From USA Today:
“Billy Graham, Harriet Tubman,
Frederick Douglass: Who Trump wants in the 'National Garden of American Heroes'”
President Donald Trump announced
during a speech in front of Mount Rushmore on Friday an executive order to establish
a "National Garden of American Heroes" featuring statues of
"historically significant Americans." The executive order includes a list of former
American presidents and historical figures to feature – with Ronald Reagan,
Abraham Lincoln, Amelia Earhart, and Billy Graham among them. Trump's effort to build more statues comes as
protesters across the U.S. have torn down statues in protest of police violence
against Black people in the wake of George Floyd's death in May. Trump has condemned the protesters tearing
down statues, which have included Robert. E. Lee and Christopher Columbus,
among others, and signed a separate order in June to provide long prison
sentences to people who remove or vandalize statues and other historical
monuments. In his speech Friday in South
Dakota, Trump said protesters were "determined to tear down every statue,
symbol, and memory of our national heritage." The executive order also
mentions efforts to tear down statues. “To destroy a monument is to desecrate
our common inheritance," the order says. "These statues are not ours
alone, to be discarded at the whim of those inflamed by fashionable political
passions; they belong to generations that have come before us and to
generations yet unborn. My Administration will not abide an assault on our
collective national memory.”
The National Garden will include
but is not limited to the figures mentioned in the order. The order stipulates
that the Garden should include "historically significant Americans,"
who "contributed positively to America throughout our history,"
offering Founding Fathers, abolitionists, religious leaders, police officers
"killed or injured in the line of duty," and "opponents of
national socialism or international socialism" as some examples. The order further clarifies that any
"individual who was, or became, an American citizen and was a public
figure who made substantive contributions to America’s public life or otherwise
had a substantive effect on America’s history" is eligible, including
Columbus and Junipero Serra. Both Columbus and Serra, who are cited in the
executive order, have been subjects of removal for protesters. The order states that none of the Garden's
figures "will have lived perfect lives, but all will be worth honoring,
remembering, and studying." A task force from the Department of the
Interior will be responsible for adhering to these guidelines, as well as
choosing the park's location, according to the order. The order's aim is open
the garden to the public in time for the 250th anniversary of the Declaration
of Independence on July 4, 2026.
The full list of historical
figures featured in the executive order are included below:
John Adams
Susan B. Anthony
Clara Barton
Daniel Boone
Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain
Henry Clay
Davy Crockett
Frederick Douglass
Amelia Earhart
Benjamin Franklin
Billy Graham
Alexander Hamilton
Thomas Jefferson
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Abraham Lincoln
Douglas MacArthur
Dolly Madison
James Madison
Christa McAuliffe
Audie Murphy
George S. Patton, Jr.
Ronald Reagan
Jackie Robinson
Betsy Ross
Antonin Scalia
Harriet Beecher Stowe
Harriet Tubman
Booker T. Washington
George Washington
Orville and Wilbur Wright
^ I would like to see a National
Garden honoring different important people from American History. With that
said I do not want Trump’s name or signature on it since it only taints what is
good. I also do not believe that we should have any Confederate people in the
National Garden. The Confederacy and everyone who fought for the Confederate
cause were committing treason against the United States of America. They tried
hard to destroy our great country and that should not be honored (remembered –
yes, honored – no.) Trump seems to forget that the same Confederates that he
wants to honor would have tried to overthrow and kill him if they could (since
he is the US President) and yet he wants to give them a place of national honor.
That is just plain dumb. ^
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