 Legacy Park, a scenic collection of leaders and notable historic figures memorialized in bronze made its debut this week on the campus of Hampton University. A trip around the park introduces visitors to familiar and unexpected faces in the university's history, from former employees and famous graduates to civil rights icons in U.S. presidents. One of those U.S. presidents earned less than positive attention on social media and in some news coverage, a statue of George H.W. Bush. Students, alumni, and HBCU supporters took issue with a permanent monument to a politician who had more than a passing controversy concerning race in America. Bush and Dukakis on crime. Bush supports the death penalty for first-degree murderers. Dukakis not only opposes the death penalty, he allowed first-degree murderers to have weekend passes from prison. One was Willie Horton, who murdered a boy in a robbery stabbing him 19 times. Despite a life sentence, Horton received 10 weekend passes from prison. Horton fled, kidnapped a young couple, stabbing the man and repeatedly raping his girlfriend. Weekend prison passes. Dukakis on crime. Vice President Bush, many critics of your administration say that it is the most hostile to minorities in recent memory. Have you inadvertently perhaps encouraged that view by supporting tuition tax credits, the anti-busting amendment citing Bob Jones University, a case before the Supreme Court, the original opposition to the Voting Rights Act extension and so forth? We believe in trying something new to help these black teenage kids. The minimum wage differential. It says, look, to an employer, hire these guys. And yes, they're willing to work for slightly less than the minimum wage. We think of civil rights as something like crime in your neighborhoods. And for example, when crime figures are going in the right direction, that's good. That's a civil right. HBCU stakeholders are right to take issue with the bad side of Bush's views on race. But it's only fair to put them next to and in context with the good side of his policymaking benefiting HBCUs and African Americans. Last month's order also directed that the federal personnel office develop a program to improve recruitment at Alcorn and similar colleges for part time and summer positions to help people get started in the concept of federal public service. And I understand that a campaign is underway here now to raise a half a million dollars through a federal challenge grant program. Recently I signed an order bringing 60 million dollars in new funds to boost the endowment matching grants available to schools like Alcorn. As I told the college presidents who gathered at the White House last month, these new initiatives are just a start. More must be done. After all, we have no problem putting the nation's first black president, Barack Obama, in the full context of his time in office. He, like Bush, is also featured in the park and like Bush was a Hampton commencement speaker. But unlike Bush, Obama cost HBCUs millions in revenues and thousands of students. The potential lawsuit stems from new federal financial aid policies that hit hard at students at majority black institutions. The new policies make it more difficult for parents to get the so-called plus loans for their children's education. October of 2011, the government says we're no longer, for whatever reason, and that's the big issue here. October of 2011, they told us all we're going to change these rules or at least our interpretation or our enforcement, whatever language you want to use. But immediately last year, we saw 14,000 students who had many of whom who had received the parent plus loans in the past become immediately ineligible. And my understanding is also because, look, 90% of a lot of the budgets of HBCUs are based upon the financial aid of students. And so all of a sudden, on some of these campuses, when four or five hundred students didn't show up, I was told that in Morehouse they had to furlough employees because of a budget shortfall, other universities had to dip into their reserve funds to cover the gap as well. Worse yet, many of those schools just sent the kids home. They said we can't go to other places. We can't furlough enough people. We can't turn off enough lights. These are just expensive. We have to send these kids home and that was the travesty. That's what happened last year that got us all in an uproar about. The point is not to defend Bush or to attack Obama. Both are immortalized in Hampton's Legacy Park and both have connections to Hampton University and HBCUs, which for better or for worse, will forever be etched in our minds and in their biographies. HBCUs, like black people, have complex relationships with power and politics. And their stakeholders have the historic bandwidth to deal with both honestly and respectfully. HBCUs don't have history problems or statue problems. And honestly, we really shouldn't try to create them where they don't exist.