Harvard Memorial Committee Chairman Visits SLRC, discusses strategy

Patrick B. O’Neal, Chairman of the SLRC’s Harvard Confederate Memorial Initiative Committee, recently spent two days at the SLRC offices exploring ways and means of bringing pressure to bear on the Harvard administration to erect an on-campus memorial to its 71 alumni who died fighting for the Confederacy.

Committee membership is still being extended, and consists of both Harvard alumni (such as O”Neal himself, who is a Harvard Law graduate) and “laymen.” The overall strategy is to work through selected Harvard alumni chapters and on a one-to-one basis with key Harvard personnel to reintroduce the Confederate memorial idea, which was originally floated at Harvard in the 1980’s but was subsequently shelved following vehement protests from minority student associations and some faculty and administrators, including the then president of the University.

The SLRC designed a HCMI lapel pin and blazer badge for use in its grassroots campaign, and has been offering them as bonus premiums to new or existing SLRC members who contribute at the level of $75 or more. At present, the SLRC still has about 100 of these beautiful enamel pins and embroidered blazer patches on hand before having to reorder, and is making them available on a first-come, first-served basis to both new and existing members. For a look at the HCMI logo, as well as an SLRC membership application form, please visit the SLRC website, www.slrc-csa.org.