Adler Backs Out Of Veterans Day Parade Over Confederate Flag Use

AUSTIN, TX — Mayor Steve Adler has backed out of participating in the upcoming Veterans Day parade because some groups plan to carry a Confederate flag as part of the festivities.

Adler announced his decision to skip the parade on Thursday. The parade is scheduled to start at 9:30 a.m. this Saturday, Nov. 11. Adler will focus on another way of honoring veterans on that day by volunteering at the Central Texas Food Bank, an event he previously announced he'd be attending. The food bank serves a large contingent of local veterans residing in the Austin area.

In a prepared statement, Adler said military veterans should be the sole focus of a parade staged in their honor as his reason for cancelling his appearance: "Veterans Day should only be about honoring United States Military Veterans. Symbols of racism, Civil War secession, and white supremacy should not be forgotten or erased, but they need to be remembered and studied in museums and classrooms not cheered and applauded in parades," Adler said.

Adler acknowledged parade organizers made some allowances related to use of a Civil War-era flag, eschewing the battle banner in preference of the more familiar, official flag of the Confederacy. But the mayor said that step didn't go far enough in making his participation palatable.

"I understand the parade committee will allow the carrying of the official Confederate flag and not the battle flag that is the more widely seen symbol of racism," Adler said. "I appreciate that step in the right direction, but for me it does not go far enough."

It's the context of what those flags represent to which he's averse, he noted: "The articles of secession adopted by the Texas Legislature were based in significant part on support for slavery," the mayor explained. "We must remember, but not celebrate, the Confederacy which had as its 'corner-stone,' according to its Vice President [Alexander H.] Stephens '…that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery – subordination to the superior race – is his natural and normal condition.' The flag in the parade is a symbol of that moment. We should all know, but not celebrate, that flag."

The mayor's reference was to the vice president of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War.

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>>> Photo of Austin Mayor Steve Adler via City of Austin