Political Correctness Running Amok at Point Lookout
 

I don't know about you all but this infuriates me. What flag are Confederate POW's supposed to be buried under!

June 06, 2003
Point Lookout Memorial Speech Lines Disapproved by Judge

June 6, 2003--A federal judge has upheld a ruling by the Department of Veterans Affairs that requires several lines to be removed from a speech to be given at a memorial service June 14 at Point Lookout, a holding camp for Confederate prisoners of war in southern Maryland. The service is to be held in the portion of the camp now designated as a national cemetery.

Patrick J. Griffin III, a Maryland resident and past commander of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, had planned to include four passages in his address in which he opposed the government's decision to allow the Confederate flag to fly at the site only during the annual ceremony. Griffin was required to submit a draft of his planned speech to Veterans Affair officials in advance.

Among the lines the agency found objectionable were: "The government is surely right in allowing our flag to fly here today," and, "Especially in this place, the flag should fly every day, just as it is doing this morning."

Veterans Affairs rules require that public remarks in national military cemeteries must be nonpartisan and "viewpoint neutral," the Washington Post's Eugene Meyers reported. The SCV requested a preliminary injunction barring the VA from forcing Griffin to revise his remarks or from fining him for speech it considered improper.

James J. Schwartz, a Justice Department attorney representing the VA, said in court that regulations banning contentious speech were adopted to ensure that such cemeteries remain tranquil places, free of controversy, where the dead may be honored and remembered with dignity. The VA, he said, "is entitled to determine what is the subject matter and to go forward with its mandate to protect these national shrines."

The SCV's suit did not dispute the department's right to exercise prior restraint over speech on public land, their lawyer said. Michael F. Wright, an attorney on the various challenges, argued yesterday that Griffin and the other plaintiffs were contesting only the removals from the specific speech that Griffin planned to give.

"We're not saying VA has to let Save the Whales in there, for example," Wright said.

District Judge William Nickerson denied the motion for injunction. He said that the regulation's constitutionality had already been settled and that it was up to the plaintiffs to show that the rule "as applied" in this case would cause actual and imminent harm.

"The real harm is very hard to comprehend," the judge said.

Griffin said he would abide by the ruling and delete sections of his speech the VA had found objectionable.

"Today obviously wasn't our day," said "I abide by and respect the law," he said, "even though I may not agree with it."

Point Lookout was established by Union forces after the Battle of Gettysburg. Over the course of its operations the facility housed 52,264 Confederate prisoners, some 14,000 of whom died there and are buried in a mass grave on the grounds.

The camp, much of which is now a Maryland state park, is located at the very tip of the state south of Washington DC where the Potomac River enters Chesapeake Bay.

Until about ten years ago the Confederate battle flag routinely flew over the memorial. After controversies arose in various places over the use of the flag at taxpayer-supported venues, the VA restricted its display, a policy that was challenged and upheld in the courts. Under an agreement reached after another lawsuit, the Confederate flag is flown at the cemetery only on the day of the memorial meeting.

Another lawsuit has been brought by the Confederate groups challenging policies at Point Lookout, but the judge declined to issue a ruling on that matter at the hearing on the injunction over the speech.

In May, the Point Lookout POW group bought two acres near the federal monument where it intends to erect a statue of a Confederate soldier and fly the battle flag along with flags of all the states of the Confederacy.

Bill :d: :d: :d:

Follow on Questions
 

One might make the accurate assumption that there are many German POW's buried in the US, since many were brought here during WWII. Many of them were committed Nazis, fighting well and hard for the Fatherland until their fate, and the magnaminity of US forces intervened and they began to learn what America was all about. It's just a wild guess, but I assume that some of them died here, either of wounds, old age or whatever, and were buried accordingly. Just what flag should they be buried under? How offensive would some people find it to see a Nazi flag flying in this country? And kindly refrain from making the accusation that I'm equating the Confederacy with Nazi Germany - that dawg won't hunt in Wimberley.

I wouldn't even dream of thinking you equate the two flags. However, these were Americans who fought for a cause they believed in. Many of whom felt that they, not the North were actually upholding the constitution. My point is that the flag of their enemy is flying over the graves.

