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The board of trustees of the Institutions of Higher Learning, during its Thursday meeting, is expected to consider and approve a plan to relocate the Confederate monument at the University of Mississippi. Several sources close to IHL board members told Mississippi Today on Monday that the 12-member board, amid statewide and national protests about racial inequities in government and Confederate iconography, will vote to approve the university’s plan to move the monument at its Thursday morning board meeting. The meeting will be held virtually, and a meeting agenda will be released on Wednesday. Several representative bodies comprised of University of...

All across the country, monuments to the Confederacy, which lost a traitorous war waged for their right to own slaves, are being beheaded, toppled, and thrown into the river. The Southern Poverty Law Center has a map of where these monuments are located, if you were interested in such a thing.

A number of opposing petitions have been posted online to counter one posted Monday by a Lee University student that advocated for the removal of a Confederate statue that has stood at a downtown Cleveland intersection since the Jim Crow era. Differences in opinion regarding the statue have resulted in sharp, often bitter debate on the Cleveland Daily Banner’s Facebook page, highlighting the complicated history residents of Cleveland and other Southern cities share as they examine their pasts. SNIP The first Cleveland anti-statue petition, posted by Lee student Kelsey Elaine, listed several grievances against the monument, which was erected in...

The imagery couldn’t be more direct. Across the nation, rioting and unrest that has killed black Americans and destroyed black neighborhoods has included the defacement of historic monuments, including those to abolitionists.The last wave of monument destruction, in 2017, largely focused on Confederates and slave holders, erasing all the accomplishments of figures such as George Washington and Thomas Jefferson with a scarlet S, for slave-holder. This time, the ignorance has descended even further.The rioters are now tearing down and defacing memorials wantonly, apparently assuming that if someone is being celebrated that person is “probably a racist,” as the image...

In last week's memorial service for George Floyd, the Rev. Al Sharpton noted that the recent demonstrations against abusive policing were caused not just by Floyd's death after a white officer kneeled on his throat. Instead, it was the last straw after centuries of oppression. Mr. Sharpton noted, "Because ever since 401 years ago, the reason we could never be who we wanted and dreamed of being is you kept your knee on our neck." One weapon to suppress African Americans: monuments to white supremacists. Soon after the Civil War, Southern whites began reasserting their dominance. During the following 80...

Confederate monuments have been toppled in Southern states including Alabama, South Carolina, and Virginia during the historic George Floyd protests sweeping the country. On Tuesday morning the bronze statue of Confederate soldier 'Appomattox' was taken down in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia by its owners who feared it would be vandalized in demonstrations. The statue, erected in 1889 to honor Confederate soldiers, has been a point of controversy for years but remained standing despite repeated demands for removal, until this week. Alexandria Mayor Justin Wilson tweeted photos of the statue removal saying: 'Alexandria, like all great cities, is constantly changing and...

A new reserve group, inspired by the Monuments Men of the World War II era, will aim to protect antiquities and important cultural sites in war zones. It’s no secret that the war-ravaged nations where American soldiers have been enmeshed in conflict for nearly two decades are home to many of civilization’s oldest and most prized antiquities and cultural treasures. But in the heat of battle in Afghanistan or Iraq, how are troops to know whether they are taking their positions behind mounds of insignificant rubble or inside the precious remains of a 3,000-year-old temple complex? The Pentagon’s answer, announced...

After literally scrubbing references to the "Lord" from a memorial honoring fallen police officers, a "divided" South Carolina city has removed the monument outright. The City of Tega Cay City Council announced the decision to take down the memorial Tuesday in a Facebook post. Three references of "Lord" had been washed off the monument, which is a police officer's prayer and was in front of the police department, after some residents complained. But the decision to remove the three references to "Lord" also drew outrage. City officials said they removed the monument while they sought to find a solution that...

The monument depicting Calvin, Farel, Bèze and Knox appeared covered in paint with the rainbow colours. The city files a complaint.Toursits walking through the Parc des Bastions in Geneva (Switzerland) discovered on July 15 that the Reformation Wall had been vandalised. The monument is one of the main touristic attractions of the city in which Jean Calvin, one of the key French Protestant Reformers, developed his work after 1536. The wall, inaugurated in 1909, also honours the influence of Guillaume Farel, Théodore de Bèze and John Knox. The paint was thrown on the monument forming a rainbow, a symbol of...

History should be taught and scrutinized, but should never be sanitized, at least not in a country that aspires to learn from its imperfect past. July 2, 2019 “To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child.” — Marcus Tullius Cicero In 1962, President John F. Kennedy welcomed a group of Nobel Laureates to a dinner in their honor at the White House. To provide the requisite historical context and to underscore the accomplishments of those in attendance, he observed that “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human...

