Lawsuit aims to remove Confederate monuments at N.C. courthouses, with Gaston’s first
A new lawsuit calls for the removal of the Confederate memorial standing over the Gaston County Courthouse.
But it’s coming for all of them.
As of now, some 40 monuments to the old Confederacy stand at or near county courthouses in North Carolina. More than 150 Confederate symbols are displayed on public property across the state, a number that, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, trails only Georgia and Virginia.
Durham attorney Hampton Dellinger, who is helping represent a group of plaintiffs that include three Gaston County residents and the county chapter of the NAACP, says all of the monuments violate the N.C. Constitution.
Yet, the former North Carolina assistant attorney general said the ones “guarding” courthouses — particularly the “Confederate Heroes” statute in Gaston County facing onto, ironically, Martin Luther King Way — should be particularly galling to the state’s residents.
“Every day, citizens, judges, jurors, attorneys, have to go past symbols of white supremacy to enter a courthouse that promises to be impartial and colorblind,” Dellinger told The Observer on Thursday.
“You know, District Court is the people’s court, but these are not monuments to the people. These were monuments established in white supremacy, and it’s time for them to go.”
Dellinger, who is part of a legal team that includes Cheryl Comer of Gastonia and Cheyenne Chambers of Charlotte, said in an earlier statement Thursday that the lawsuit was filed because local leaders in too many places refused to act.
“The goal of this suit is to unite the dozens of cities and towns across North Carolina where Confederate monuments still stand at courthouse entrances. They are divisive and costly symbols causing real pain and real problems,” Dellinger’s statement said.
“Elected officials have had more than enough time to end these controversies. Today, we are asking the courts to do so.”
In Gaston County, commissioners — all of them white — originally voted to move the monument. But they reversed course in August when the Sons of Confederate Veterans refused to take ownership of the 35-foot statue topped by a armed soldier, which is more than a century old.
Commissioner Chad Brown, a Stanley Republican, told the Observer in a phone interview Thursday that he had not read the complaint.
However, he defended the county’s monument as a tool to teach history and the progress of race relations — not as “an enshrinement to slavery.”
“Where else in America does a monument stand on Martin Luther King Boulevard?” Brown said. “It’s a monument to how far we’ve come in America.
“Are there some terrible pieces to that history? Yes. But that’s what we have to learn to overcome and come together. ... All people of color, I want them to prosper. But we have so much infighting.”
The emotional debate over architectural tributes to the Civil War have been an on-again, off-again flash point across the South for decades. This year, following the police killings of George Floyd and other Black Americans, the calls have intensified, even becoming a pressing issue in the still bitterly-contested presidential race.
In some N.C. communities, the monuments were peacefully removed. In others, they were razed by demonstrators.
In Gaston County, a protective fence now surrounds the Confederate Heroes statue. Deputies also provide security, according to the lawsuit.
The monument was dedicated in 1912 when it was unveiled in front of the old courthouse during a ceremony that included tributes to the bravery of Confederate soldiers and the white race, according to the lawsuit.
The statue was moved to its current location when the new courthouse opened in the late 1990s.
The legal maneuvering surrounding it has cut both ways. Before the commissioners changed their minds, Gaston resident Lisa Rudisill filed a pending lawsuit in federal court to keep the monument where it stands.
Earlier, Rudisill described efforts to remove public displays of Confederate history as “ethnic genocide.”
The new lawsuit claims statues like Gaston’s are illegal because they violate both the equal-protection and anti-race discrimination provisions of the state Constitution. The cost of maintaining and protecting them — which Dellinger says runs into the tens of thousands of dollars — amount to a misuse of taxpayer money for unconstitutional purposes, according to the complaint.
The plaintiffs have asked the courts to order the removal of the monument to private property within 45 days.
Gaston County attorney Cheryl Comer, who is helping fight the case, said the county commission could — and should — remove the statute now.
“It’s time for this community to come together. That symbol promotes a racial divide,” said Comer, who is a member of the county’s so-called “Council of Understanding,” which recommended removing the monument.
“You know, I hear people say ‘That statue didn’t hurt anybody.’ We’re saying the symbol, not the statue itself, invokes a painful memory of the black struggle and the pain and the treachery that we’ve endured.
“...To continue to waste taxpayer money to protect that statute despite all the divisions Gaston County went through over it sends the wrong message. We want a community and a county that celebrates diversity. That’s the future.”
This story was originally published November 12, 2020 at 4:19 PM.
