A colossal 21 foot tall Robert E. Lee statue has been removed from Virginia’s capital, state officials said on Wednesday. The statue stood for over 130 years as a monument to the Confederacy. “Virginia’s largest monument to the Confederate insurrection will come down this week,” Governor Ralph Northam said. “This is an important step in showing who we are and what we value as a commonwealth.”
It was announced that the statue would be dismantled 30 days after George Floyd’s murder and resulting protest movements, but progress was halted by two lawsuits filed by residents who didn’t want to see the statue removed. The Supreme Court of Virginia ruled last week in favor of the statue’s removal.
The statue, one of the largest and most recognizable Confederate monuments in the US, became an epicenter of the Floyd protests. Lawrence West, a member of BLM RVA, an activist group that occupied the Lee monument, believes the decision to remove the statue was the work of protesters. West told CBS he would like the area where the statue once stood turned into a community space.
