“Hello, I’m Johnny Cash”: Statue of “Man in Black” unveiled at Capitol

Among the white marble statesmen and bronze war heroes who stand silent guard in the halls of the Capitol, one musician arrived Tuesday. He is Johnny Cash, the “Man in Black” who made his name singing about and for outlaws and the effects of love and cocaine on a man.

The bronze statue by Arkansas-based sculptor Kevin Kresse shows a young Cash looking thoughtfully at his feet as he strides forward, a guitar slung over his shoulder and his left hand on the strap, as if he had just stepped onstage — perhaps at San Quentin Prison — to approach the microphone, swing his six-string guitar and begin the show as he always did: “Hello, I’m Johnny Cash.”

He joins the National Statuary Hall collection in the Capitol, but this bronze man will not be He will follow the line that tour guides so often follow. Instead, he will remain in the Capitol Visitor Center, next to Philo T. Farnsworth, Utah’s “father of television.”

Arkansas will remain represented in the old House chamber by its other new statue, unveiled in May, of Daisy Bates, the civil rights activist and organizer of the Little Rock Nine. The pair replaced the two previous sculpted Arkansas delegates, Uriah Milton Rose and James Paul Clarke. Although Rose opposed secession, he remained loyal to Confederate Arkansas during the Civil War, and Clarke’s descendants have themselves denounced his virulently racist views.

The decision to replace both with Cash and Bates was made in 2019 when the Arkansas state legislature passed a bill, signed by then-Governor Asa Hutchinson.

According to House Speaker Mike Johnson, Cash is the first professional musician to be honored on Capitol Hill. He is also, presumably, the first man arrested at the U.S.-Mexico border on drug charges to receive the honor, a point Johnson did not mention in his speech.

Johnson noted, however, that more than 100 members of Cash’s family were in attendance at the packed ceremony, including, it turns out, himself.

“My team did a genealogy report,” Johnson said. “I’m Johnny Cash’s fifth cousin.”

Cash’s Grammy Award-winning daughter Rosanne delivered a speech on behalf of the family. “I’ve been very careful not to put words in his mouth since he passed away, but today I can safely say that he feels that of all the honors and distinctions he’s received in his life, this is the most important,” she said.

“He was an imperfect but deeply humble, kind and compassionate man with a beautiful generosity of spirit who loved those who were suffering because he knew great pain and great loss,” she said. “He was passionate about his work for prisoners’ rights, Native American rights, poor children and all those who were struggling and whose prospects were bleak.”

In his closing blessing, Cash’s nephew Mike Garrett emphasized his uncle’s Christian faith. “I’ve been given everything the world has to offer and I’ve only found one thing that fully and completely satisfies me,” the executive director of Christian Counseling Associates in Raleigh recalled Cash telling him. “That’s Jesus.”

Republican Rep. Steve Womack of Arkansas said he was a longtime fan, so much so that he memorized the lyrics to “A Boy Named Sue” as a child. Speaking to Kresse, Womack later said, “Kevin, I can actually see ‘the gravel in his belly and the spit in his eye,’” paraphrasing the song.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries praised Cash, citing John Adams, Bob Dylan and Snoop Dogg, who once called Cash a “true American gangster.”

Born to sharecropping in rural Arkansas during the Great Depression, Cash became one of the most prolific songwriters in American history, releasing more than 90 albums in his half-century-long career. He sang about outlaws and farmers, soldiers and auto workers, lovers and cheaters. He notably gave a series of prison concerts, some of which he recorded on albums, such as “At Folsom Prison.”

He himself was arrested several times, often on charges related to his drug addiction, but he managed to avoid a felony conviction. This arrest fueled his outlaw image and his songs about prison life. He served in the Air Force, but later became a pacifist who notably opposed the Vietnam War.

After young Cash’s remarks, the U.S. Air Force Band performed his father’s hit, “I Walk the Line.”