I have struggled with this day, and its close cousin Veteran’s Day, for quite some time. My struggle seems to be the result of dealing with the conflict between my beliefs and the popular beliefs that surround Memorial Day. The intention of the holiday is to honor the soldiers who died in the wars of the United States. From what I can tell, the official purpose of the holiday is to acknowledge the sacrifice of those who died and to honor their memory. However, I learned today that the original meaning of the holiday was a bit different.
First of all, the holiday was originally called Decoration Day. This was because it started with the decoration of soldiers’ graves by grateful citizens. What I didn’t know is that these citizens were black people who had just been freed through the sacrifice of Union soldiers. This is the real story of Memorial Day and it is an incredible story.
“The first well-known observance of a Memorial Day-type observance after the Civil War was in Charleston, South Carolina on May 1, 1865. During the war, Union soldiers who were prisoners of war had been held at the Charleston Race Course; at least 257 Union prisoners died there and were hastily buried in unmarked graves. Together with teachers and missionaries, black residents of Charleston organized a May Day ceremony in 1865, which was covered by the New York Tribune and other national papers. The freedmen cleaned up and landscaped the burial ground, building an enclosure and an arch labeled, “Martyrs of the Race Course.” Nearly ten thousand people, mostly freedmen, gathered on May 1 to commemorate the war dead. Involved were about 3,000 school children newly enrolled in freedmen’s schools, mutual aid societies, Union troops, black ministers, and white northern missionaries. Most brought flowers to lay on the burial field. Today the site is used as Hampton Park. Years later, the celebration would come to be called the “First Decoration Day” in the North.”
The big question to me is, why haven’t I heard this before? Why was I not taught any of this during the interminable 12 years I spent in school? I can only conclude that, like much of our history, it has been revised to suit the prevailing social class of the time. After reading Howard Zinn’s “A People’s History of the United States” as well as other historically revealing books, I see how this approach to history-telling has permeated our educational system. Regarding the “evolution” of the story about Memorial Day, this is a good article by Ben Becker. Clearly, what we now call Memorial Day is a white-washed (literally) representation of its original and what I consider, most appropriate meaning.
My conflict about Memorial Day is not so much about its popular meaning, but about how I can reconcile my commitment to a peaceful world, devoid of the egoic conflict which is the root of war, and my desire to acknowledge the very real emotion that many feel around the ultimate sacrifice of our soldiers and their friends and families. How can I connect and share in the love that people feel for the war dead and hold a belief that these wars were motivated by the greed of wealthy capitalists and not by patriotic zeal or a desire to bring freedom? The truth is that these wars imposed economic slavery, exploited people and resources and encouraged division and separation among us. How can I feel good about the sacrifice of our young people on the altar of corporate hegemony and global destruction? Is there any honor in this all? Well, not according to one of our most senior military men of the 20th century, U.S. Marine and Major General Smedley Butler.
“War is just a racket. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses. I believe in adequate defense at the coastline and nothing else. If a nation comes over here to fight, then we’ll fight. The trouble with America is that when the dollar only earns 6 percent over here, then it gets restless and goes overseas to get 100 percent. Then the flag follows the dollar and the soldiers follow the flag.”
Like the history of Memorial Day, I’ll bet the vast majority of Americans have never heard of General Butler. Apparently, he too was a victim of revisionist history. We need not look to history, however, to find courageous military people who are risking their future and their survival to denounce our current wars and expose the dark motivations of greed and power that underlie them. Most notably, Bradley Manning awaits court martial on June 3 for revealing war crimes committed by U.S. soldiers in Iraq. Despite repeated torture and the longest solitary confinement in U.S. history, he remains steadfast in his commitment to the truth. As was the case in ending the Vietnam War, veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan are risking everything to share the truth about these wars and bring them to an end. 
Lest you think I am another pontificator, I have marched before the gates of Ft. Meade in support of Bradley Manning and on the streets of Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and New York with our courageous young veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan. This does not make me an expert, but it did provide me with an understanding of the experience of people who have actually been to war and some assurance to you that I walk my talk.
As far as I can tell, the only way for me to honor our dead soldiers while opposing the wealthy elite whose thirst for power caused their death is to transform myself. I must recognize the anger, the fear and the separation which I have allowed to exist within me and release them. I must let go of my reasons for opposing anyone and instead recognize that my own desire to control my circumstances, to force things to go my way is the same as in those I oppose. Only by accepting my own humanity and that of others, is anything new possible. Consequently, I ask you to consider a journey into yourself, into your own anger, resentment and fear, as the best way to transform our collective experience and bring about the peaceful world that I think all of us wish to see. I believe that such a world will manifest through the collective expression of the human heart. I hope you join me on this road to a world that works for everyone.