Charlottesville's Second Confederate Statue To Be Removed

CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA — Charlottesville City Council has voted to remove the second Confederate statue displayed in a park.

The Daily Progress in Charlottesville reports that the city council vote to remove the Confederate Gen. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson statue was unanimous Tuesday night.

The council had originally planned to keep the Jackson statue up even though it voted to remove the Gen. Robert E. Lee Statue from a public park. But after an Aug. 12 rally turned deadly when white nationalists clashed with counter-protesters, the council reconsidered.

Mayor Mike Signer, who had voted against the Lee statue removal, was one who changed his mind. "Clearly, they become magnets for people who are evil, and who want to turn us against ourselves and destroy a certain part of America and make it into something that no one in their right mind would want it to be," Signer said, according to The Daily Progress. (Subscribe to a Virginia Patch News Alert and Newsletter. Or, if you have an iPhone, download the free Patch app.)

White nationalist groups held several rallies after the council's decision to remove the statue in February and sell it in April. The Ku Klux Klan rallied in July and other groups of white nationalists gathered in May, but neither event turned as violent as the Aug. 12 rally. Three were killed in events related to the violence. Charlottesville resident Heather Heyer died after being run over by a driver believed to have Nazi sympathies, and dozens of others were injured. Hours later, two Virginia state troopers, Lt. H. Jay Cullen and Trooper-Pilot Berke M.M. Bates, were killed in a helicopter accident while monitoring the violent clashes.

The city still faces a hurdle in removing the statues. A judge issued a six-month injunction in May after the council voted to remove the Lee statue. The city has already covered the Lee and Jackson statues in black shrouds to mourn the victims.

Tuesday's measure to remove the Jackson statue was introduced by Vice Mayor Wes Bellamy, who has been the target of criticism of a white nationalist leader. In late 2016, white nationalist Jason Kessler called for Bellamy, an African-American, to be removed from his job over tweets some believe were anti-white. In a statement to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Bellamy apologized for the tweets, which were sent between 2009 and 2014. Kessler was the organizer of the Aug. 12 "Unite the Right" rally.

Following the Charlottesville violence, officials and protesters took immediate steps to remove Confederate statues, from an overnight removal in Baltimore to a toppled statue in Durham, North Carolina. Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe has called upon localities and the General Assembly to remove Confederate statues and has temporarily banned rallies at Richmond's Lee Monument until officials issue new regulations on rally permits.

Do you agree with removing the "Stonewall" Jackson statue? Let us know in the comments.

Photo of covered Confederate statue by Steve Helber/Associated Press