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IHL Tables Vote to Move Confederate Monument
By Alyssa Schnugg
News editor
alyssa.schnugg@hottytoddy.com
The Confederate statue will be moved to the Confederate cemetery on campus. Photo courtesy of William Garner.
A discussion and possible vote on whether to relocate the Confederate statue was pulled from the agenda this morning by Institute of Higher Learning Trustee Thomas Duff.
Duff said he would like a full report from the University of Mississippi on the progress made in implementing all of the recommendations included in the contextualization report, including the university’s plans to replace markers in the cemetery.
“Given this is a very important matter, I’d like to receive a full report before we vote on such, thus, I will be pulling this matter from the agenda today,” Duff said during the monthly IHL board meeting at 9 a.m. Thursday morning.
One agenda item up from the discussion about the monument, the board voted to name the new STEM building currently under construction on the Ole Miss campus, the “Jim and Thomas Duff Center for Science and Technology Innovation.” The Duffs have committed to a $26 million donation to the school. Duff recused himself during the vote.
The monument was installed in 1906 to honor the 400-plus men from Lafayette County who died in the Civil War. It was envisioned by a UM Professor of Chemistry, R. W. Jones in 1892, and the funds were raised by a group of 45 women.
The statue was a rallying point in 1962 for people who rioted to oppose court-ordered integration of the university.
Pro-Confederate groups from outside the university rallied at the monument Feb. 23 after hearing rumors of a revived effort to move the statue. The Associated Student Body voted in March to relocate the Confederate statue to the Confederate cemetery on campus. The ASB was one of four governing bodies to unanimously vote on the statue’s relocation. The Graduate Student Council, Faculty Senate and Staff Council were the other three in agreement with the ASB’s decision to relocate the statue.
The university sought the opinion of the Mississippi Attorney GEneral’s Office as to whether the school could move the statue. The AG’s opinion stated the university did have the authority to move it if the new location was deemed “more appropriate.”
In August, then-interim Chancellor Larry Sparks announced the University’s intent to move the monument located in the Circle to the Confederate Cemetery.
Last month the Mississippi Department of Archives and History approved the university’s plans on how the statue will be moved and its new location. The MDAH board issued a resolution that should the IHL approve the request, the MDAH will issue a permit for the statue’s relocation.
The drawings and specifications for the proposed plan are available to view online.
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George Guffin
January 16, 2020 at 12:06 pm
I find it hard to understand how we let the uneducated dictate to the educated. What is the point in the teaching of History if we elect to remove it from society. Especially when History of old doesn’t represent History made of today. One whom is educated would deduct that knowledge of yesterday would prevent making its same mistakes today. By allowing the uneducated to dictate to the educated then the reference point in which we allow the removal of reference points has us more apt to repeat what we should have known. This is so anti advancement of mankind that it could be considered negligent and corrupt. It would be counter productive over the long term for a minority of individuals to set back intellectual thought when we know that in doing so is wrong and eventually having to start over and address this History again through repetition. This is the definition of insanity!
Donna
January 16, 2020 at 2:00 pm
How much would it cost to move the statue and where will that funding come from? The same people complaining about the statue are fussing about how bad the campus library is and wants more money out into the library.
Clara
January 16, 2020 at 5:07 pm
This is the definition of incoherence!
Clara
January 16, 2020 at 5:15 pm
LOLOLOL. The University just wasted $78k paying Glenn Boyce to hire himself, and will waste another $300k inflating his salary every year.
The idea that this is about money is ridiculous.
Judy Spencer
January 20, 2020 at 5:38 pm
Stand your ground and vote with your heart. The. South fought until they were defeated at Appomattox. They would not have given up before the fight had hardly begun. The southern ladies worked so hard to have this memorial to the University Grays and they wanted it to be placed at the front of our beautiful campus for all to see. Now the liberal progressives want to hide it as if these boys died in vain. We all know we lost the war, but it does not mean that we have to forget these young boys and hide them.
I will never have the same feeling for Ole Miss if this monument is moved. It is like we lost the war all over again,but this time we gave in without a fight. These boys know what is going on and that would be so hurt that you are letting them be forgotten.
To all those people who worked on this project and all those people who went along with this, Shame on you. You may want a generic University without a soul but there are a lot of Rebels out there that disagree with you. The sad thing is those silent Rebels are letting a few dictate to us all and just like our country, they are taking over and we are not fighting back. ( I do not mean physical fighting for I do not want a Civil War, but we do need to voice our opinion and fight in other ways).