Moreover, there are German POW's buried here in the states. To my knowledge a German flag does not fly over their graves. The distinction here is that the Germans were foreign belligerants, not Americans. the Confederate flag, like it or not is a piece of our history. 250,000 Americans died under that flag, to relegate it to nothingness to me is a gross insult.

Here is the point, I wish to make. This board laudably wants to record this nation's military history. Many of the notable events not only occured during the War of the Rebellion (Its official government name) but also by necessity it must include the deeds of Confederate as well as Union soldiers. The banner under which the Confederate soldier fought therefore in my opinion deserves a better fate than it is suffering now in this PC world.



Bill

I agree with you Tamoroa. The flag deserves a better fate. I could argue the issues for days with either side but the fact will always remain that the flag is a very important piece of American History and should be treated as such.

DITTO Tamaroa!
 

I totally agree with you!

Don'tcha be payin no attention to thet thare ole SuperSurly feller. Hell, he's-a frum a dangnabbed FOREIGN country anyways---The Republic of Texas, or Texecans, ere sumthing like thet! I think he's originally an "immigrant" frum thet thare place he's-a hollerin about all the time---LOMA-LINDA, or some kinda weird place anywho!

Respectfully your'n,

General Beauregard "Stonewall" Gimpster

DITTO Tamaroa! I also agree with you! I am a SCV member here in SE Georgia and when I go to the Confederate Memorial cemetery in Waynesville,GA on April 26th for Confederate Memorial Day I also return in May for Memorial Day to place a US flag on the WW1 veterans' grave that is also in the cemetery. Because we are all members of the biggest fraternity those who served in the military. Someday we will depend on a stranger to remember to honor our memory and decorate our grave with the proper respect and Flag. God bless the Veteran because he served his country when others wouldn't and protected their rights anyway. So when you hear about someone or some group protesting the St.Andrews Cross (Confederate Battle Flag) remember its the Confederate Veteran they are protesting because it's their flag they carried in battle not the 1st National or later CSA flags to fly over Richmond,VA which flew over the South as Old Glory fly over the US from inception . So truth be known the Old Glory we all love as Americans has flown over Slaves longer then any CSA flag ever did. BTW my Wifes GrGr Uncle John Eason was held as a POW at Point Lookout,MD two months after the War Between the States was over he was released in June 1865.John W Eason of Union Co. NC Pvt, Co D, 37th Reg at age 22 was a Volunteer entered service on Sept 16, 1861.On his Roll of Honor* paperwork it list him being wounded at Chancellorville on May 3 ,1863 .

What a coincidence!! JerryD
 

I have a distant relative William Doherty who was in the 37th North Carolina, He was a 1st Lieutenant, KIA at Gettysburg. I guess that makes you a step brother in solidarity to me :)

Bill

JerryD,
What does the "W" stand for in "John W Eason?" Your wife and I may have common relatives. My family history comes through Barnwell county....or was that a "township?"

I agree with David; the flag issue could be argued both ways. Is it possible to separate the political part and simply honor the soldier? Were any Confederate or USA sailors buried in foreign soil? Could we expect our flag to fly there as it does in Normandy? Would you consider the soldiers that Bill is talking about as being buried in foreign soil or homeland?



Chilidog

Chilidog: the "W" in John W Eason stood for Wilson and He also had a 2nd Brother in the Co.D,37th Reg NC Inf. Thomas Lee Eason. He had a third brother William S. Eason who served in Co.I, 53 Reg. of NC and was know as one of the two best marksmen in his company.It is interesting how if one looks into their family history you can trace them back to common events if you look for them.Thanks for the Info Bill (Tamaroa) :ae:

Jerry,
I'm going to pass these names on to my dad and see what he has in his notebooks. What is the "S" for in William S. Eason? I have a Seborn Eason that was in King's Btn, LA Inf. We have noticed that over the generations 3 or 4 names kept being repeated throughout the Eason clan.


