City orders Daughters of the Confederacy to remove monument

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – A North Carolina city has told the owner of a recently vandalized Confederate monument to remove it by Jan. 31 or face a possible lawsuit.

The Winston-Salem Journal reports the city’s mayor, Allen Joines, announced at Tuesday’s Emancipation Proclamation ceremony that the United Daughters of the Confederacy could face legal action if the group doesn’t comply.

State law makes it difficult to remove monuments on public property, but the Confederate Soldiers Monument is on private property.

Last week, someone wrote “cowards & traitors” on the statue’s base. It was previously vandalized after the 2017 deadly white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Considering that and the confrontations over Confederate monuments elsewhere, the city attorney believes it creates a public nuisance.

The newspaper couldn’t reach the statue’s owner for comment.

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Information from: Winston-Salem Journal, http://www.journalnow.com