The Virginia Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that the city of Charlottesville can legally remove statues of Confederate Civil War generals, overturning a lower court ruling.
Statues of Robert E. Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, erected in 1924 and 1921, respectively, have been the topic of controversy in the city for several years, as the public has become less tolerant of racist symbols and monuments. Charlottesville city leaders were sued by a group of citizens after voting to remove the statues in the wake of a white nationalist rally in 2017.
A state circuit court sided with those citizens in 2019 on the grounds that removing the statues would violate a state law on the “disturbance of or interference with” war memorials. The city appealed that ruling, however, and on Thursday the State Supreme Court ruled in favor of Charlottesville officials.
The statues, the court explained, were put up before the law on war monuments was established. “It has long been the law of the Commonwealth that retroactive application of statutes is disfavored and that ‘statutes are to be construed to operate prospectively only unless a contrary intention is manifest and plain,'” the court said in its ruling.
The law cited by city residents in favor of keeping the statues “did not provide the authority for the City to erect the Statues, and it does not prohibit the City from disturbing or interfering with them,” the court added.
A national reckoning with Confederate memorials took place following the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally, when white nationalists and neo-Nazis descended upon the city in defense of the monuments for generals who fought to defend slavery. The rally turned violent after far right participants attacked counterprotesters, causing significant injury and harm, including the murder of anti-racist activist Heather Heyer.
Former President Donald Trump was heavily criticized in the days after the rally for expressing unabashed sympathy for the neo-Nazi and white nationalist protesters. Trump defended the positions of the far right, claiming that removing Lee’s and Jackson’s statue was “changing history” and “changing culture.”
Many historians have argued against such sentiments and have demonstrated that these monuments serve to perpetuate a mythologized and distorted account of slavery and the civil war pushed by Confederate apologists.
History relies upon factual documents and other pieces of evidence. “None of this requires statues,” said William Cavert, an associate professor of history at the University of St. Thomas, in an op-ed last summer. “Indeed, the process of removing monuments and renaming streets, squares and even cities themselves has always resulted from remembering the past.”
Angry, shocked, overwhelmed? Take action: Support independent media.
We’ve borne witness to a chaotic first few months in Trump’s presidency.
Over the last months, each executive order has delivered shock and bewilderment — a core part of a strategy to make the right-wing turn feel inevitable and overwhelming. But, as organizer Sandra Avalos implored us to remember in Truthout last November, “Together, we are more powerful than Trump.”
Indeed, the Trump administration is pushing through executive orders, but — as we’ve reported at Truthout — many are in legal limbo and face court challenges from unions and civil rights groups. Efforts to quash anti-racist teaching and DEI programs are stalled by education faculty, staff, and students refusing to comply. And communities across the country are coming together to raise the alarm on ICE raids, inform neighbors of their civil rights, and protect each other in moving shows of solidarity.
It will be a long fight ahead. And as nonprofit movement media, Truthout plans to be there documenting and uplifting resistance.
As we undertake this life-sustaining work, we appeal for your support. We have 10 days left in our fundraiser: Please, if you find value in what we do, join our community of sustainers by making a monthly or one-time gift.