On Monday, New Orleans began the process of removing confederate monuments throughout the city starting with the 35-foot Liberty Place statue that was a symbol of a “failed” White supremacist uprising of 1874.
It is the first of four Confederacy statues which will be removed.
New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said of the statues’ removal, “We will no longer allow the Confederacy to literally be put on a pedestal in the heart of our city. Of the four that we will move, this statue is perhaps the most blatant affront to the values that make America and New Orleans strong today.”
Landrieu said the Liberty Place statue was meant to “honor the killing of police officers” by White supremacists.
Of course when there’s talk or action about removing anything confederate, there will be protests. A small group of people came together for a vigil at the Jefferson Davis statue to show their disdain for the monument’s removal.
Civil War re-enactor, Robert Bonner, said, “When you start removing the history of the city, you start losing money. You start losing where you came from and where you’ve been.”
The other three statues that will be removed at undisclosed times are of General Robert E. Lee, P.G.T. Beauregard and Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Upon removal, all will be placed in storage.
Things seem to be changing slowly but surely.
