{"id":2005612,"date":"2023-08-19T06:44:02","date_gmt":"2023-08-19T10:44:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/gop-lawmakers-across-us-seek-to-keep-confederate-monuments-standing\/"},"modified":"2023-08-19T06:48:45","modified_gmt":"2023-08-19T10:48:45","slug":"gop-lawmakers-across-us-seek-to-keep-confederate-monuments-standing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/gop-lawmakers-across-us-seek-to-keep-confederate-monuments-standing\/","title":{"rendered":"GOP lawmakers in various states aim to preserve Confederate monuments."},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fgop-lawmakers-across-us-seek-to-keep-confederate-monuments-standing%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2005612&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><h2>Republican Lawmakers Cement\u200d Confederate Statues \u2063in\u200b Their States<\/h2>\n<p>Republican lawmakers have spent the last decade working to \u2062pass laws that will\u2064 <strong>cement the existence \u200bof Confederate statues<\/strong> in their states \u2014 literally.<\/p>\n<p>Since the death\u200b of George Floyd \u200cin Minneapolis, \u200bover\u2064 200 Confederate memorials have \u2064been taken down, but GOP members have found ways \u200dto make statues of U.S. history permanent. The Southern Poverty Law Center determined that, as\u2063 of February 2022, there are 723\u2063 monuments, 741 roadways, and 201 schools honoring Confederates.<\/p>\n<h3>Hunter Biden Investigation: Comer Requests \u200dUnredacted Emails and Documents from National Archives<\/h3>\n<p>Liberal activists say the monuments misrepresent\u2062 history, while \u2064conservative\u2063 lawmakers argue\u2062 that the\u200d memorials are a part\u2064 of U.S. history and should be preserved.<\/p>\n<p>The vast majority of \u200dmemorials are located in former Confederate states, as well as Washington, D.C., and border states. Since 2013, over 100 monument protection bills \u200dhave been introduced across 21 states, according to a USA Today analysis.<\/p>\n<h3>Where have protection laws been established?<\/h3>\n<p>Six\u200b states, Alabama, Arkansas,\u200d Georgia, Mississippi, Ohio, and Tennessee, have enacted preservation laws to block the removal of Confederate memorials in the last 10\u2063 years.<\/p>\n<p>Most of\u2062 these \u2064preservation laws either propose harsh financial penalties \u200cor criminal charges against municipalities. Others create complicated approval systems \u2063that let the state leaders, not towns or cities, determine the fate of Confederate monuments.<\/p>\n<p>Data show that 74 of the 113 bills passed ban monument alteration entirely. Fifty of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/gop-lawmakers-across-us-seek-to-keep-confederate-monuments-standing\/\" title=\"GOP lawmakers in various states aim to preserve Confederate monuments.\">113 laws passed punish local governments<\/a> by withholding \u2064state funding \u2064or fining local officials, and 23 laws make monument removal \u200ba misdemeanor or a felony.<\/p>\n<p>Tennessee&#8217;s law, the Heritage Protection Act of 2013, serves as a model for other \u2064GOP\u200d states looking to create monument protection laws. It prohibits the removal of monuments on public property but grants\u200c the Tennessee Monuments and Memorials Commission, a nine-member\u200d board, \u2063with the power to make exceptions.<\/p>\n<p>A bill currently being considered in Nashville is looking to impose a \u2064fine of $10,000 a day on public officials who participate in the removal or renaming of a\u2062 monument or building.<\/p>\n<p>In Arkansas, GOP lawmakers blocked the city of Fort Smith from removing a life-size statue of a Confederate soldier by passing a law in 2021. The \u200dcity administrator \u200chad considered removing the monument in the years since Floyd&#8217;s death, and residents petitioned the city to take it down.<\/p>\n<p>In West Virginia, Republicans have introduced\u2064 over a dozen bills since 2016.\u2062 The state has nine Confederate memorials, compared to the \u2062over 100 \u200dstatues present in neighboring\u200c Virginia.<\/p>\n<p>Democratic groups and \u200dlegislatures standing way of GOP \u2064bills<\/p>\n<p>Several liberal groups decry Republicans&#8217; laws as an effort to remove power from\u2063 blue cities in red states.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt&#8217;s happening all across\u2062 the country in states with \u200ca Republican-controlled legislature,\u201d Abe Rubert-Schewel, who is representing the NAACP in a North Carolina monument case, said to USA Today. \u201cThey are passing laws to control what the urban centers, which are \u200bDemocratically controlled, can\u2063 do.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Only states with Republican-led legislatures have passed monument protection\u2063 laws, and it appears that trend\u200c will continue, despite GOP lawmakers in blue states hoping\u200d to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/tactical-nuclear-weapons\/\" title=\"Tactical Nuclear Weapons\">achieve similar outcomes<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this year, New York \u2064Republicans\u200b introduced the Veterans&#8217; Memorials Protection \u200bAct, which could protect monuments constructed to honor veterans of any U.S. conflict or war. However, \u200cthe \u200dDemocratic-controlled New York Assembly killed similar introductions of the act in 2013 and 2015, so it is likely the recent bill will die.