Lafayette in Union Square

Lafayette, always been a fan. Without the help of France, America would never have been founded. Good thing the early 00’s are over with, with that silly Freedom Fries and Surrender Monkey bull crap. People point to World War II, failing to remember that by the time France surrendered, they already had lost 80,000 soldiers. France was right about Iraq. France was often the first to recognize American originals like Poe or Jazz or Film Noir. So, we have Lafayette, a younger statue here, in Union Square—I never really noticed it before—than the concrete thing by the arches in Washington Square. Lafayette and Washington were genuine friends, he even named his son George Washington, but that didn’t stop Lafayette from urging Washington to emancipate slaves when George became President number one. Washington would eventually emancipate his slaves in his will. He joined a French abolitionist society that sought to end the slave trade and in 1782 Lafayette addressed the House of Delegates and urged emancipation. He was not the only one back then to see the contradiction in our love of liberty and our enslavement of a race. If we listened, maybe the Civil War and Jim Crow could have been avoided. It’s important to remember, inevitability is not an absolute and also, sooner or later, one way or another, contradictions will be resolved