Mikaela Lefrak
Virginia localities will now have the power to remove their Confederate monuments, under the provisions of a long-debated bill that Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam signed into law Saturday.
Previously, Virginia cities and counties were not allowed to remove, modify or add historical context markers to war memorials. That’s not the case in many other states — a number of Maryland localities, for example, have voted in recent years to relocate Confederate statues from prominent public spaces to private property.
Both chambers of Virginia’s Democratic-majority General Assembly passed legislation earlier this year to ease the restrictions on modifying war memorials. The final bill, from Sen. Mamie Locke (D-Hampton) and Del. Delores McQuinn (D-Richmond), allows local lawmakers to hold non-binding referendums on their monuments.
Northam also signed a number of other racial justice-focused bills on Saturday, including one that will establish a commission to recommend a replacement for Virginia’s Robert E. Lee statue in the U.S. Capitol. The Capitol’s state statue collection includes about a dozen Confederate leaders, mostly donated by Southern states.
Northam has paid particular attention to racial justice legislation in the wake of last year’s blackface scandal, which nearly resulted in his ouster from office.
Efforts to change the state’s rules around statues gained momentum following a riot in Charlottesville in 2017. A local campaign there to take down a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee catalyzed a white supremacist rally that resulted in the death of a counter-protester.
Richmond lawmakers have also been pushing for the right to remove Confederate statues along the city’s Monument Avenue. Alexandria’s city council unsuccessfully lobbied the General Assembly for special permission to remove a statue of a Confederate soldier from an intersection in Old Town.
Virginia has the second-most Confederate memorials of any state, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. (It has 110 to Georgia’s 114). Many of the statues were erected in the late 1800s and early 1900s during a time of heightened public interest in Civil War commemoration.
The statues legislation was among dozens of social justice-focused bills that became law in the Commonwealth on Saturday. Northam also signed a bill expanding non-discrimination protections for the LGBTQ community.
