Today's little rant began as a reply to a comment from a regular reader who shares my low opinion of France about the Statue of Liberty post:
Maybe we should let the Lady rust a little more. After all, it was a gift from France.
Actually the Statue of Liberty wasn't a gift from France (the French Govt.) or the French people. It was two Frenchmen, Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi (the sculptor) and Edouard Rene Lefebvre de Laboulaye (a scholar, jurist, abolitionist and a leader of the "liberals," the political group dedicated to establishing a French republican government modeled on America's constitution) who conceived and implemented the idea. They envisioned that the moneyed classes would fund the statue as an intellectual statement.
At a dinner party Laboulaye commented, "Wouldn't it be wonderful if people in France gave the United States a great monument as a lasting memorial to independence and thereby showed that the French government was also dedicated to the idea of human liberty?"
Key phrase is people in France not the French or France.
Elaborate fundraising events were staged: a banquet at the Grand Hotel de Louvre in November 1875 a gala benefit performance of a new Liberty Cantata by French composer Charles Gounod at the Paris Opera. But money was slow in coming. Since very few contributions for building the statue were coming from France's moneyed elite, a public lottery was conceived. The prizes were substantial: a silver plate set worth 20,000 francs (about $20,000); jewelry fashioned from pearls and gems, worth 5,000 francs; plus two works by Bartholdi.
Additional funds were raised with creative merchandising: a signed and numbered collection of clay models entitled "Models of the Committee," bearing the Franco-American Union's seal, were sold for 1,000 francs each in France and for $3,000 each in America. The buyer's name could be engraved in the clay before the statue was baked.
By the end of 1879, about 250,000 francs had been raised for the statue's construction. Enough to complete the work and the French press soon forgot about the statue. In June 1884, French Prime Minister Jules Ferry and Ambassador Morton dedicated Liberty with much pomp and circumstance. But when Bartholdi invited the celebrating party to join him in climbing the statue's steps, few accepted.
Until the spring of 1885, when she was dismantled for the long voyage to America, Liberty remained in Paris, a tourist attraction drawing thousands of French visitors. Only Bartholdi’s drive and passion for the project kept it alive, the statue would have languished in Paris as public interest waned. The Statue of Liberty reflects one man's vision more than his nation's attitude about America.
France's leftist government, socialism, and ensuing anti-Americanism were not in play when the Statue of Liberty was envisioned, the French were still a people willing to fight for and/or defend liberty. Liberty doesn't represent the France of today and for me at least, carries none of the stigma of France's perfidy in recent world events.
As much as I dislike the French as they now purport themselves, in fairness, one must add that the French lost the will to fight in WWI where they sacrificed a generation in a futile war.
It is not helpful that their government engages in puffery as if they were still a world power and one day we will most likely be called upon to haul their bacon from the fire again. We'll do it, because that's the sort of people we are and what the French have become.
The Statue of Liberty is a monument to the sort of people the French once were...when the concepts on which we based our country still excited and inspired others; it also reminds us of what can be lost.
We don't want to be the next France. Men such as Howard Dean would see that we are indeed by accommodating, equivocating and retreating from the role that has been thrust upon us by our very success as a society. We made the decisions and sacrifices that have brought us to this point and now we must carry the burden of that success by defending ourselves and much of the world from it's avowed enemies.
In keeping the Statue of Liberty open and we deliver a strong rebuke to the French and a statement about our resolve in the war we now face and must win.
Your blog is a refreshing change from the majority of blogs I have visited. When I first started visiting web sites I was excited by the potential of the internet as a resource and was very disappointed initially. You have restored my enthusiasm and I thank you for your efforts to share your insights and help the world become a better place.
Posted by: Sabina at May 7, 2004 12:13 PM