<\/p>\n<p>A similar bill has repeatedly\u200d been introduced in Pennsylvania after Democratic lawmakers\u200c called for the removal of the statues in the wake \u2063of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/graham-the-politics-of-weaponized-car-attacks\/\" title=\"GRAHAM: The Politics Of Weaponized Car Attacks\">civil rights protests<\/a>. The most recent bill currently sits in the state Senate Judiciary Committee, where similar bills have died.<\/p>\n<p>Both sides work to \u200bcircumvent the law<\/p>\n<p>Some states, \u200dlike Louisiana, Georgia, and Virginia, \u2062specifically mention Confederate \u200dmonuments. Others \u2062use subtle wording like &#8220;the War Between States,&#8221; and some just prevent the\u200b removal of any &#8220;historically significant&#8221; memorials or monuments &#8220;more than 40 years old.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In Oklahoma, state House Republicans attempted to remove wording that limited protection to monuments after World War I.\u2064 The revised bill would also have \u2064protected memorials from the Civil War, 40 years before Oklahoma became \u200ca state. However, the bill did not pass.<\/p>\n<p>On the other side, some Democratic-controlled cities have worked to circumvent a ban \u2064on altering statues. Cities like Memphis, Tennessee, have sold monuments to nonprofit groups or added signs to add context to the statue&#8217;s historical significance.<\/p>\n<p>Other\u2064 blue cities have openly defied their Republican-led legislatures, with one mayor in North Carolina livestreaming the \u2062demolition of \u2063a Confederate memorial in August 2022.<\/p>\n<h3>What Confederate memorial removals\u2063 are being discussed?<\/h3>\n<p>In September, a panel recommended the \u2062Confederate\u2063 Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery be removed for being &#8220;problematic from\u200d top to bottom.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The cemetery announced on Tuesday that \u2064it is \u200bpreparing \u200cfor the removal of the \u200bmemorial following a\u2063 Congressional mandate. Beginning Aug. 4, the Army\u2063 filed\u2062 a notice of intent to initiate a 30-day scoping period and \u200dreceive comments about the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/anti-abortion-group-challenges-abortion-pill-with-clean-water-act\/\" title=\"Anti-abortion group uses Clean Water Act to challenge abortion pill.\">potential environmental effects<\/a> associated with the\u2062 mandate.<\/p>\n<p>Richmond, Virginia, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/pa-state-lawmaker-who-harassed-elderly-woman-teen-girls-praying-at-planned-parenthood-running-for-lt-gov\/\" title=\"PA State Lawmaker Who Harassed Elderly Woman, Teen Girls Praying At Planned Parenthood Running For Lt. Gov.\">made national headlines<\/a> after completing\u200b the removal of all public Confederate\u200d statues\u200c in December\u2063 2022. The removal \u2064of Confederate Gen. \u2064Robert \u2064E. Lee, one of the\u200d nation&#8217;s largest Confederate monuments, occurred during Democratic Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam&#8217;s tenure. It\u200d had faced several lawsuits from Richmond residents, but the \u200dremoval of the statue was upheld by the Virginia Supreme Court.<\/p>\n<p>CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER<\/p>\n<p>A public hearing will be held\u200d on Aug. 23 as requested by the Army. People will seek alternatives that could avoid, minimize, or mitigate any adverse effects from the \u2063memorial&#8217;s removal.<\/p>\n<p>On Monday, the North Carolina Court of Appeals rejected a lawsuit that challenged the town of Louisburg&#8217;s decision to move its Confederate monument from the center of Main Street to a nearby cemetery. The court ordered that the plaintiffs, who said the town violated state law, \u200bdid not have an \u2062ownership stake in the monument.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Republican lawmakers have strived for a decade to solidify Confederate statues in their states. Despite the removal of 200 Confederate memorials after George Floyd&#8217;s death, GOP members ensure permanence for U.S. historical statues, preserving Southern heritage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2005613,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[538],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2005612","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-washington-examiner"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2005612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2005612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2005612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2005613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2005612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2005612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2005612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}