Robert E. Lee loses in Virginia

The city of Charlottesville won approval Thursday from Virginia’s highest court to take down two Confederate statues, including one of Gen. Robert E. Lee that was at the center of the 2017 white nationalist rally.

A state Supreme Court judge overturned a lower court ruling in favor of a group of residents who sued to keep the monuments to Lee and fellow Gen. Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson.

The Charlottesville City Council had voted to remove both, but several residents argued in March 2017 that state law barred officials from taking down war memorials or monuments.

On Thursday, state Supreme Court Justice Bernard Goodwyn said the law’s provisions did not apply to statues built before its passage.

“In other words, [the law] did not provide the authority for the city to erect the statues, and it does not prohibit the city from disturbing or interfering with them,” Goodwyn wrote Thursday.

It was unclear if the city would move immediately to take down the century-old statues.

The Lee monument was thrust into the national spotlight when white supremacists and neo-Nazis descended on Charlottesville for a “Unite the Right” rally in August 2017 to defend the statue, which was erected in 1924.

Avowed white supremacist James Fields Jr. plowed his car into a crowd of counter-protesters, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer. He was found guilty of first-degree murder in December 2018 and sentenced to life in prison plus 419 years.

Former President Donald Trump stirred racial tensions by claiming there were “very fine people on both sides” of the Charlottesville clash, a remark that white nationalists and other far right-wing groups celebrated as a sign of his support for their violent movement.

The push to remove, replace or alter statues honoring Confederate leaders has become a major flashpoint in the nationwide debate on racism in recent years.

Many liberal-leaning cities and states have moved to remove the statues and other offensive monuments to leaders with repugnant views.

But many white conservatives have defended the statues as tributes to Southern heritage.

Virginia’s capital city of Richmond, also the former capital of the Confederacy, has removed several statues of Confederate leaders.