A battle has taken shape between government officials, that will determine the future of a standing Confederate statue in Birmingham, Alabama. On Tuesday, August 15, the city's Mayor William Bell, took the advice of Birmingham's City Council President Johnathan Austin, who suggested he consider how offensive the monument is to constituents of the locale, and promptly remove it from Linn Park. Mayor Bell would comply and is now going to have his day in court, as the state announced that it would sue the city only hours later.
Because Alabama law prohibits the actual removal of the statue, Bell had determined that covering the statue up while the local government decides what to do with it, would be the next best course of action. The monument would be covered in plastic but wound up bare after the plastic was soon removed. Having learned of the failure to secure the statue from the public, Bell then ordered crews to encase it in plywood at around 9 p.m. on Tuesday.
State Attorney General Steve Marshall has had his sights set on Bell since, reminding the Mayor that law prohibits the "relocation, removal, alteration, or other disturbance of any monument on public property that has been in place for 40 years or more," according to the Alabama Memorial Preservation Act. Bell refused to back down, and would in fact, eventually fire back at Marshall, stating, “We look forward to the court system clarifying the rights and power of a municipality to control its parks absent state intervention.”
