City set to remove Lee monument that sparked clashes
RICHMOND, Va. — A Confederate monument that helped spark a violent white supremacist rally in Charlottesville will be taken down Saturday, the city announced.
Charlottesville said in a news release Friday that the equestrian statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee as well as a nearby one of Confederate Gen. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson will be removed. Designated public viewing areas for the removals will be established in both parks where the statues are located, the release said.
The development comes more than five years after a removal push focused on the Lee statue. As those plans evolved, the monument unveiled in 1924 — when Jim Crow laws were eroding the rights of Black citizens — became a rallying point for white supremacists and other racist groups, culminating in the violent “Unite the Right” rally in 2017.
Because of litigation and changes to a state law dealing with war memorials, the city had been unable to act until now.
A coalition of racial justice activists who have long been fighting for the removal of the
statues celebrated the news.
“As long as they remain standing in our downtown public spaces, they signal that our community tolerated white supremacy and the Lost Cause these generals fought for,” the coalition, Take ’Em Down
Cville, said in a statement.
Preparations around the parks began Friday and include the installation of protective fencing. The city said only the statuary will be removed for now; the stone bases will be left in place temporarily and removed later.
The Lee and Jackson statues are perched in places of relative prominence in Charlottesville, a small, picturesque city in the Blue Ridge mountains that’s home to the University of Virginia. Commissioned by a UVA graduate, the statues are just blocks apart from each other.
After a petition started by a Black high school student, Zyahna Bryant, advocacy from other local leaders and activists, and the work of a commission appointed to study the issue, the Charlottesville City Council voted in February 2017 to take the Lee statue down.
A lawsuit was quickly filed, putting the city’s plans on hold, and white supremacists seized on the issue.
First, white supremacists rallied by torchlight in May 2017, then a small group of Klansmen gathered in July, far outnumbered by peaceful protesters.
The issue reached a crescendo in August, when white supremacist and neoNazi organizers of the “Unite the Right” rally gathered in the city to defend the statue of Lee and seize on the issue for publicity. They brawled in the streets with antiracist counterprotesters as police largely stood by and watched, scenes of intense violence that shocked the nation. A short time later, an avowed white supremacist intentionally plowed his car into a crowd of people, killing Heather Heyer and injuring others.
Both statues will be stored in a secure location on city property until the City Council makes a final decision on their fate, the news release said.