Writing and Statues

On twitter a historian denied any obligation for historians to fight for the preservation of statues.  That got me thinking about the difference between statues and historical artifacts--mostly written ones, but also the sort of things which wind up in museums.  Some thoughts:

• as I wrote yesterday, raising a statue is an act of power, signaling the influence of the group behind it and their importance in the community (I'm assuming that usually only a minority which feels strongly are pushing a statue). A statue is an assertion of meaning occupying a public space.  The power embodied in a statue ebbs and becomes stale as the years pass, but the statue is always there, somehow imposing on our attention to public matters. Though as I've written, statues can fade into the general landscape, no longer noticed by the majority of the public; a thorn only to a minority with reason to be aggrieved.
• written artifacts can sometimes be more obnoxious than any statue--consider Mein Kampf or the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.  But such writings cannot intrude themselves on our notice once the context of their creation is gone.  I mean, presumably most Germans were somewhat aware of Mein Kampf by 1938 or so, to that extent it was a signal of the power of Hitler and the Nazis, but post 1945 it's stuck on library shelves, fodder only for historians and a few on the far right. 
• other artifacts, say quilts or old episodes of I Love Lucy, also lose their power and their meaning as the years increase since the time of creation.

So what is the justification for a historian not to fight for preservation of a status in its original setting? To me the key is the occupation of a public space. It's reasonable and no violation of a historians pledge to the past to say that statues should be removed from public spaces.  And just as historians have no obligation to preserve all buildings they have no obligation to preserve all statues somewhere..  Every statue has some value, considered as an object with history, but we can't preserve everything.

Power, Statues, and Signalling

An article on the Columbus statue in front of Union Station in DC this morning provokes these thoughts:

The ability to erect statues is a signal of the power of the people behind the movement.  In the case of Union Station, it was the power of the Knights of Columbus back in the day.

In the case of statues commemorating Confederate generals, it was the power of upper class white Southern women (UCWSW).

In the case of naming forts it was likely the power of the Congressional delegation in the state, responding perhaps to UCWSW.

Now, the ability to take down statues is a signal of the power of the Black Lives Matter movement (construed broadly), power to move the needle and gain white support.

[Updated: by signaling I mean the action is not very important by itself to most people, is quite important to some.  For leaders of the movement, it's a way to gain influence.  If the KofC can persuade the powerful to emplace this statue, they must be listened to when they want X, Y or Z. If BLM can persuade the powerful to change the MS flag, then they must be listened to on other issues.  When non-legal processes are used, there's an element of physical fear involved as well, as there was in dumping the tea in Boston Harbor.]