Much of what he writes is deceptive. For example, Lee was not charged as executor of his father-in-law's estate to manumet his wife's inherited slaves until five years passed and the war intervened. Brooks does not tell us these relevant facts.
Brooks suggests that Lee committed treason against his country but the contemporary culture of Virginia was to the effect that his country was Virginia.
Brooks limits the meaning of the Confederate flag to southern heritage which he implies must give way because it is also associated with racism. But the flag also represents federalism, a real and legitimate interpretation of the Constitution which, one might add, impelled Robert E Lee to decline the offer to lead the Yankee armies and to stay true to this interpretation of the Constitution. According to this interpretation, codified in the ninth and 10th amendments, Robert E Lee would have committed treason had he drawn his sword against his native state.
Lee's conduct after the surrender is impeccable and he sought by personal example to effect reconciliation to the union.
Much of the racism associated with the Confederate battle flag has been engrafted onto this flag in the 20th and 21st century by merchants of victimhood who seek a villain and a symbol the destruction of which can be equated with their obtaining power, power to destroy federalism, power to distort the Constitution, power to substitute their judgment for the will of the majority of the people, power to rewrite history. It is not for David Brooks or the left, whom he represents by the way, to tell those who support the flag what their motives are, rather decency if not logic demands that those who support the flag have the right to express their motivations on their own.
As to the character of Robert E Lee and his inspiring biography, I have expressed my feelings a number of times in replies that follow:
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As to the observation that Lee, "would have done better to have kept his oath and remained true to the US government", that is a judgment that is made after a century and a half of perspective. It is clear that all his life Lee regarded his choice to have been the moral choice. I think that we have to judge historical characters upon the knowledge that they had or which was reasonably available to them. Judging by this standard, I will not substitute my judgment for his when he declined the union' s offer of command of their forces and to retire to his home state and not to draw his sword except in the defense of Virginia.
If I recall correctly, there were two "Lee to the rear" incidents where he exposed himself to peril in front of his troops to rally them in the dark days of 1864 when the weight of numbers was simply debriding his forces through a pitilessly imposed attrition. The quoted words were of his troops promising they would plug the hole if he would personally withdraw to the rear and get out of harm's way. These incidents lead me to believe that he was wholly committed to the cause during the war.
Although he behaved as a model citizen of the Union after the war, his reticence about the war was rarely broken, but a couple of remarks seem to indicate a deep regret that the cause was lost. Certainly he remained nostalgically fond of his officers and men to the end of his life.
Was it immoral for Lee to have decided that the larger moral commitment was to his state rather than his country? Clearly, within his culture his choice was the statistically normal one and a fully rational one.
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The Confederates were so poor that half of them were wearing captured Yankee uniforms. The idea of Confederate gray is largely a misnomer, many of them had butternut as a result of home weaving. General Lee put on his best uniform which he rarely wore to maintain the dignity of his army while he alone underwent the indignity of the surrender, an unavoidable but honorable act forced upon them by circumstance which all the efforts of duty and honor could not avoid. Upon learning that he was surrounded with no hope of reinforcements, that his military situation was hopeless, Lee remarked, "Then there is nothing for it but I must go to General Grant and surrender and I would rather die a thousand deaths." With that action he performed his last duty as a soldier and picked up his duties as a citizen of the Federal Republic which he served faithfully until his death.
Yes he took a staff, I think of two, but he did not take an entourage. Rather, he took responsibility.
Equally, he took responsibility in declining his subordinates suggestion to filter his men out through Yankee lines to begin to wage a guerilla. I have described this in my about page to emphasize the moral character of the man about whom I often assert, "the noblest and sublimest American of them all." When we came out of the McLean house having executed the articles of surrender as he waited for Traveler to be brought to him he was alone as he clapped his hands together and exclaimed, "too bad, too bad, oh too bad." None of these actions were consistent with a vainglorious, splendidly uniformed commander.
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Perhaps the noblest and sublimest American of them all, Robert Edward Lee embodied the virtues praised in his father's eulogy to the man who inspired the economium, "first in war, first in peace, first in the hearts of his countrymen." Whether George Washington equaled the sublimity of Robert E. Lee or Lee the nobility of character of his hero, George Washington, is a question whose contemplation delights and edifies the soul.
