Confederate monuments spark debate about how cities remember their history
ABC News
Confederate monuments continue to spark controversy. Over 2,000 Confederate memorials are still in place across the country, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
More than 60 years after Martin Luther King Jr. uttered 'Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia,' racial and historical tensions continue to boil over at Stone Mountain, which doubles as the home of the largest Confederate monument in the world and the Ku Klux Klan's 20th-century rebirth.
The Confederate monument etched into the mountain is larger than Mount Rushmore, according to the Atlanta History Center. The carving honors three Confederate figures in the Civil War -- Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederate states, and Generals Robert E. Lee and Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson.
Stone Mountain is one of more than 2,000 Confederate memorials still in place across the country, according to the legal advocacy group Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). This list includes monuments, plaques, street and building names, and more.
In 2023, about 49 memorials were removed, including nine Department of Defense forts that have been renamed, according to the SPLC.
According to a Congressional Naming Commission Report, hundreds of Confederate monuments -- including names, symbols, monuments, and paraphernalia -- honoring figures on Department of Defense land alone were set to be removed by January 2024.
