:
    I will state my deeply felt pride and distresses about the effort to remove the Confederate Monument.
    Mr. Woodall — You have a petition to remove the Confederate Monument. I ask: How many of the people who signed your petition to remove the monument have actually seen it, know the history at all? Are these local citizens? Are these students who will live here a year, two or maybe four years?
    Mr. Woodall — How do you see moving monuments and restating history different from what ISIS is doing throughout the Middle East? How do you deem this different from what ancient pharaohs and dictators did tearing down and removing what others before them had done?
    The War of North and South was not about slavery. But that is all we hear or read by people who simply prat the “socially correct” rather than looking for the truth.
    It is indeed true that many of those who fought for the South were not slave owners and had little personal stake in the politics of that time. For them, it was a fight to defend their homeland against an invading force.
    My great grandfather fought with Co. E. 23rd G. Georgia at Chancellorsville, Va., was captured, imprisoned, then hospitalized and died in Petersburg, Va. He is buried at Blandford Church Cemetery in Petersburg. The location of his burial is not known as this is a mass grave of thousands. According to the National Park Historian I am very fortunate to know he is buried in this grave as most Confederate burial locations are unknown. These thousands of Confederate soldiers do not have their individual graves for loved ones to commemorate.
    Rather than trying to change history, society today must be sure all people are treated equal as by the laws of the land. All people in a democracy must be learned, aware and active.
    I am distressed that society does not know history; that past events of cruelty by a few are repeated over and over and over; that past events of goodness are rarely seen, read or heard; to see a nice old woman in tears in Baltimore lamenting all the work she and her friends had done to get a quality drug store in their community go up in flames; to see a middle aged man having to plead with his community to stop destroying and burning what he and his friends had spent years working at, trying to make his community a better place; a young man rob a store, curse a policemen, punch the policeman and attempt to grab the policeman’s gun — his relatives then cry — we want justice; small children curse teachers and call them names; that education has degraded to the lowest rather than reaching for the best; that education has degraded to numbers and money rather than true education.
    Today is today. Yesterday is what was.
    Mr. Woodall, you stated you think the Confederate Monument on the Bulloch County Courthouse lawn, put there in 1909 to honor all men who fought to save their lands and livelihood, should be moved. You want something “on that ground that represents all people”.
    Mr. Woodall, this Confederate Monument does represent all people — it is history.
    I strongly vote — No. Do not move this monument.
    E. Ruth Green, Ph.D.
    Statesboro