Chilidog

Chilidog: the "S" is just the Middle Initial we have on the family tree it is unknown to us for now. So Seborn is as good of a guess :)

Dale Earnhardt Jr. and his thoughts in a recent intv asked about the Confederate Flag
 

SOUTHERN COMFORT
Dale Earnhardt Jr. + Ludacris: The Complex Interview

From MLK to Elvis to Bill Clinton to James Brown, the South's most famous men have always attracted hype and scorn in equal measures. The latest favorite sons of the South are no different, though they developed from starkly separate branches of the region's cultural landscape.
Ben White

Ludacris reps the Dirty South and Hotlanta, with lyrical skills and a trademark sound that have catapulted him into the realm of rap's best MCs. He's an heir to the grand Southern musical tradition, as well as one of its ambassadors, but his provocative lyrics have courted controversy on TV and in corporate boardrooms. "Little E," as Dale Earnhardt Jr. is known throughout the NASCAR world, comes from the South's more problematic side, the land of racecar-lovin' rednecks and Confederate-flag-wavers. Yet he's charted his own course, weathering the high- profile death of his legendary father to become NASCAR's most famed--and feared--driver. He's also one of the sport's most enterprising businessmen. Emerging from the relative comfort of the Southland, Ludacris and Little E are quickly becoming American icons. And their worlds are not mutually exclusive. Little E's favorite rapper is Ludacris, who prepped for his role in the upcoming sequel to The Fast And The Furious by attending racing school and learning what he calls "some serious Dale Earnhardt-type shit." They met for the first time for the Complex Interview, finding common ground in their love of fast cars and beautiful women, and their ability to stir things up but always come out on top.
THE SOUTH
COMPLEX: How much of your identity and success do you attribute to coming up in Atlanta?
LUDACRIS: Most of it, because Atlanta is like the Motown of the South. I remember when LaFace Records was there. You had So So Def and Dallas Austin... just being around all of that really motivated me. Everything from the catfish to the grits to riding in Cadillacs, from the hot weather--Hotlanta--to the women. You know, everything.

James Brown, Tina Turner, and Aretha Franklin were part of the first wave of Southern black music to hit mainstream airwaves. Do you look at what's going on in hip-hop in the South now as another renaissance period?
LUDACRIS: I definitely feel it's a renaissance, because the East Coast was dominant in the music field for a while, then you had the West Coast, and then people like the Cash Moneys and the No Limits really started opening it up. For the longest time in the South, people were putting out independent albums which were just regional [successes]. Once record companies realized how many units people were selling on their own, they picked up these artists.

How much of the Southern sound do you trace back to bass-driven music?
LUDACRIS: You could say that "bounce" is the new bass music. People like riding around in their cars listening to speakers--big speakers, of course. My man Mr. Earnhardt over here also likes putting speakers in the back of his car and riding around. It's about music that's real energetic and kind of motivates you to wanna go do something.

What's your take on Martin Luther King as a Southern icon?
LUDACRIS: Martin Luther King. That's Georgia for you. That's Atlanta. He's my motivation, man. He represents strength, a movement, change.
DALE: He was something positive during some bad times. He had a lot of guts.

Another icon from the South: Elvis?
DALE: I'm a fucking huge fan. He's the pillar of rock 'n' roll. When he was younger, he was really cool. He just did his own thing [even though] everybody gave him shit about it. He had a way with the ladies, too. But he had a fucked-up deal-- everyone thinks his manager was fucking him [over] and stealing his money, and then he got fucked up on all those pills. But he just rode the whole thing out. He was a badass.

What's your take on Elvis?
LUDACRIS: Man, Dale said a lot, but you know, I wish people would just realize that he is deceased. They keep trying to say they see this dude in malls and shit. Please, let the man rest in peace. He's not alive anymore. Let him be. He's a legend [though]. His albums still hit number-one on the Billboard charts. And his sideburns were cool. My sideburns are real similar to the way his sideburns were. It's all about the sideburns and just letting him rest in peace.

NASCAR racing is a predominantly white sport. Are they trying to bring in more diversity?
DALE: As far as drivers go, that's just going to take some time, because there isn't really a place where you can go learn [to race]. There's not a college level.

