The Alabama chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-AL), a chapter of the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today said a vote by the Florence City Council rejecting an explanatory marker in front of a controversial Confederate monument is an “attempt to suppress the truth of our nation’s past.”
The proposed plaque, rejected by a vote of 4-2, would have acknowledged that while monuments set up after the Civil War were designed to honor veterans, “The majority of Confederate monuments, however, were erected later, in the years between the 1890s and the 1930s, coinciding with the end of Reconstruction and the spread of white supremacist policies known as Jim Crow laws.”
In a statement, CAIR-AL Staff Attorney A. Britton O’Shields said:
“Refusing even a modest, historically accurate explanation of when and why most Confederate monuments were erected is an attempt to suppress the truth of our nation’s past. These monuments were not simply about honoring the dead; many were political symbols designed to reinforce white supremacy and intimidate Black Americans during the Jim Crow era. Honest history is not an attack on heritage. It is a prerequisite for justice.”
She said CAIR has repeatedly called for the removal of Confederate names, holidays, flags, statues, and symbols nationwide.
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CONTACT: A. Britton O’Shields, Staff Attorney – Alabama Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Alabama), aoshields@cair.com, 205-206-6399, 205-616-0733; CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell, 404-285-9530, e-Mitchell@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-744-7726, ihooper@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Manager Ismail Allison, 202-770-6280, iallison@cair.com