Austin Leaders Take First Step In Renaming Robert E. Lee Road

AUSTIN, TX — City officials have begun the process of relabeling a street named in honor of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee following the graffiti defacement of the marker over the weekend and a petition garnering tens of thousands of signatures asking for the change.

The "Robert E. Lee" street is near Zilker Park. Vestiges of the Civil War — statues, monuments and even road signs — have come under greater scrutiny after the recent death of a protester decrying the presence of a statue honoring the general in Charlottesville, Va., mowed over by a white supremacist driving into the crowd.

Several members of the dais spoke out against Confederacy symbols during a city council session on Tuesday, with particular focus on the local street honoring the slave-owning general who fought to preserve sanctioned human bondage.

Related story: Petition Calls For Renaming Robert E. Lee Road In South Austin

“There is a very deliberate anti-historical effort that’s been underway since the end of the Civil War to actually erase history and to rewrite history not being about keeping people enslaved,” District 4 Austin City Council Member Greg Casar said.

District 5 City Council Member Ann Kitchen suggested the street name infers tacit approval of Lee's activities: "They say something about who we are and our values as a community," she said of Confederacy-related symbols. "That's not a history we want to keep alive."

In the immediate aftermath of the events in Virginia, local organizers started a petition to compel the city to change the name of the street. Thousands of signatures were garnered in the first 24 hours of its launch, and eventually more than 16,000 people signed the petition.

Like with any bureaucracy, the process to have a street name changed can be lengthy, and the council session ahead of the full council meeting on Thursday is but a first step. Various agencies have to weigh in on the proposal before a final approval by council.

>>> Photo of Gen. Robert E. Lee via the New York Public Library Digital Collections