What do you know about Willie T. Ribbs?
DALE: There was Wendell Scott, the first black NASCAR driver back in the '60s and '70s. Willie T. was the second. Willie T. was actually good, but he never got good cars to show what he could do. He came to NASCAR after he peaked in his ability-- he was a little bit older, but he just never quit. He kept on trying. He's still trying. He's gotta be at least 50 years old today! There's a guy now, Bill Lester. I've known him for about four years. Me and him worked together on a couple of projects with inner-city youth, and he's like a super-nice guy. He's got a lot of talent.
LUDACRIS: I definitely give [Willie T.] respect for being as brave as he is, because I know that there are a lot of fans out there that don't want to see him succeed. Just the fact that he's trying to change history is good enough for me. I'm going to stand behind him. But he needs to watch his ass. And that's real.
DALE: [laughs] Totally.

It seems NASCAR needs to appeal to a younger, more diverse audience to escape some of the redneck associations.
DALE: Yeah. That's basically what I've been thinking about all day, with me and [Ludacris] doing this photo shoot. It's really going to surprise a lot of people, and it should change a lot of attitudes and shut a few people up. Those kinds of things gotta happen all the time.

Is racism still a factor within NASCAR?
DALE: It's still there. Ten years ago, it wasn't really spoken. Now that NASCAR's gotten so corporate, people are starting to ask questions.

Speaking of racism, here's another hot-button issue in the South: the Confederate flag. Thoughts?
LUDACRIS: It's a no-no. They just need to get rid of it. Come with something new or just take that shit away. If they reissue it and put a big Malcolm up at the top of it, then we're good.
DALE: I feel the same way. Back in the Civil War, when they flew it, it was just a flag. Now people are using it for other reasons. I was in Richmond, onstage in front of about 340 people, and there was a Confederate flag. I was doing a Q&A session with these people in the crowd, and this guy's like, "Turn around. What do you think about that flag right there?" I turned around and I was like, "I don't think it means the same to me as it does to you." I just left it at that, but anybody who is trying to show that flag is probably too ignorant to know what the hell he's doing.

CAR AND DRIVER
Of all the cars you've ever driven, what's your favorite?
DALE: I like the way a Corvette drives. I like its attitude.

Favorite car?
LUDACRIS: My '93 Acura Legend. It's like champagne. The reason I love it so much is that when I was doing my independent album, it was like my tour bus. That's what I drove everywhere. Before I got signed to Def Jam, I was driving places that were within six hours of Atlanta to promote my own record and do shows. I would always drive that car and bring my guys with me to perform. I took great care of it. It has damn-near 200,000 miles on it, but it still drives like it's damn-near new. I will keep that car for as long as I live. It's like a shrine.

Sexiest car ever made?
DALE: '67 Camaro.
LUDACRIS: Ferrari 360.

Ludacris, I was shocked that you wanted to drive to Charlotte from Atlanta for this photo shoot. Then I heard that you write your best lyrics when you're driving, right?
LUDACRIS: That's the method to my madness. You see [drivers] talking on their cell phones... Me, I'll talk on my cell phone, use my two-way, watch TV--I have a television inside my steering wheel--and write lyrics on a pad with a pen while I'm driving. I love doing it. A lot of ideas seem to really springboard when I'm in my car. Whenever I have the opportunity to drive four, five, six hours, I get so much work done.

While filming your role in 2 Fast 2 Furious, you were traveling back and forth between the set in Miami and your home in Atlanta. You drove all by yourself?
LUDACRIS: Hell, yeah. Nobody drove with me because they felt like it was too long of a drive. Me, I don't stop anywhere.

Did you learn a lot more about cars from doing 2 Fast 2 Furious?
LUDACRIS: I have a whole new appreciation for cars. I was just telling Dale that before we did the movie, they had everybody take a driving course. We went out to the airport and they had cones, and we was just kind of test driving, doing 360s in the Corvettes, and doing all kinds of stunt driving. A lot of the new cars, they have buttons for traction and sometimes you have to take those off if you really want to get the wheels to spin. I was on some Dale Earnhardt-type shit out there. It was great. It was the best time I ever had.

Dale, your career is driving cars, so when you're driving for leisure, is it something you enjoy?
DALE: Me and my friends, we always take road trips and stuff, and I always drive down to Daytona when we race down there. I like taking long trips--it's a good time to kind of think, chill out, and pump the speakers. I like driving racecars because of the competition, but when I'm on the highway, I ain't in no hurry. I'm just kind of cruising around.

