We are all haunted by George Santayana’s famous statement: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” We say it often, but is it true?
I welcome others’ opinions, but I have my doubts. Let me offer three reasons:
First, do we ever really understand the past? Could the Civil War—the most deadly war in American history—have been prevented? Possibly. But if so, how would slavery have ended? Avoiding one tragedy might have perpetuated another. So what have we learned about the Civil War that could possibly guide us in the future?
Second, let’s suppose we understand the past. Can we know where to apply that understanding and where not? Nearly everyone agrees that World War I was a pointless war and a horrific tragedy; in contrast, historians generally agree that World War II “had to” be fought, and it was the Allies’ finest hour.
A July 3 Chronicle of Higher Education article by Liam Knox [2] recounts how Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) ignited a firestorm when she compared U.S. detention centers for illegal immigrants to (presumably Nazi) concentration camps. The radical wing of the Democrat party applauded while conservatives asserted that the comparison was specious and cynical.
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum weighed in, saying it “unequivocally rejects efforts to create analogies between the Holocaust and other events, whether historical or contemporary.”
Responding to the museum, “scholars” launched an open letter which had collected almost 600 signatures by the time of Knox’s article. The signers justified the comparison because “The very core of Holocaust education is to alert the public to dangerous developments that facilitate human rights violations and pain and suffering; pointing to similarities across time and space is essential for this task.”
I find this to be a dubious, arrogant, and disingenuous proposition.
I found myself asking, “Scholars of what?” Law? Gender, Race, and Identity? Music? Social Work? Art? And what sort of a qualification is it to be a “scholar” of something? Holocaust deniers often describe themselves as scholars….
Steve Beller discusses the history of anti-Semitism among political leftists. In History Today.
A summer theater highlight: the story of Alan Freed, the 1950s DJ who invented the term “rock and roll.” Reviewed by Bruce Chadwick for the History News Network.
Are analogies to the Holocaust appropriate? No, says the Holocaust Museum. Yes, say 600 scholars. In the Chronicle of Higher Education.
Does the Declaration of Independence include God? And if so, whose idea of God? Paul Seaton deliberates the question on Law and Liberty.
Brian T. Allen offers new insights into Norman Rockwell’s Four Freedoms paintings. In National Review.
Young people can’t study AP history in China. It doesn’t conform to the Chinese Communist Party’s view of history. In Inside Higher Ed.
“Juneteenth” commemorates June 19, 1865, when Texas slaves learned they had been freed and began celebrating “the “other American Independence day.” By Zuri Davis in Reason.
University of Cambridge will investigate its ties to slavery. In History Extra.
“Rosie the Riveter” in Ireland, in the Napoleonic Wars. From JStor Daily.
“Africa’s Lost Kingdoms”: Howard W. French reviews five books about stunning African civilizations. In the New York Review of Books.“Africa has never lacked civilizations,” he writes.
Enjoy a pithy interview with Niall Ferguson by History Today.
The tide turned against Hitler in 1941, not 1944, says Andrew Nagorski, in the Daily Beast.
Rebuilding Notre Dame “will reopen the theological-political problem people believe to have been settled by the laicization of 1905 and will thus renew a great political quarrel in France,” warns Titus Techera on Law & Liberty.
The Russians also launched a major campaign in June 1944. Howard Tanzman describes it (with a map). on his website.
Mackubin Owens explains the complexity of D-Day. “All military operations are complicated but none more than an amphibious assault against a defended beach,” especially when Clausewitz’s “friction” sets in. On Law & Liberty.
Tony Williams reviews three new books about D-Day. On Law & Liberty.
Note: During the summer, I won’t be adding my own posts (I have to build up an inventory for the fall), but will be linking frequently to others’ articles about history. (And there are more links in the righthand column.)
Norman Rockwell, disdained by art critics, loved by many Americans, was the person who made FDR’s speech about “freedom from fear itself” famous. Before that, Roosevelt’s 1941 inaugural speech was a dud. Brian T. Allen writes the first of two articles on “Normal Rockwell, Realist” in National Review.
Great Britain’s Queen Victoria was born May 24, 1819, became queen at age 18, and ruled for over 60 years. For the 200th anniversary of her birth, BBC’s History Extra tells many stories about the woman for whom an era was named. One feature is about whether she was pretty or not.
Lighten up, and read about “16 Facts that Will Warp Your Perception of Time” in the Reader’s Digest. For example, the tenth president of the United States, John Tyler, has living grandchildren.
Jeffrey A. Tucker compares today’s effort to bring back protectionism to the counter-revolutionary processes at work just before World War I, when the state began to grow after a century of increasing freedom. On AIER.
Naomi Schaefer Riley of the Wall Street Journalinterviews Wilfred McClay, author of a new history book, Land of Hope: An Invitation to the Great American Story (article is subscriber-only).
Ross Douthat compares The Avengers to Gothic cathedrals. In National Review.
Rebecca Onion attacks David McCullough’s new book. Pioneers, as the kind of book you find at Costco and Target but not in academe. On Slate.
