Since the publishing of his book, Robert E. Lee and Me – A Southerners Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause and his appointment to the U.S. Naming Commission, Visiting Professor of History Ty Seidule has been in heavy demand as a speaker. This month’s request by a subpanel of the U.S. House of Representatives Oversight Committee was a bit different. Seidule was asked to be a panelist for a session on the “Risks of Progressive Ideologies in the U.S. Military.”
Described in a News from the States article published on dozens of news sites around the country as “winding,” the session addressed a broad range of topics. Among them were “recruitment, benefits for military families, Marxism, Alabama GOP Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s months-long blockade of military promotions, military desegregation through the decades, the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” and even a relitigation of the end of the Vietnam War.
The thrust of Seidule’s remarks was that the U.S. military has become more effective because of social change precipitated by Congress over several decades as gender barriers fell and legally protected classes expanded. “The military has been working on diversity for a long time because it works,” he said.
In addition to his appearance before the House committee available now on YouTube, Seidule also appeared on SiriusXM’s POTUS channel with Steve Scully’s “The Briefing with Steve Scully” on a segment titled “Why We're Still Arguing About the Civil War” in December. The two men discussed Seidule’s book, Nikki Haley's response on the Civil War, and Hamilton's Common Ground program.
The removal of the Confederate monument in Arlington Cemetery generated quite a bit of media coverage. Seidule was included in several articles on the topic including in The Washington Post. “It’s incredibly ironic the party of Lincoln is the one doing this,” he said as he was describing the GOP effort to stop the marker’s removal. “It is the cruelest monument in the country because it is so clearly proslavery.”
In Metropolis’ “The Past, Present, and Future of Public Outdoor Space,” Seidule said, “Commemoration isn’t about who you’re putting the monument up to. It’s about the people in power” in the November article. In the same month, he also spoke in Jackson, Mississippi, about his book at the “History is Lunch” program, under the auspices of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Switching to current events, Seidule also appeared on public TV WCNY’s “Ivory Tower” on Nov. 17 and discussed the problems in the Middle East, the fairness of non-compete clauses in the workplace, and college coaching salaries. On Jan. 12, 2024, he appeared again on "Ivory Tower" and contributed on the subjects of the upcoming primaries, immigrants, and the state of the state.
