,

With a recent stroke of his pen, Gov. Ralph Northam put Virginia at the forefront of efforts across the South to remove symbols of white supremacy from public spaces.

The law signed by Northam last month overturned the state’s prohibition on the removal of Confederate memorials, allowing local governments in Virginia to decide for themselves whether to remove these symbols of oppression.

It was a major step forward for the commonwealth, which has more Confederate memorials than any state except Georgia.

And it came just two months before the fifth anniversary of the horrific event that ignited a nationwide movement to remove Confederate symbols from public spaces. It was on June 17, 2015, when white supremacist Dylann Roof – who had posted pictures of himself with a Confederate flag – walked into the historic “Mother Emanuel” AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, and shot nine Black church members during a prayer meeting.

The terror attack – and Roof’s embrace of the flag – inspired then-South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley to call for the flag’s removal from the state Capitol grounds, a move approved by state lawmakers. Then, Alabama’s governor, Robert Bentley, summarily ordered the removal of several versions of the Confederate flag that flew alongside a towering monument just steps from the Capitol.

Since then, a total of 138 Confederate symbols, including 58 monuments, have been removed from public places across the country, according to the latest count by the Southern Poverty Law Center. In a 2019 update of its Whose Heritage? report, the SPLC cataloged nearly 1,800 monuments and other Confederate symbols across the country.

In 2019, eight Confederate symbols across the country – including four monuments – were removed from public places, and five more are now in the process of removal. In addition, five memorials bearing the names of Confederate figures were renamed last year. 

Most Southern states, however, still celebrate the so-called “Lost Cause” by designating a special month and/or day in honor of Confederate “heroes.” Alabama, Florida, Georgia and Mississippi each had their own Confederate Memorial Day in April. North Carolina and South Carolina celebrate their version in May. Louisiana, Kentucky and Tennessee reserve a day in June.

But pretending that these state holidays are about preserving Southern history is an insult to the residents of these states.

Read more here.

The Editors