Americans who regard the Statue of Liberty as a false idol that breaks their promises.

It's a cool and sunny autumn in new york. Like many others, Lily Defreo Black is eager to see the great statue donated by France to the United States as a symbol of friendship and a monument to freedom finally unveiled. President Grover Cleveland was standing on Bedlow Island (later renamed Liberty Island), ready to give a speech at the bottom of the statue. This statue was designed in France and shipped to new york in the spring of 1885. Now it was finally assembled on the base in June of 1886.

"Soon, the veil disappeared from her beautiful and calm face," Blake wrote at the event that day. "The air is full of artillery salute to the new goddess; The earth and the sea trembled because of the strong vibration, and the whistle of steam was mixed with people's screams. All this is done by men to commemorate a woman. "

Blake didn't watch it on the island, although only two women were invited to visit the statue that day. Blake and other members of the New York Women's Voting Association, the main women's voting organization in new york at that time, had rented their own boats. Not only were women excluded from the unveiling ceremony of the statue, but from the perspective of freedom itself,

Blake's * * event is one of several prominent events in the new Statue of Liberty Museum, which opened in Liberty Island earlier this month. Although the pedestal of the statue once supported a small museum, the additional square feet of the new space enabled historians and exhibition designers to expand the story of the Statue of Liberty, her supporters and opponents.

"In some people's retelling of the statue, in some ways, Nick, the exhibition designer of ESI Designs, who is responsible for preparing the new museum? Nick Hubbard said: "Whether it is a statue as a symbol of the United States, a statue as a symbol of new york, or a statue as a beacon for immigrants, it seems to have a unique concept. However, as explained by newspaper clippings, big pictures and images in space, this statue and its symbol are not universally loved. For many people, it is not so much a beacon of hope as a loud slap in the face.

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The French kept the statue for themselves as a gift, but it depends on the United States providing it with a base. After the New York State and the federal government refused to provide funds for the project, Joseph Pulitzer, a new york world publisher, announced that he would use his paper to raise $654.38 million+(equivalent to more than $2 million today) as the base. The suggestion is simple: mail the donation and print your name in the newspaper. There are many stories about children and elderly women giving allowances and change, and there are also some warm stories about Mongolians supporting this great project. These stories occupy the front page of Pulitzer newspapers and the imagination of the country, and to a great extent consolidate the Statue of Liberty, which was widely loved by Americans from the beginning, but

Cracks immediately appeared on the front. Blake and nearly 200 other women who took a boat to Bedlow Island issued a statement saying: "In a land where women do not enjoy political freedom, the Statue of Liberty of women was erected, and men showed pleasant inconsistency, which aroused the surprise and admiration of the opposite sex," they pointed out. President Cleveland didn't notice the women floating directly below him in his speech. Blake waved a placard that said "American women have no freedom". But feminists all over the country have noticed this, and their statues have become the symbol of everything they don't have and the direction of freedom. In the following decades, Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cuddy Stanton visited the statue. After 19 15, a measure to give new york women the right to vote failed in the ballot box, a group of female partisans used 19 16 Woodrow Wilso's visit to win thousands of votes for women! "The flyer of the biplane on the statue,"

"It's a picture of Puck, a humorous magazine published by 19 15. The unveiling of the statue made headlines in the weeks around the official date, and the Cleveland Bulletin, an African-American newspaper with a circulation of 5,000, was no exception. 1886165438+1October 27th, one month after the statue was opened to the public, their front page published an editorial entitled "Postpone the statue of bartholdi until there is color freedom." Ta Kung Pao said:

"Push bartholdi's statues, torches and everything into the sea", "until the" freedom "of this country enables a hardworking colored man in the south to live a decent life for himself and his family without being killed or murdered by Gukwangsi, his daughter and wife are angered and his property is destroyed. The idea of "freedom" in this country "enlightens the world", even in Patagonia, is absurd in extreme cases.

Hubbard said that it is very important to include an editorial in Ta Kung Pao in the exhibition, which conveys that the Statue of Liberty has raised and is still raising a series of questions about American values. He said: "We really must establish the concept that the statue is a promise, which represents and symbolizes the basic ideas of the United States and the basic ideas of the United States." . "It established this promise, but even from the beginning, someone said,' But wait, this promise may not be realized'"

The Statue of Liberty spent most of its time in new york Harbor as a symbol of American immigration, and this country has just begun to formally limit the number of immigrants every year. 1882, the federal government passed the first large-scale immigration law, the Chinese Exclusion Law, which clearly put forward the reasons for giving priority to immigrants based on race and restricting immigrants. Chinese-American writer Sang Songbo responded to Pulitzer's donation to the pedestal of the statue in his letter to The New York Sun:

* * * wrote: "I think calling on us to donate money to build the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty on this land is an insult to us in China." . "That statue represents freedom, holding a torch and illuminating all countries that have entered this country. But is it China people who allow E? As for China people here, can they enjoy freedom like people in other countries? Can they walk around without being insulted, abused, attacked, wronged or hurt by men of other nationalities?

"Freedom" is far from a fixed word, but a fixed meaning, which is the core of the experience of the Statue of Liberty Museum. Hubbard said: "When designers think of statues, people's understanding of freedom and its meaning becomes very complicated and controversial." . By incorporating these ideas into the exhibition, the Statue of Liberty can be displayed in space and still stand on new york Harbour more than 65,438+000 years after the torch was first lit, which symbolizes how far the country still has to go.