SUMMARY: Memorial Day began after the Civil War as a commemoration of those who had fallen in America’s greatest struggle for social justice. Though we have engrafted additional layers of meaning onto Memorial Day, that original subtext is still very much at the heart of our commemoration of those who have died in this country’s service. If we are to do right by those who have laid the costliest of sacrifice on the altar of freedom, we must ensure that the arc of America’s moral universe continues to bend toward justice and toward a more perfect and inclusive Union.
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By: Paul S. Marchand
Of all the various holidays that festoon our American calendar, two specifically force us to confront the reality of war and sacrifice. Veterans Day (or Armistice Day as it is still called in some quarters) should rightly turn our minds toward those who have fought in our wars, facing foreign shot, foreign shell, and foreign steel on our behalf. Veterans Day is a time to think about the moral and social debt we owe to those who have gone to war and returned.
By contrast, Memorial Day is a time to commemorate those who have fallen in this country’s service. It is a time to give thanks for their service, but also a time to think carefully and critically about larger questions of war, peace, and the limbo in which societies often find themselves between the two, as we have found ourselves since the end of World War II.
On Memorial Day, I find myself ineluctably drawn back to words spoken half a century ago at West Point by Douglas MacArthur as he accepted the Sylvanus Thayer award. Addressing the Corps of Cadets, MacArthur spoke of hearing in his dreams “the crash of guns, the rattle of musketry, the strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield.”
For most of us now living, America has been at war or involved in military operations for more years than she has been at peace. The background music of the greater part of our lives has been “that strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield.”
Now Memorial Day began as Decoration Day, a commemoration of the Union’s Civil War dead. Though the passage of nearly a century and a half has led to considerable accretions of symbolism and meaning onto Memorial Day, it began, and remains still, a commemoration of the greatest struggle for social justice in American history.
For if the Civil War began as merely a fight to preserve the Union, it ineluctably evolved into a far larger moral confrontation as Americans realized that the Union could not be saved except by overthrowing once and for all the Peculiar Institution of chattel slavery. If the Union were to be saved, it could have no more truck with the proposition that it is ever permissible for one human being to own another.
Since then, the arc of our moral universe, however long, has bent, however slowly, toward justice. Starting with the abolition of slavery itself, America has engaged, over and over again, in a series of often agonizing internal struggles over who and who is not a part of our American body politic.
It has taken more than a century to rid ourselves of the grosser inequities and iniquities of the Peculiar Institution. Even now, with an African-American president in the White House, racial insecurities continue to bedevil our political discourse.
It has taken more than a century to accept the basic proposition that women ought to be entitled to all of the badges and incidents of first-class citizenship. Women’s suffrage means little if women can legitimately discriminated against in hiring and compensation or be denied access to basic reproductive autonomy or contraception.
We are still involved today in a great struggle over whether America’s queerfolk should even be allowed to exist, let alone enjoy first-class citizenship as out people in the Commonwealth.
Yet, the arc continues to bend toward justice; it continues to bend toward a more perfect Union and a more inclusive Commonwealth, even if some in our society find themselves apoplectic at such a prospect. But a society that cannot find room for people of color, for women, for the queer, and for all who are in some way Other, is a society that has yet to do right by those whose final resting places are to be found in our national cemeteries, who in this country’s service laid down what Abraham Lincoln so movingly called “so costly a sacrifice on the altar of freedom.” We must make it right.
On this Memorial Day, as we recall the sacrifice of those who fell for us, we should remember two things. First, let us remember that America is always at her greatest when she seeks purposely after justice. Second, let us remember that from the earliest days of our history, those who have died for America have been of every sort and condition of human being.
Male and female they have died for us.
Old and young they have died for us.
Straight and queer they have died for us.
From every creed and confession they have died for us.
From every tongue and nation they have died for us.
From every race and region they have died for us.
And in the equality of their resting place, we have only one word for them: American.
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By: Paul S. Marchand
Of all the various holidays that festoon our American calendar, two specifically force us to confront the reality of war and sacrifice. Veterans Day (or Armistice Day as it is still called in some quarters) should rightly turn our minds toward those who have fought in our wars, facing foreign shot, foreign shell, and foreign steel on our behalf. Veterans Day is a time to think about the moral and social debt we owe to those who have gone to war and returned.
By contrast, Memorial Day is a time to commemorate those who have fallen in this country’s service. It is a time to give thanks for their service, but also a time to think carefully and critically about larger questions of war, peace, and the limbo in which societies often find themselves between the two, as we have found ourselves since the end of World War II.
On Memorial Day, I find myself ineluctably drawn back to words spoken half a century ago at West Point by Douglas MacArthur as he accepted the Sylvanus Thayer award. Addressing the Corps of Cadets, MacArthur spoke of hearing in his dreams “the crash of guns, the rattle of musketry, the strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield.”
For most of us now living, America has been at war or involved in military operations for more years than she has been at peace. The background music of the greater part of our lives has been “that strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield.”
Now Memorial Day began as Decoration Day, a commemoration of the Union’s Civil War dead. Though the passage of nearly a century and a half has led to considerable accretions of symbolism and meaning onto Memorial Day, it began, and remains still, a commemoration of the greatest struggle for social justice in American history.
For if the Civil War began as merely a fight to preserve the Union, it ineluctably evolved into a far larger moral confrontation as Americans realized that the Union could not be saved except by overthrowing once and for all the Peculiar Institution of chattel slavery. If the Union were to be saved, it could have no more truck with the proposition that it is ever permissible for one human being to own another.
Since then, the arc of our moral universe, however long, has bent, however slowly, toward justice. Starting with the abolition of slavery itself, America has engaged, over and over again, in a series of often agonizing internal struggles over who and who is not a part of our American body politic.
It has taken more than a century to rid ourselves of the grosser inequities and iniquities of the Peculiar Institution. Even now, with an African-American president in the White House, racial insecurities continue to bedevil our political discourse.
It has taken more than a century to accept the basic proposition that women ought to be entitled to all of the badges and incidents of first-class citizenship. Women’s suffrage means little if women can legitimately discriminated against in hiring and compensation or be denied access to basic reproductive autonomy or contraception.
We are still involved today in a great struggle over whether America’s queerfolk should even be allowed to exist, let alone enjoy first-class citizenship as out people in the Commonwealth.
Yet, the arc continues to bend toward justice; it continues to bend toward a more perfect Union and a more inclusive Commonwealth, even if some in our society find themselves apoplectic at such a prospect. But a society that cannot find room for people of color, for women, for the queer, and for all who are in some way Other, is a society that has yet to do right by those whose final resting places are to be found in our national cemeteries, who in this country’s service laid down what Abraham Lincoln so movingly called “so costly a sacrifice on the altar of freedom.” We must make it right.
On this Memorial Day, as we recall the sacrifice of those who fell for us, we should remember two things. First, let us remember that America is always at her greatest when she seeks purposely after justice. Second, let us remember that from the earliest days of our history, those who have died for America have been of every sort and condition of human being.
Male and female they have died for us.
Old and young they have died for us.
Straight and queer they have died for us.
From every creed and confession they have died for us.
From every tongue and nation they have died for us.
From every race and region they have died for us.
And in the equality of their resting place, we have only one word for them: American.
Requiescant omnes in pace, et lux aeternam luceat super omnes. Amen.
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PAUL S. MARCHAND is an attorney who lives and works in Cathedral City, California, where he served for two terms as a member of the city council. The views contained herein are his own, and not necessarily those of any entity or organization with which he is associated. They are not intended to constitute, and should not be construed as, legal advice, though effective Monday, white shoes may be worn without risk of committing a fashion felony.
