President Biden: Just Because I Disagree With You Doesn’t Mean I Am on Jefferson Davis’s Side.

In a speech in Atlanta on Tuesday, Joe Biden said, in urging the passage of various election law bills in the Senate: “Do you want to be the side of Abraham Lincoln or Jefferson Davis?" 

I have news for President Biden.  Just because I don’t agree with him on those bills, doesn’t mean I am on Jefferson Davis’s side.  When I was taking American history classes in high school in the mid-1960s, my heroes were Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant.  When I toured Tennessee in 1977, I went to the Shiloh and Chattanooga battlefields.  In Virginia in 1997, I went to the Wilderness and Appomattox.  When I returned to Virginia in 2002, I was appalled that streets and roads were still named after Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee.  When other people were telling me how noble Robert E. Lee was, I saw a man who had abandoned his country and committed treason.

Mostly, I don’t need President Biden telling me that I am on the side of Jefferson Davis because I don’t agree with a particular election bill he wants passed.  I particularly don’t need him calling me names because I disagree with him.  We had too much of that during President Biden's predecessor’s term.  We don’t need President Biden to keep doing it.  Plus, he won’t convince many people to change their minds and support what he wants if he goes around calling them names.