Lincoln statue depicting slave to be removed

Boston’s arts commission voted unanimously yesterday to remove a statue that depicts a freed slave kneeling at Abraham Lincoln’s feet.

The commission had fielded escalating complaints about the Emancipation Memorial, also known as the Emancipation Group and the Freedman’s Memorial, as a nation confronting racial injustice rethinks old imagery.

The statue has stood in a park just off Boston Common since 1879. It’s a copy of a monument erected in Washington, DC, three years earlier. The copy was installed in Boston because the city was home to the statue’s white creator, Thomas Ball.

Although the monument was created to celebrate the freeing of slaves in America, many objected to the image of a Black man kneeling before Lincoln.

“What I heard today is that it hurts to look at this piece, and in the Boston landscape, we should not have works that bring shame to any groups of people,” said Ekua Holmes, vice chairperson of the arts commission.

“After engaging in a public process, it’s clear that residents and visitors to Boston have been uncomfortable with this statue,” Boston Mayor Marty Walsh said in a statement.

More than 12,000 people had signed a petition demanding the statue’s removal. Officials did not immediately set a date to take it down, and said details would be worked out at their next meeting on July 14. —AP