Decision delayed on relocating N.C. monuments

RALEIGH, N.C. — Seeking more input, a state panel in North Carolina on Friday delayed a decision on whether three Confederate monuments from the grounds of the old Capitol should be moved to a Civil War battlefield in an adjoining county.

The North Carolina Historical Commission voted overwhelmingly to create its own group to study the relocation request from Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper and the state law that allows such monuments to be moved to places of similar honor, prominence and visibility. The commission will review the group’s report at its meeting next April.

Cooper asked the panel two weeks ago to approve relocating the monuments to the Bentonville Battlefield.

But the commission opted to postpone any decision until next spring and in the meantime form a subcommittee to examine the two sites and take comments about the 2015 state law. Membership will include the head of the state’s black heritage panel.

The commission of professors, historic preservation advocates and other citizens appointed by Cooper and Republican predecessor Pat McCrory made clear they weren’t trying to shirk their responsibilities.

“It’s a precedent-setting decision,” interim Chairwoman Mary Lynn Bryan said. “We’re really not used to as a body having issues that are this deep and this problematic coming before us in such a short period of time.”

Cooper says Confederate memorials on public property glorify a war about slavery. The calls for moving the monuments from the square where the state’s 1840 Capitol sits came in the weeks following a violent white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, and the subsequent toppling of a local monument in Durham.

After the vote, Cooper spokesman Ford Porter said the governor appreciates the commission’s work on the issue and still believes “that museums and historic sites are more appropriate places for these monuments.”