By David Lee Kesler

Special to the Salisbury Post

In the aftermath of the horrible shooting in Charleston, S.C., I have been astonished at the flag and memorial destruction suggested. All of this misguided concern over Southern heritage is a way people divert the public’s attention from the real issue.

On the Confederate flag and the Civil War, our secession from the United States had to do with unfair and lopsided laws coming from Washington, D.C. (not even a state). These “Columbians,” backed by the industrial North, invaded the South and began killing and burning. Sounds like Korea and Vietnam, huh? We fought to protect ourselves from invasion.

The Emancipation Proclamation was a lopsided law. This law allowed some states to keep their slaves if they wanted. It was the Thirteenth Amendment that freed all the slaves. Slavery was on the decline before the war, due to the Industrial Revolution. The farm tractor, combine and cotton gin provided a more productive and economical way of planting and harvesting crops.

Most Southerners did not own slaves. Christian values made it impossible for them to agree with the concept of owning another person. My ancestors never owned a single slave; they picked their own cotton. It is a good thing an animal activist from Washington didn’t see the mules in the field, or family members would have had to pull the plow.

The removal of our Confederate monument would be a slap in the face. The real issue here is hate and murder, tools of the devil. What you can not see is more real than what you can see.

The demoniacally possessed young man, full of hate, was working for the devil. Why else would he have chosen to murder people in a church? This fact has been swept aside in lieu of other agendas. Do you really think the people killed would want to be remembered as “the black people killed by a white boy?” Or would they want to be remembered as Christians slain while worshiping God? 

The removal of the Lord’s prayer from our public schools has left a void that Satan has filled. I am thankful that Jesus watched over my classmates and me while attending school in western Rowan County. We let that young man down by replacing Jesus and His love with metal detectors and security guards, none of which can stop the devil. Had he received the same chance at life we did, things would be much different for him. My heart and prayers go out to the victims’ families.

The memorial in Salisbury is probably worth millions. I can’t afford to buy it, but I would pick it up at no charge and put it in my front yard. Perhaps it is not the dead Confederate soldier some people find offensive, but the angel.

David Lee Kesler lives in Kitty Hawk.