Montgomery County has erected a wooden box around a Confederate monument recently spray-painted with the words “Black Lives Matter,” in hopes of shielding the statue from further vandalism as officials seek to move it out of downtown Rockville.
County workers put up the barrier Friday, about a week after the words appeared across the base of the 102-year-old bronze statue of a Confederate soldier.
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[Montgomery County Executive Isiah] Leggett — the first African American elected to the Montgomery County Council and Montgomery’s first African American county executive — says he agrees with others who consider the statue part of a neo-Confederate effort to obscure Maryland’s pro-Union leanings. He declared last month that he was moving the statue, which is on land owned by the county.
What Leggett apparently didn’t realize was that the statue’s historic designation means it can be moved only with the permission of the Rockville Historic District Commission. The commission is scheduled to consider the county’s application for removal, on Sept. 17.
Read the article: Montgomery boxes Confederate statue to protect it from vandalism
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