Mary Stevens, a resident of Cobb County, Georgia explained to meeting attendants that Confederate General Joseph Johnston’s name should remain on a local park.
The commissioner’s meeting was held on June 12. Stevens used the portion used for public comments to state her sentiments.
Stevens commented, “had it been so bad for the freed slaves, they would have left the south” and, somehow, it just got more horrifying from there.” Stevens also iterated that the Civil War “wasn’t about slavery” – a myth that is fueled by the fact that less than one per cent of blacks served in the Confederate Army.
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They served as cooks and general laborers. Blacks were not allowed to serve in the United States Army as soldiers.
Cobb County District 4 Commissioner Lisa Cupid eloquently explained her take: “I was deeply offended by some of the statements that were made this morning by the previous speaker. I’m not here to refute the fact that there may have been slaves other than persons who are African American. But there is numerous documentation and historical evidence that the chattel slavery that blacks were subject to in America was not comparable to that of any other race. And I also want to address the point that, had it been so bad for slaves, they would have left the south. I found that statement also equally offensive.”