Dale, is there a racetrack that's your nemesis?
DALE: Yeah. I got three of them--Sears Point out in San Francisco, Rockingham, and Darlington. Sears Point is a road course, and I just can't figure it out. Rockingham and Darlington are both close to the beach, and they pave those tracks with crushed seashells instead of regular asphalt. After years and years of racing, you wear this asphalt off, and then you're running on broken seashells and it tears the tires out to hell, and you're just sliding all over the place. I just can't figure out how to get around it when I'm on old tires.

Having coped with your father's tragic death during a car race, how do you handle the mortal risk involved in a dangerous sport like racing?
DALE: I feel like with racing, there's not really just pure luck. I think you make your luck. If you get in a crash, you did something to put yourself in that position. You can control a little bit of your destiny when you're on a racetrack. The consequences are pretty severe, but if you're smart and you're aware of shit, you can have a good long career. Then again, you can't control everything. But I don't mind. If I ever got killed in a racecar, I was doing what I wanted to do. If I quit because I was afraid of that, I'd never fucking forgive myself.

What's the ideology behind oversized rims?
LUDACRIS: It's a fashion statement. Cars are part of people's lifestyles, so getting big rims on your car symbolizes that you have enough money to pay for them. It's like shoes. You always have to have the new shoes, and they gotta be clean--when people scuff your shoes, you get mad at them. [In the same way,] if you happen to hit a curb and you scrape your rim, you're gonna be upset until you can get it re-chromed or get a new one.

What's the craziest detail piece you've got on one of your vehicles?
LUDACRIS: The television inside the steering wheel column of my 2000 Deville. No, wait--it's a tie between that and the television in the trunk of that car. It's there so that when you go picnic or something, you can raise the trunk up and watch television.

GIRLS AND GROUPIES
Both of you have risen to the status of celebrities. Has there been a big difference in the last couple of years in terms of having groupies and fanatics?
DALE: Damn, it's not the same, man. I'm a racecar driver. We're not in show business. Entertainment and show- business groupies, they look at [Ludacris] differently than they look at me. There's no real scale, but if our fan levels were the same, they'd look at him differently because of what he does. If he sings about how he likes to hang out with girls or I say in an interview that I love when girls pull their tops off, that's what they'll do next week. So, you know, it's all about whatever you want. You just gotta be careful.

Luda, so when you're working on these songs that are overtly sexual, like Dale's saying, do you anticipate how much heat that will bring you?
LUDACRIS: You know what? I was a little prepared for it, because I was on the radio before I blew up, so I kind of had the ghetto-celeb thing going on. My only thing is, I wish women that are groupies would stop saying that they're not groupies. If you're a groupie, say you're a groupie. It's OK. But, I mean, how do I deal with it? I think that almost any man, if it's thrown at him... we can run from groupies all we want, but we can only run so far before they catch our asses. We can try hard, but eventually we're going to give in, right? So as you get older, you start realizing more, and you feel like you've been there and done that, and that's when you start calming down.

OK. Next question: favorite strip clubs?
LUDACRIS: The Gentleman's Club was my favorite until they closed it down recently, and it seems like a club called Magic City is taking its place in Atlanta. But we have a lot of them. On Sundays, there's a place called Jazzy T.'s. Then you have a place called The Blue Flame. I could go on and on.
DALE: I like Vegas the best. They've got some good-looking women. Every time you go back, there's a better one or a new one. But I like Crazy Horse II.
LUDACRIS: Yeah. I've been there too. It's like $20 for a dance. What they do, I don't think it's worth $20. I'm just going to let the record be straight here. I don't give a damn.

Ideal girls? Dale, I heard you were a big fan of Tyra Banks.
DALE: Yeah, she's probably the hottest woman.
LUDACRIS: Yeah.
DALE: She's supposed to be with me. She just ain't figured it out yet.

HEAVY ROTATION
Unexpected music picks?
LUDACRIS: Nobody would expect me to listen to Three Doors Down. I love shit like Puddle Of Mudd, Staind, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers.
DALE: Lenny Williams or some old-ass, solid-gold soul shit like that. I like all that stuff.

