Confederate Symbols Removed From North Carolina In 2020

NORTH CAROLINA — More Confederate monuments were removed in 2020 across the United States than during the five previous years combined, the Southern Poverty Law Center said in its most recent “Whose Heritage?” report that tracks public displays related to the Confederacy.

Ninety-four of the 168 Confederate symbols removed or renamed nationwide in 2020 were monuments, the report found. Fifty-eight were removed from 2015 to 2019.

In North Carolina, 24 Confederate symbols were removed throughout 2020, according to the Law Center.

• In June 2020, six monuments for Confederate soldiers, two monuments to the Confederacy, two monuments for Henry Lawson Wyatt, one George Davis statue and a North Carolina Women of the Confederacy Monument were removed.
• In July 2020, four monuments for Confederate soldiers, one Confederate reunion marker, a monument to 60th Regiment North Carolina Volunteers, a Robert E. Lee Dixie Highway monument and a Vance County Confederate monument were removed.
• In August 2020, two monuments for Confederate soldiers were removed.
• In September 2020, one Confederate soldiers monument was removed.
• In October 2020, one Confederate soldiers monument was removed.

Lecia Brooks, chief of staff for the Law Center, called 2020 a “transformative” year in the movement to remove Confederate symbols nationally.

“Over the course of seven months, more symbols of hate were removed from public property than in the preceding four years combined,” Brooks said in a statement.

The Law Center began tracking the movement to take the monuments down in 2015, when a white supremacist entered a South Carolina church and killed nine Black parishioners.

Virginia by far saw the most Confederate symbols removed in 2020 with 71, the Law Center’s report found. The states with the next highest number are North Carolina with 24, and Alabama and Texas, both with 12.

Brooks praised Virginia, which changed its preservation law and, according to Brooks, “led by example” by removing so many Confederate symbols in 2020. Preservation laws in several other Southern states — including Alabama, Georgia and North Carolina — still exist and prohibit individual communities from removing certain displays.

The movement to remove these symbols from public spaces became part of the national reckoning on racial injustice following the killing last May of George Floyd, a Black man who died after a white Minneapolis police officer pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for several minutes.

All but one of the 168 symbols that were removed last year came after Floyd’s death. The symbol that was removed before May 30 was Virginia’s decision to replace Lee-Jackson Day with Election Day in April.

The Law Center considers public Confederate symbols as any government buildings, monuments and statues, plaques, markers, schools, parks, counties, cities, military property and streets or highways named after anyone associated with the Confederacy.

The organization said 2,100 Confederate symbols remain in the country into 2021. Monuments account for 704 of the symbols, the Law Center said.

“These dehumanizing symbols of pain and oppression continue to serve as backdrops to important government buildings, halls of justice, public parks and U.S. military properties,” she said.

The Associated Press contributed reporting.