
When Statues Fall
STATUES OF COLONIZERS ARE FALLING. The autumn of the patriarch has arrived. Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the French minister of state from 1661 to 1683 and chief architect, together with his son, of the Code Noir (the laws governing slavery in France’s imperial outposts), awakens covered in paint; Francis Scott Key, enslaver and author of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” is pulled to the ground; British human trafficker Edward Colston ends up at the bottom of the River Avon; Christopher Columbus is decapitated; Leopold II of Belgium and his noble steed are ignominiously defaced; King Louis XVI has his hand