In a ruling that is sure to make Left-wing haters’ heads explode — again — a local judge in Charlottesville, N.C., has ruled that Confederate monuments there are protected by state law and thus cannot be removed. According to local CBS affiliate WCAV, the ruling by Circuit Judge Richard Moore flies in the face of a trend by city councils, schools, and other political subdivisions in removing Confederate historical symbols and markers under pressure from Leftists who claim they are monuments to slavery and ‘white supremacy.’

Editor's note: This column was authored by Ross Marchand.To say the least, America has a complicated relationship with its past. Hundreds of Confederate monuments dot town squares, mountains, and prominently-placed paintings, and recent tussles show we still have no idea how to deal with them. Dallas’s Confederate War Memorial (near City Hall) was recently deemed by the City Council as “non-contributing to the historic overlay district” in which it resides, and will probably be removed soon—at a cost of half-a-million dollars. Soon, one of Winston-Salem’s most prominent Confederate statues will also come down, amidst “public safety” concerns cited by Mayor...

From simple rock arches to Stonehenge, tens of thousands of imposing stone structures dot Europe’s landscapes. The origins of these megaliths have long been controversial. A new study suggests that large rock constructions first appeared in France and spread across Europe in three waves. The earliest megaliths were built in what’s now northwestern France as early as around 6,800 years ago, says archaeologist Bettina Schulz Paulsson of the University of Gothenburg in Sweden. Knowledge of these stone constructions then spread by sea to societies along Europe’s Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts, she contends in a study posted online the week of...

According to a report by the Moscow Times, pranksters in Bulgaria are repainting Soviet-era monuments so that Soviet military heroes look like American Superheroes. Needless to say, the Russians are not too happy about it: Russia is demanding that Bulgaria try harder to prevent vandalism of Soviet monuments, after yet another monument to Soviet troops in Sofia was spray-painted, ITAR-Tass reported. The Russian Embassy in Bulgaria has issued a note demanding that its former Soviet-era ally clean up the monument in Sofia's Lozenets district, identify and punish those responsible, and take "exhaustive measures" to prevent similar attacks in the future,...

Trafalgar Square and it’s monument in the heart of London is dedicated to the British naval victory over Napoleons combined French and Spanish fleet at Cape Trafalgar in October 1805. The British fleet was under the command of Lord Admiral Horatio Nelson, a statue of which sits atop of a 169’ granite and bronze column. Such a tall monument for such a small man in stature; 5’4”, 130 lbs , missing one arm and an eye from battle wounds. He also suffered from gout, chronic headaches, was often sea sick and had a ferocious temper. However, he was a tactical...

The North Carolina Historical Commission voted Wednesday to keep three Confederate monuments on the grounds of the state Capitol building amid controversy about the statues’ future in the state. The commission voted 10-1 not to remove the statues, but to add context about slavery and civil rights, according to the Associated Press. The commission also called for a monument to be built honoring African-Americans’ contributions to North Carolina. The state commission’s vote came in response to Gov. Roy Cooper (D), who called for the three monuments to be removed from the Capitol grounds and preserved at a Civil War battlefield....

The city councilors who voted for the removal of Charlottesville's two Confederate monuments may be liable for damages and legal fees if the court ultimately rules in favor of the plaintiffs in the case, according to a written opinion signed Thursday by Charlottesville Circuit Judge Richard E. Moore. In a news release, The Monument Fund, a group involved in the lawsuit against the city, announced that the court had sent the parties a letter explaining its opinion on whether the councilors are entitled to immunity. “There may still be some questions, even if defendants are not immune, as to what...

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) — It took generations to erect all the nation's Confederate monuments, and a new report shows they're being removed at a pace of about three each month. The study — released Monday by the Southern Poverty Law Center — shows that 110 Confederate monuments have been removed nationwide since 2015, when a shooting at a black church in South Carolina energized a movement against such memorials. The number — which includes schools and roads that have been renamed in California, a repurposed Confederate holiday in Georgia, plus rebel flags and monuments that have been taken down in...

Reining in federal land ownership--a drop in the bucket When the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument was designated under President Clinton’s purview in 1996, it created real hardship for regional ranchers. New management rules locked up more than one and a half million acres, discontinuing grazing leases that were imperative to sustain cattle growers who’d been using the land responsibly for more than a century. Part of the impetus for closing off natural resource development at the time was to halt access to one of the best sources of low sulfur coal, including from tribal populations, putting a stranglehold on arid...

Former Navy SEAL and current Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke delivers brief remarks at the Capitol Building in Utah. Prior to President Trump signing a national monument proclamation, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke told a packed-house crowd the Antiquities Act, an obscure law that Barack Obama used to broaden federal monuments in Utah, ‘was never meant to prevent. It was meant to protect.’ “Our public land is for the public to use,” Zinke said.