Favorite TV show?
LUDACRIS: In Living Color, man. I wish they'd come out with the DVD set, so I can go buy that shit. And The Cosby Show.
DALE: My granddaddy was a big Redd Foxx fan, so we always watched him. I used to watch Saturday Night Live all of the time when Adam Sandler first came on it. That was the only show I made sure I didn't miss.

All-time worst job?
DALE: Pumping gas. When I got my first speeding ticket, I got a job at an Exxon station to pay off the ticket.

ON WAR
President Bush. You want to take that?
DALE: I don't think he's somebody you want to fuck with. [laughs] I met him a few times, and he's tough. Don't piss him off or you're going to pay. I like that a little bit--the fact that he ain't scared. Nobody intimidates him. He don't back down from no man. But I think he's gotta understand that there's a lot at stake.
LUDACRIS: I didn't respect him at all when he first came into the presidency, but I've started giving him a little respect now. When he started talking about war, he had a whole new walk to him, a whole new aura. Besides that, I agree with this comedian I heard saying, "I think the 'W' in George W. Bush stands for 'What? When? Where? When did that happen?'"

What do you think of the impending war?
DALE: I mean, there's been an impending war for the last 70 fucking years, so I don't think it's a big deal. It's no different than anything else we've dealt with.
LUDACRIS: Damn! I was watching the news last night, [and they were] talking about the weapons that we have prepared for war. It was the most invigorating thing in the world. It made me proud just to be a part of the United States, just because we have at least five new, really, really, really crazy weapons. [There's one weapon] that, no matter the weather, no matter the circumstances, will always hit its target because it's like a GPS satellite. And then someone was talking about how we've started to get remote-control planes instead of having actual men fly planes. That's just crazy, man.

You're in Atlanta. That's maybe not the first target, but do you ever get bugged out about what war is going to mean?
LUDACRIS: After 9/11, I'm bugged out all the time. I just feel like you have to live every day like it could be your last.

ARCHRIVALS
Is there anyone that you have it out for?
DALE: It changes every week. In five hundred miles, somebody's going to fucking piss you off. Somebody's going to do something that upsets you, and you're going to carry it over. There's guys on the track that are kind of crazy, and you just stay away from them.

You've managed to really piss off some other drivers. Tell us about the incident with Ward Burton at the Sharpie 500.
DALE: We were racing--he was running fifth and I was running sixth. There was about a hundred laps to go. That's a real small track, so a hundred laps is nothing. I was faster than him and I got up underneath him. I tried not to hit him, but I got into him and he spun into the wall. They got these things they put on your heels that keep from burning your foot because the metal down there is like 350 degrees sometimes--it's right next to the motor. He took those off and threw them at my car. He was pissed, and he was like, "Yeah, I wish I had a gun. I would have shot him." He was really pissed off, and I can kind of understand because he was running good. [But] I don't do that shit on purpose. I don't have the reputation of running over people. That shit's just going to happen sometimes.

Archrivals--you got any? People you just want to fucking rip apart on the mic?
LUDACRIS: I don't, nah.

How about Bill O'Reilly?
LUDACRIS: [sarcastically] Hell of a guy! He's trying to stop hip-hop music, and it's not going to happen, so he might as well just chill out. He's a hypocrite. I don't feel bad about calling him a racist, man. I think I'm going to send all his kids and his family Ludacris CDs. I think that's why he's upset at me--because his family probably loves my music.

How much money does he owe you?
LUDACRIS: He don't owe me any money. I got my check. When it comes to money, it's all good.

Pepsi had to eat whatever money was in the deal?
LUDACRIS: Yeah, I got all the money that was owed to me. Bill O'Reilly just focuses on the negative things that hip-hop music brings. A lot of the things that I do personally are positive. I have a foundation that concentrates on helping kids and doing things in the community like helping out homeless people and going to different hospitals around the country. But he just concentrated on the negative things. And Pepsi, they need to find out more about how businesses are run, so that silly mistakes like this don't happen in the future. They motivated me to try and make my own beverage. I'm working on that also.
DALE: Luda-pop?

