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Article: 'Unreconstructed Rebel' ; The Jefferson Davis bicentennial provides a chance for study, not celebration.
- Article from:
- Columbia Daily Tribune
- Article date:
- February 24, 2008
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2008 Columbia Daily Tribune. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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It hasn't been easy getting people excited about celebrating the
200th birthday of that tall, gaunt, bearded, Kentucky-bred president
who was born in a log cabin and went on to lead his people through a
bloody civil war.
No, not Abraham Lincoln. Last week, President George W. Bush
himself helped kick off a two-year celebration of the Great
Emancipator's Feb. 12, 2009, bicentennial that will include dozens
of events in Kentucky, Illinois, Washington and beyond.
It's that other tall, log cabin-born Kentuckian, Jefferson Davis,
whose 200th has turned out to be something of a lost cause.
"The response to date has been timid," acknowledges Bertram Hayes-
Davis, head of the Davis Family ...