Tribute to ‘lost cause’ removed in New Orleans

Masked workers dismantle confederate obelisk; first of four

On the same day that some Southern states were honoring their rebel heritage, masked workers in New Orleans dismantled a monument to that past — chunk by chunk, under darkness and the protection of police snipers.

“We will no longer allow the Confederacy to literally be put on a pedestal,” Mayor Mitch Landrieu said after a 19th-century obelisk honoring what the mayor called “white supremacists” was taken down early Monday.

The Battle of Liberty Place monument, which honors members of the Crescent City White League who died trying to overthrow the New Orleans government after the Civil War, was the first of four statues linked to the Confederacy that are set to be torn down in New Orleans.

Landrieu said that “intimidation and threats by people who don’t want the statues down” prompted him to order the monument removed before sunrise, without prior announcement, on the same day that some other states celebrate Confederate Memorial Day.

After a small group of protesters dispersed about 1:30 a.m., police officers barricaded surrounding streets, and snipers took position on a rooftop above the statue, according to the TimesPicayune. By 3 a.m., workers were drilling into the obelisk’s pale stonework, and by dawn the Liberty Place monument had been trucked away in pieces.

Contractors wore face masks, helmets and what one reporter described at a news conference the next morning as “militarylike bulletproof vests.” Landrieu said the workers were disguised for their protection.

There was no sign of threats the next morning, although a New Orleans group called the Monumental Task Committee condemned the operation.

GERALD HERBERT/ASSSOCIATED PRESS Workers dismantle the Liberty Place monument Monday, which commemorates whites who tried to topple a biracial post-Civil War government, in New Orleans. It was removed overnight in an attempt to avoid disruption from supporters.