They'll be drinking your soda, right?
LUDACRIS: Hell, yeah. We'll be forcing it down their throats.

This post is back on the original subject !
 

Plot buy lets flag of Civil War fly
By Stephen Manning
ASSOCIATED PRESS

SCOTLAND, Md. ? There is little to the Confederate Memorial Park right now, mostly a rough-cut field inhabited by swarms of mosquitoes.
But planted in the middle of the 3-acre plot, surrounded by several wreaths, a Confederate battle flag flies from a 40-foot pole.
Descendants of the thousands of soldiers held at a nearby Union prison camp during the Civil War plan to build a statue of a Confederate soldier and a marker with the names of those who died.
They also want to unfurl at the site the flags of the 11 states that seceded.
The Point Lookout POW Descendants Organization bought the land in May and raised the Confederate flag soon afterward.
Its location is no coincidence: The site borders a Confederate prisoners of war graveyard run by the Department of Veterans Affairs.
For several years, Confederate heritage organizations have fought the VA in court for the right to fly the battle flag perpetually at the graveyard.
The VA allows it just two days a year and has won several court challenges to its restrictions.
Patricia Buck, founder and president of the POW group, said building the memorial on private land will allow the descendants to fly the flag year-round next to the cemetery.
"We're not doing this to get back at the VA," she said. "We're doing this solely to honor our ancestors who died there."
She said the 1,120-member POW association had been hunting for a memorial site as early as 1992, well before the court cases.
The group bought the land with $32,000 it raised and has $5,000 of the estimated $100,000 cost of building the complete memorial it has proposed for the site.
Although the first thing that went up after the association purchased the land was the flag, Mrs. Buck said it was not meant to be offensive.
She said it's meant to serve as a reminder of the cause for which soldiers buried nearby fought. Those who object to it "don't know history," she said.
But St. Mary's County residents say flying the Confederate flag at the memorial site on a country road is divisive and a symbolic insult.
"To me, it's racism," said Harold Herndon, a black businessman from nearby Hollywood. "Anytime I see that, it bothers me."
The dispute over the memorial is the latest over marking the deaths of an estimated 14,000 Confederate soldiers who perished in the squalid prison camp at the tip of southern Maryland.
Erected after the battle of Gettysburg in 1863, the tent camp held about 52,200 Southern prisoners until the war ended in 1865. Some who died there are buried in a mass grave marked by two obelisks and plaques engraved with 3,000 names.
Confederate groups gather there once a year and fly the battle flag to commemorate their ancestors with speeches, re-enactments and prayers.
"All of us feel it is appropriate to fly the Confederate battle flag over the graves of Confederates. That is the flag they chose to go into battle under," said Patrick J. Griffin III, a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans who has been part of several lawsuits against the VA.
But the VA has deemed some of the speeches at the celebration inflammatory, including remarks last year by the Rev. Alistair Anderson, who called the Confederate cause "righteous" and "just" as he railed against modern Southerners who have been "emasculated by political correctness and Yankee propaganda."
The VA required speakers scheduled for the gathering this year, including Mr. Griffin, to submit their speeches for review and excised some portions it deemed inappropriate.
Mr. Griffin and others argued that speakers were being censored illegally, but a federal judge allowed the VA to screen the remarks.
Many people who live near the planned memorial site say the don't mind the flag but note that it has been stolen several times since it was first raised.
"I don't have a problem with it," said Bobbi Koontz, who works at the state park about a mile down the road. "They died fighting for that flag."
But others are uneasy about the display.
County Commissioner Dan Raley, who runs a nearby grocery store, said he has heard from several local black leaders who are angry about the flag and upset that another county commissioner helped dedicate the site.
"I worry it is going to cause some problems," he said. "The issue is the flag and all the bad thoughts it brings on."
For Mr. Herndon, 65, those bad thoughts include memories of growing up in segregated North Carolina and arriving in 1960 in Southern Maryland, where schools also were divided racially.
Mr. Herndon spoke out against the flag at a recent Rotary Club meeting and found some members were outraged but others didn't object to the memorial.
However, he said allowing the memorial to be built would just encourage other "radical" groups to put on similar displays.
"We're not going to sit around and watch it happen," he said.