Public hearings on Confederate monument removals set for Thursday

The Jindal administration’s vow came after New Orleans’ Historic District Landmarks Commission cleared the way for the City Council to take down prominent statues of Robert E. Lee, P.G.T. Beauregard and Jefferson Davis and a less public monument commemorating an attack launched by the White League against the Reconstruction-era government in the city.

Bobby Jindal might invoke a state “Heritage Act” to keep the four controversial public monuments in New Orleans in place may be a lost cause.

The City Council will now have to formally vote on an ordinance to remove the monuments.

“Governor Jindal opposes the tearing down of these historical statues and he has instructed his staff to look into the Heritage Act to determine the legal authority he has as Governor to stop it”, said Doug Cain, Jindal’s spokesman, in a written statement Thursday evening (Aug. 13).

The Human Relations Commission (HRC) Public Hearing starts at 6:00pm in the same place. But the governor is willing to explore a variety of legal avenues for keeping the Confederate monuments in tact, according to his staff.

Ashley Merlin, author of “Statuesque New Orleans”, a book of photographs of the city, said that the monuments offered an important lesson in history and art. “This discussion is about whether these monuments, built to reinforce the false valor of a war fought over slavery, ever really belonged in a city as great as New Orleans whose lifeblood flows from our diversity and inclusiveness”, said Mayor Landrieu.

But Judy Reese Morse, New Orleans deputy mayor for citywide initiatives, who spoke at one of Thursday’s hearings, criticized the ideology that had prompted the statues to be erected.

In July, Mayor Mitch Landrieu appeared before the New Orleans City Council to begin the “legal and public hearing processes” of relocating the monuments.

“These symbols say who we were in a particular time, but times change”.

Jindal has been consistent on the issue of Confederate symbols.

For others at the commissions’ meeting, statues are just the start.