Prof. Jill Hasday Quoted by WHYY About Founding Father Statue Restoration

Professor Jill Hasday, McKnight University Professor and Centennial Professor in Law, was quoted by WHYY in Philadelphia about Delaware founding father Caesar Rodney should be remembered as a patriot. Others say his legacy is tarnished as an owner of enslaved people. A bronze statue depicting Rodney on a horse stood in downtown Wilmington for more than 100 years before it was taken down in 2020 amid nationwide protests that largely targeted monuments to Confederate leaders and those who held people in slavery. Rodney is said to have owned up to 200 enslaved people. State leaders are debating whether the statue should be exhibited next year in Washington, D.C. as part of the America’s 250th anniversary. Prof. Hasday, author of We the Men: How Forgetting Women’s Struggles for Equality Perpetuates Inequality, said battles over who we commemorate never cease between people on different sides of the political spectrum. She said, “It takes a lot of energy to commemorate someone and usually one of the factors that drives that is people are trying to send a message about the world they live in, and not just about the past.”