Removal signals a new era The shadow cast in Richmond by the statue of Robert E. Lee will soon be lifted
The statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee occupies a place of prominence in Richmond, casting a long shadow on Virginia’s capital and serving as a constant, painful reminder of the commonwealth’s ugly past.
Soon, the statue will be gone and that shadow lifted, a symbolic act, but a clear indication that things are changing in Virginia. More will be done — more must be done — but this decision marks an important step for progress and inclusiveness that should be echoed in communities across the commonwealth.
Following days of unrest in Richmond — including a shocking assault by police firing tear gas on a seemingly peaceful crowd on Tuesday afternoon — Gov. Ralph Northam and Mayor Levar Stoney announced on Thursday that the Lee statue would be removed from its pedestal.
A pedestal is a place of honor, the governor said, something that inspires us to look up. But the statues of Confederate leaders that populate Virginia do not inspire us. Instead, they celebrate the darkest moments in this nation’s history — when states went to war over the issue of slavery.
Virginia was on the wrong side of that fight. Had the Confederacy prevailed, the brutal and murderous institution of slavery would have continued. The war extinguished hundreds of thousands of lives so the enslaved would be free.
It is important to remember that terrible toll, to preserve the memory of what happened and why. But we need not celebrate those who took up arms against the United States, nor force black Americans to walk each day under the gaze of those who would have condemned their ancestors to remain in bondage.
The statues are a point of heated debate. There are many people in Virginia, and here in Hampton Roads, who strongly believe that removing Confederate statues means erasing history or that it diminishes the sacrifices of those rank-and-file soldiers who answered the commonwealth’s call to defend their homes, not to preserve slavery.
Yet they give short shrift to those whose ancestors were brought to Virginia against their will and who were brought and sold on the whims of men. Deprived of their liberty and drained of their humanity, they lived in torturous conditions until they died on Virginia plantations or in Virginia fields.
In many cases, the Confederate monuments that occupy honored places in our communities were located with deliberate intent. In Norfolk, the Johnny Reb statue sits near the location of a former slave market, a fact that wasn’t lost on city residents when it was erected.
During the Jim Crow era, these were daily reminders to black residents of their place in society — under the watchful eye of Confederate overseers and under the thumb of a system that did not consider them deserving of equal treatment and equitable justice.
Removing these symbols of white supremacy will not repair an unequal and unjust system. But symbols are important. They hold weight. If they weren’t meaningful, there would be no outcry from those who oppose the removal of the Lee statue and others like it.
That is why the General Assembly this year passed a law that allows localities to remove, relocate or add historical context to Civil War memorials and monuments. The commonwealth shouldn’t stand in the way of communities choosing who they celebrate and honor in their public squares, and that legislation will free them to do so.
Norfolk officials announced this week that they would begin the process when the law takes effect on July 1 and would seek to remove the Confederate statue downtown. Richmond moved on the Lee statue because it is owned by the state, not the city, and could be done now. Other cities will follow.
Virginia may never erase the stain of being the capital of the insurrection, but building a more inclusive, forward-looking Virginia doesn’t mean papering over our complicated and difficult history. It requires us to take measure of where we’ve fallen short and work to be better, for all our residents.