New Orleans to remove four major Confederate monuments

According to Daily Mail, Democrat City Council President Jason Williams suggested the removal of the statues would represent “severing an “umbilical cord” which ties New Orleans to old Democrat policies like slavery and Jim Crow.

Those monuments include the Robert E. Lee statue at Lee Circle, the Jefferson Davis statue on Jefferson Davis Parkway, the P.G.T Beauregard equestrian statue on Esplanade Avenue at the entrance to City Park and the Battle of Liberty Place Monument at Iberville Street. Opponents of removing the monuments included Gov. Bobby Jindal.

The council voted 6-1 in favor of removing the monuments.

Hours after Mayor Mitch Landrieu signed a controversial ordinance to declare four Confederate monument public nuisances, a group of preservationists filed a federal lawsuit looking to stop their removals before they can begin.

The mayor says it will cost about $170,000 to remove the monuments, including statues of Confederate Gens. An obelisk marking the Battle of Liberty Place in the city will also come down. “The plan … is rife with the possibility of influence pedaling (if not worse) because it precludes and possibility the public will know whether the individual who made the donation receives anything of value from the city”.

Divergent views on what should happen to Confederate monuments in New Orleans are being voiced at a lively, and sometimes disorderly, city council meeting.

“As we approach the Tricentennial, New Orleanians have the power and the right to correct historical wrongs and move the City forward”, he added.

Landrieu proposed that the monuments be placed in a museum or a Civil War park.

Lee monument in New Orleans in 2008.

“Prior to 1861, Robert E. Lee, P.G.T. Beauregard and Jefferson Davis were members of the Armed Forces of the United States”.

Councilwoman Stacy Head, the only vote against the measure, said she thought it would do nothing to break down the city’s social and economic barriers.

Four organizations whose goals are to protect and preserve New Orleans’ historic landscape have filed a federal lawsuit to halt efforts to remove four prominent Confederate monuments.

Landrieu said he picked these four monuments because “these are the ones that matter most to the city now”. Anglim told those gathered Thursday to “do the right thing”.

Others have arguedthat taking down the monuments won’t change city problems like poverty, violence, and racism. After months of evaluation, all but one council member concluded that they do.