December 10, 2015
The Honorable Mark Dayton
Governor, State of Minnesota
116 Veterans Service Building
20 W 12th St.
Saint Paul, MN 55155
Dear Governor Dayton:
I’ve been reading news lately about the difficult decisions regarding art in the Capitol. It seems many folks are weighing in on which items are appropriate to display in the Capitol and which aren't. And that’s good, because that’s democracy.
I am writing you this letter today because of a news item I read about General Nash’s opinion. He doesn’t want the Civil War paintings removed. Governor, I agree with the Adjutant General on this one, and here is why. Right up the street from the Capitol sits a granite column (on the grounds in front of the Cathedral) erected by the Grand Army of the Republic, a fraternal organization founded after the Civil War made up of Civil War Veterans. It was erected 40 years after the war, just like how the Hmong and Lao Veterans Memorial we broke ground on this summer took 40 years, post-war, to build.
Why 40 years? That’s the timeline it takes for these old soldiers to come to grips with the fact that the horrible stories they buried for so long must be told, and honored, lest they be lost forever. When these veterans start to get old and recognize their growing mortality, they begin to understand the necessity of relaying their hard earned lessons, so that their children and grandchildren may learn from old scars, instead of repeatedly learning from fresh wounds. The violence depicted in some of the paintings in the Capitol is not an ugly blemish to be hidden, but absolutely necessary to understand the lessons from our journey as a state. The efforts of our veterans to memorialize those hard won lessons are a fundamental part of who we are as a people.
On July 29, 1928, President Calvin Coolidge came to Cannon Falls, MN, to dedicate the memorial there to Colonel William Colvill, who commanded our most decorated veterans of the Civil War. Former President Coolidge’s words that day made no equivocations about the role of our forebears on the second, bloodiest, day of Gettysburg when he said "Colonel Colvill and those eight companies of the First Minnesota are entitled to rank as the saviors of their country.” Those who know the nature of that war and of our history know that Coolidge’s words on that day were no idle platitudes. They recognized the unique and supreme sacrifice of these Minnesotans, all of them immigrants, and many who spoke no English, who would never return home.
You may be saying to yourself, “That’s all well and good, Lesch, but why must we depict these war scenes in the Capitol, and even in the Governor’s office?” My answer can be best summarized by the famous quote of one prominent 19th century Prussian military tactician (Carl Von Clausewitz) who stated, “War is the continuation of politics by other means.” War memorials, and war paintings, are especially appropriate in the building where we practice politics, Governor, because they are, if one regards them appropriately, a perpetual reminder of the consequences of our failure. We must always be reminded of this. Another prominent 19th century military man (who surely read Clausewitz too), Otto Von Bismarck, stated, "Only the fool learns from his own mistakes. The truly wise person learns from the mistakes of others.” The mistakes of our forebears, either in what they did or in how they remembered it, ought not be relegated to our back rooms or basements. For in their failure lies the map to our success.
Governor, I ask that you help us to continually be aware of our mistakes as a people, and that these paintings, and depictions of battle, with all their uncomfortable themes, be held in prominent positions in the Capitol and, therefore, always be held prominently in our minds as we craft for the people a just and peaceful Minnesota.
Sincerely,
State Representative John Lesch