Thomas Jefferson Descendant Calls For Removal Of His Famous Ancestor's Statues

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Shannon Lanier, a ninth-generation direct descendant of President Thomas Jefferson, believes that statues of the Founding Father would be better off in museums.

Lanier, who works as a journalist and is related to Jefferson through the third president’s relationship with enslaved woman Sally Hemings, penned his thoughts in a Newsweek editorial, arguing that Jefferson was “a participant in the institution of slavery—perhaps the most notorious one among the Founding Fathers, not least because of the jarring contrast between what he practiced and what he preached.”

In the piece, Lanier emphasized that while he respected Jefferson’s accomplishments, including drafting the Declaration of Independence and fulfilling the Louisiana Purchase, the man still “owned more than 600 people against their will, knew it was wrong, but never let them go.”

Lanier also added that statues of slaveowners like Jefferson have been left untouched largely to “remind people of color of their ‘degraded’ place in society.”

https://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/thomas-jefferson-shannon-lanier-statues-205446209.html

[Binkie The Clown]

1. I grew up being told I was a great-great... grandson of Andrew Jackson.

Years later I researched the family tree and found one ancestor with the last name Jackson, but it wasn't THAT Jackson. Funny how family legends grow from nothing.

[Sneederbunk]

2. Will have to remove half of Mt. Rushmore.

[Polybius]

3. Too bad

Jefferson literally founded the country and was one of its greatest Founders. As an African American male, I say keep Jefferson's statues up forever.

[HipChick]

4. There was no relationship with Sally Hemings..

Call it what it was..Rape

Thomas Jefferson was a rapist..

Sally Hemings was a half-sister to Jefferson’s late wife, the product of a relationship between Jefferson's father-in-law and one of his slaves.