The Smithsonian Institution --- coined "the nation's attic" and charged with preserving our heritage --- published an article days before Thanksgiving, stating the Statue of Liberty was "originally intended to represent a female Egyptian peasant as a Colossus of Rhodes for the Industrial Age." While that description does fit an Egyptian statue that was never built, Lady Liberty was designed and built for an entirely different purpose --- to be an icon and beacon of freedom.
“To make the case for the refugees, the Smithsonian has come out and said, 'Well, you all know that the Statue of Liberty is a Muslim woman.' I'm not kidding. I'm not making this up," Glenn reported Tuesday during The Glenn Beck Program. "Now, is there any truth to that? I'll let you be the judge, okay, because this is the truth of the Statue of Liberty."
The copper statue, a female figure representing Libertas, the Roman goddess, was designed by French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi and built by Gustave Eiffel. She was a gift to the United States from the people of France, dedicated on October 28, 1886.
Bartholdi, who wanted to sculpt an Egyptian woman based on a Greek female, tried to sell the sketched concept to the Egyptians, but they had no interest.
Around this time --- about 1855 -- Bartholdi was listening to rhetoric about the founding of America and the concepts of liberty. So he sketched a female statue with a crown of light on her head, holding tablets --- the Ten Commandments --- symbolizing our law.
"So is the Statue of Liberty a Muslim woman?" asked Glenn. "No, she's not a Muslim woman. Did it start with an Egyptian woman? A different statue? Yes. That's not the same as saying the Statue of Liberty is a Muslim woman."
Glenn asserted that when a country's national museum walks in lockstep with an administration's policies --- in this case, immigration --- you've got a serious problem and threat to the history of a nation.
"Can you imagine any other president that would change our history, change our traditions and start having our museums start to say --- for his policies, 'You know what, she was a Muslim woman. You should feel pretty guilty about not taking [in refugees].' This is crazy."
Watch a segment from the program below:
Featured Image: The Statue of Liberty (R. Ian Lloyd/Masterfile/Corbis)