Does Conn. really need more statues?

The passage of time can carve deeper significance for statues, but maybe their time has passed.

In recent years, a debate continues to flicker over plans to remove a statue of 17th century army Capt. John Mason from the exterior of the State Capitol building in Hartford. The 8-foot, 3,000pound salute to Mason overlooks Bushnell Park from its perch on the Capitol’s third story.

There’s no question that Mason is an important part of Connecticut’s complicated history. He led the Mystic Massacre in 1637, which resulted in 600 Pequot Native Americans being killed and countless others being enslaved in the Mystic section of Groton.

Few Capitol buildings rival Connecticut for the manner in which it is cloaked in history. Other marble figures wrapped around the iconic golddomed 1878 building include not only early settlers but the more recent addition of the late Gov. Ella T. Grasso, who was the first woman elected to a governor’s seat in the nation.

Mason’s presence was a discussion point well before the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020 that led to the removal of divisive statues from public spaces across the nation, many honoring Confederate soldiers.

His statue has stubbornly clung to the building in recent years, despite repeated efforts to have it moved. Money was budgeted, Republicans opposed a rising price tag and there it remains.

A new bill aims to commission more statues that would aspire to celebrate the diversity of Connecticut and dovetail with a $54 million renovation of the landmark building.

It includes a worthy concept of creating a new State Historical Commission that would draw experts from the deep bench of Connecticut’s colleges. They would, in theory, study the state’s commemorations and statuary and offer suggestions to the State Capitol Preservation and Restoration Commission that is overseeing the building’s makeover.

The bill is making progress, but has already drawn some political blowback, with Republican state Sen. Rob Sampson of Wolcott voicing a concern that it could result in a system of reverse discrimination.

State Rep. Matt Blumenthal, D-Stamford, who co-chairs the commission, defended the proposal be saying it would create “a process for identifying and commissioning additional statues. It’s a basic value, in addition to memorializing exemplary and meritorious people, that we should also reflect the diversity of our state in those memorializations.”

We’re not against statues either. Imagine a world without the Great Sphinx, the Venus de Milo, Rodin’s The Thinker, or, for that matter, the Statue of Liberty.

But the time has come for Connecticut to explore other forms of artistic expression. Let the committee challenge its own ambitions beyond identifying individuals. Remind visitors of why we are the Constitution State, of the wide reach of our diversity, of how we’ve evolved over centuries and yes, of the messy history that got us here.

Perhaps statues will be part of that artistic vision. But nothing should be carved in stone.