Tag Archives: monuments

Top House Republican threatens to cut funding to states, cities that don’t protect statues

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Republican leader in the U.S. House of Representatives introduced legislation on Thursday that would cut federal aid to state and local governments if they do not protect statues, after protesters attacked monuments to people who owned slaves or fought for the Confederacy.

“It is wrong to erase our history,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy said in a statement, criticizing “left-wing mobs” who have attacked statues across the United States.

Under his bill, introduced with fellow Republican Representatives Jim Jordan and Sam Graves, some federal funds would be withheld if local governments do not “restore order or arrest rioters.”

During national – and international – protests against racial injustice sparked by the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May some demonstrators have taken down or vandalized statues of historical figures such as Robert E. Lee, who led Confederate troops against the United States, and Christopher Columbus.

Republican President Donald Trump, who is campaigning for re-election in November, has harshly criticized such protesters, and criticized U.S. lawmakers who want to remove monuments to those who owned slaves and fought against U.S. forces in the 1860’s Civil War.

Trump has threatened decades-long prison terms for those who deface monuments or statues.

McCarthy introduced his bill as Democrats pushed legislation to remove monuments to slave owners and those who supported slavery from the U.S. Capitol in Washington.

On Thursday, Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she expected the House would pass such legislation next week or the week after.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

Memphis removes Confederate statues as King anniversary nears

A statue of Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States, stands in Memphis Park, formerly named Confederate Park, in Memphis, Tennessee, U.S., August 19, 2017.

By Brendan O’Brien

(Reuters) – Authorities in Memphis, a city steeped in civil rights history, removed two statues of Confederate leaders on Wednesday hours after the downtown parkland where they stood was sold to a private group.

Several U.S. cities have in recent months dismantled monuments to Confederate leaders, which have become focal points for a fraught national debate over race and politics.

The removal of the statutes of President Jefferson Davis and Nathan Bedford Forrest comes three months before Memphis marks the 50th anniversary of the assassination there of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

Confederate General Forrest was a slave trader and a Ku Klux Klan leader.

Many Americans see such statues as symbols of racism and glorifications of the southern states’ defense of slavery in the Civil War, but others view them as important symbols of American history.

“The statues no longer represent who we are as a modern, diverse city with momentum,” Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland said in a statement.

Earlier in the evening, the city council in Memphis voted unanimously to sell the land where the statues stood to a nonprofit organization called the Memphis Greenspace for $2,000 in order for the monuments to be removed, the Commercial Appeal newspaper reported.

“This is a fix, and a scam, and if the state has one hair on its ass then people will be charged with felonies,” the Sons of Confederate Veterans said in a post on Facebook opposing the sale of the land.

(Reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; editing by John Stonestreet)