Every American president has left his mark, some more than others. Future generations will judge those marks as beneficial or harmful to the Republic, but the ones that matter most are political, not aesthetic.
But we find ourselves living in the era of wokeness, where the line between the mere aesthetic and the political has blurred. Concerns over restoring the Reflecting Pool or building a long-needed ballroom expansion at the White House have become as much a political argument as any policy bill before Congress.
This polarization over aesthetics has everything to do with who’s in the White House. To put it bluntly, it’s all rooted in Trump Derangement Syndrome.
President Donald Trump is a builder. That’s how he and his family made their fortune.
With him back in the White House, it’s little surprise he’d want to leave his mark on the office and do it visibly. Of all the things to criticize Trump over, attacking his desire to beautify the city is downright silly.
Does anyone doubt that a well-built White House ballroom will serve future presidents for generations? Did anyone really contest the merits of cleaning up the Reflecting Pool ahead of 250th celebrations?
And the plans to restore DC’s aging, dilapidated East Potomac Golf Links public course are a welcome focus for anyone who has played the old course. It’s a beautiful area that has been allowed to deteriorate for too long. I mean, it’s not like Trump knows anything about golf.
Trump’s penchant for naming buildings after himself does rub many folks the wrong way. Case in point: the renaming of the Kennedy Center. However, that’s a question of renaming an already existing edifice.
Now Trump’s newest proposal has sparked another uproar: the United States Triumphal Arch, or Independence Arch. The 250-foot-tall arch would sit at the west end of the Memorial Bridge, roughly a quarter mile from the entrance to Arlington National Cemetery.
Trump’s vision for the new memorial celebrates and marks America’s 250th anniversary. Whether you agree or disagree with Trump’s vision, his desire to mark the national milestone is not crazy or uncouth. Indeed, Washington, DC, is full of monuments and memorials that recognize significant events or individuals and mark our history.
But, unsurprisingly, many anti-Trumpers like the activist reporters at The Washington Post oppose the idea.
In a recent hit piece titled “Trump’s arch would cast shadow on Arlington graves, including Kennedy’s,” the Post suggests that shadows cast by the planned arch would somehow “defile” the graves of those lying within Arlington National Cemetery. As the Post writes, “The monument would darken the nation’s premier military burial ground early in the morning on more than 280 days a year, a Post analysis finds.”
You know what darkens the entire cemetery every 24 hours? Night.
Tellingly, the Post highlights several graves that would be shadowed by the arch in the early morning: the John F. Kennedy Memorial, the Military Women’s Memorial, and the graves of Supreme Court Justices Thurgood Marshall, William H. Rehnquist, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Well, at least the Post noted Rehnquist, although you can’t help but wonder if he would have cared one whit about morning shadows cast over his grave.
For the Post, shadows equal bad vibes — at least if it’s something Trump built. Perhaps recognizing that other monuments, such as the Washington Monument, also cast shadows, the Post quotes Karla Rothstein, director of DeathLab at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, who observes that shadows “are not inherently negative.” No kidding. Sitting in the shade is wonderful on a hot summer day.
Rothstein further observes, “Perhaps the concern is not so much the presence of shade as what it means for a monument celebrating triumph to impose its shadow on a landscape commemorating sacrifice.” Sure, but that depends on how you interpret the shadow’s source.
If Trump’s arch gets built, it will outlast him, just as the city’s other monuments and memorials have endured for generations. It’s also meant as a reminder of the greatness of our country, for which virtually every person interred at Arlington contributed.
This shadow argument against the arch is as silly as it is vacuous. If you are offended by early-morning shadows, wait a few minutes. The shadows will pass.
