Wednesday’s “celebration” in Jacksonville, Florida, where recently elected Mayor Donna Deegan unilaterally tore down two bronze post-Civil War statues that leftists had deemed racist, was Orwellian politics at its worst. The statues were collectively named “Tribute to the Women of Southern Confederacy and included a robed woman carrying a Confederate flag and a woman reading to two children, which had stood for more than a century in the now renamed “Confederate Park. This tribute was to the women of the Southland who courageously took the places of their husbands, brothers,...

Mayor Donna Deegan said her decision to remove statues from the Confederate monument in Springfield Park came after it became clear City Council was unwilling to take any action in the community debate over whether Confederate tributes should be in public spaces. City Council members pledged two years ago they would take the lead by exploring a range of options, but they did not follow through by determining what the city should do. "If I have the opportunity to move this city forward, I'm going to do that," Deegan said...

A 98-year-old Tribute to the Women of the Southern Confederacy statue has been pulled from its pedestal in Jacksonville, Florida, with Democrat Mayor Donna Deegan its removal “signal[s] a belief in our shared humanity”. “Symbols matter. They tell the world what we stand for and what we aspire to be,” Deegan said, claiming the statue’s removal was “not in any way an attempt to erase history but to show that we’ve learned from it.” The memorial was removed without reference to the City Council, which rejected a request for $1.3...

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The removal of a Confederate monument in Jacksonville is still raising questions a day after the surprise move. Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan ordered it to come down and said she had the legal right to do so because it was paid for by private funds and did not need council approval. But some are still questioning: Did she have the legal authority? “I asked General Counsel, could I use private funds? And do I have the authority? And he said, yes. And so that’s exactly what I...

Confederate monuments have come down in Orlando, Tampa and most recently Jacksonville as part of a nationwide reckoning with public memorials that commemorate the Confederacy. But if a bill becomes law next year, local leaders could be fined and even booted from office if they remove those monuments. State Rep. Dean Black, R-Jacksonville, is pushing the measure to protect monuments, including memorials to the Confederacy, and punish local officials who remove them. He said his bill is retroactive and seeks to restore monuments removed by local governments after Jan. 1,...

Democratic Jacksonville, Florida, Mayor Donna Deegan announced on Wednesday the "Tribute to the Women of the Southern Confederacy" statue in the city was removed. The statue, which had been in place at Springfield Park in Jacksonville since 1915, has become the latest Confederate statue to be removed from a public area. Deegan, who was elected to the mayor's office earlier this year, said in a statement that the removal was not to "erase history" but rather to "show that we’ve learned from it." “Symbols matter. They tell the world what...

Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan announced a large statue and a smaller statue in the Tribute to the Women of the Southern Confederacy memorial were removed with grant money through the Jessie Ball duPont Fund and anonymous donors by way of 904Ward. Deegan said a plaque was also removed, and engravings of a pedestal were covered with temporary plaques. The price tag for the project was $187,000, an amount agreed upon between 904Ward and ACON Construction, city officials said. “Symbols matter. They tell the world what we stand for and what...

The newly elected Democrat mayor of Jacksonville, Florida, celebrated the removal of a Confederate statue in the city, which was officially gone before noon Wednesday. Democrat Mayor Donna Deegan, who won her mayoral bid in May, celebrated the removal of the statue in Springfield Park, formally known as Confederate Park. The monument in question, “In Memory of Our Women of the Southland,” depicts a mother with her two children at her side, looking down at a book upon her lap. It was erected in October 1915. The Democrat mayor, who...

Workers hauled off a monument to women of the Confederacy from a Jacksonville, Florida, park Wednesday, in what the city’s mayor called a show of “belief in our shared humanity,” but a political opponent described it as “tearing down history.” The “Tribute to the Women of the Southern Confederacy” monument was removed from Springfield Park, where it had stood since 1915, on orders from Mayor Donna Deegan. “Symbols matter. They tell the world what we stand for and what we aspire to be. By removing the confederate monument from Springfield...