Tea at Trianon: ‘Trumping’ Woke Savages

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Thursday, April 23, 2026

‘Trumping’ Woke Savages

From Chronicles:

In 2021, the New York City Council voted unanimously to remove a bronze statue of Jefferson from its chamber. The statue had stood there since 1834. Councilors framed the sculpture as a constant reminder of injustices once perpetrated against racial minorities. They cited Jefferson’s ownership of slaves as the embodiment of that injustice while ignoring his authorship of the Declaration of Independence.
At the University of Virginia, which Jefferson founded, the student newspaper published an editorial demanding the removal of every reference to him. It accused the famously liberal university of upholding white supremacy. The editorial even linked Jefferson’s presence to the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville.

Efforts to diminish Jefferson have reached his historic home at Monticello. Exhibits and programming there face justified criticism for fixating on his slaveholding and supposed relationship with Sally Hemings. These displays overshadow his roles as statesman, inventor, and advocate for individual liberty. (Read more.)