DAVID MARCUS: Only Hegseth can save storied Virginia Military Institute from woke state lawmakers
The last time that Virginia Military Institute was nearly destroyed was when Union troops set it ablaze during the Civil War. Today, a new threat to this storied college is coming from within the Old Dominion itself in the form of woke Democrat politicians.
Measures before the Virginia Legislature, in response to allegations of systemic racism at the institution, could not only strip the oldest state-run military college in the nation of its independence, but also cut off funding it needs to exist.
Last week, the Department of War, under Secretary Pete Hegseth, took to social media to back up VMI, writing that "the stability of this proven leadership pipeline is a matter of direct national security interest" and that the department "reserves the right to take extraordinary measures to protect the integrity of VMI."
Having spent some time this week in Lexington, Virginia, the mountainous home of VMI, it is clear that not only is the college a national treasure, it is very much a local one as well.
"VMI is the beating heart of Lexington," Melinda, an educator who has lived in the town for decades, told me. "I can’t imagine the place without it."
I met John, who graduated from VMI in the early 2000s and who said of the supposed racism and sexism, "The people who hate VMI just hate VMI because they think it represents the Confederacy." He insisted that allegations are overblown because every cadet lives by the same code of conduct.
Even a group of anti-President Donald Trump protesters I ran into on a chilly Friday afternoon had little but glowing things to say about VMI.
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"We were disappointed by the firing of the superintendent," Annette told me, referring to Maj. Gen. Cedric Wins, the first black head of the school, who was fired last year. "But we all love VMI."
So, if basically everyone in Lexington thinks VMI is great, and if it has provided America with great military leadership, from Gen. George S. Patton to Gen. George C. Marshall, why is it on the chopping block?
Because of the insatiable appetite for destruction of wokism.
VMI is integrally connected to the history of the Confederacy. Its most famous instructor was Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson, whose preserved horse one can visit at the college museum. But over the course of the 20th century, the school came to terms with this, often bending over backwards to do so.
Take for example the historical marker for Benjamin West Clinedinst's epic painting "Charge of the New Market Cadets."
"Although ‘Charge of the New Market Cadets’ was completed during a time in American history when ‘lost cause' ideology was pervasive in Virginia, today the painting serves the VMI community not as a commemoration of a Confederate victory or veneration of the Confederacy," it says.
That is what political correctness looked like, sheepishly apologizing for your own culture when nobody asked you to. But wokeness is different. Wokeness cannot tolerate the existence of ties to the evil past.
Even my hotel, which for nearly a century stood as the Robert E. Lee, has a new name. The only reference to Lee left is a plaque indicating the elevator is an original Otis car installed in 1926.
The erasure of history lurks around every corner and is now coming for VMI.
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The Union army chief of artillery who shelled and destroyed much of VMI in 1864, over his personal objection, was a Delaware man named Henry A. Du Pont, who, in 1914, as a U.S. senator, passed legislation to reimburse the school for the damage he had wrought.
These are the kinds of stories that echo around the halls of the Institute, tales of imperfect men of an imperfect nation, working toward greater perfection. If you quiet yourself on the campus on a cold, crisp winter day, you can hear them.
Last week, the VMI Class of 2001 penned an open letter to Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger, published in Lexington’s News Gazette. Two things are notable about this class: It was the first class to include women, and it graduated into war.
"We integrated women into the Corps when the nation doubted it could be done," the letter said. "We produced citizen soldiers of every race and background who trained, served, and bled together. We did not prove this through symbolism. We proved it in Fallujah, Kandahar, the Korengal, and in military funerals across the Commonwealth."
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With Democrats in clear control of the political power in Virginia, the threat to VMI’s funding and future is very real, which is why it is so vital that Hegseth and the Department of War make clear that they are a backstop to keep this special place running.
A nation and a people are its history, and few institutions hold so much of it as VMI. A town and a community are its institutions, the places that are old and storied, and in Lexington, that is VMI.
Long may Virginia Military Institute and its traditions endure.