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A federal judge issued a restraining order to stop the removal of a Confederate statue in Arlington National Cemetery after workers already started preparations to take it away.
The temporary restraining order issued Monday by U.S. District Judge Rossie Alston said that a lawyer for the plaintiffs claimed that the work at the memorial involves the disturbance of gravesites and a hearing has been scheduled for Wednesday.
Work to remove the memorial begun Monday before the restraining order was issued, but the memorial remains in place on cemetery grounds. The cemetery had said on Friday that it expected to complete removal this week.
The lawsuit filed on Sunday by a group called Defend Arlington, affiliated with a group called Save Southern Heritage Florida, accused the Army - which runs the cemetery - of violating regulations in seeking a hasty removal of the memorial.
'The removal will desecrate, damage, and likely destroy the Memorial longstanding at ANC as a grave marker and impede the Memorial's eligibility for listing on the National Register of Historic Places,' the lawsuit said.
U.S. District Judge Rossie Alston issued a temporary restraining order Monday pausing the removal of a Confederate statue in Arlington National Cemetery
The lawsuit filed on Sunday by a group called Defend Arlington claims the removal process disturbs gravesites
The Army - who runs the cemetery - had already begun the removal process and put up safety fencing around the statue
The judge said he 'takes very seriously the representations of officers of the Court and should the representations in this case be untrue or exaggerated the Court may take appropriate sanctions.'
Last week, a federal judge in the District of Columbia dismissed a lawsuit seeking to block removal of the memorial filed by the same plaintiffs. Alston, in his order issued Monday, told the parties to be prepared to discuss how that case affects his decision whether to extend his temporary restraining order beyond Wednesday.
Safety fencing had already been installed around the memorial, and officials anticipated completing the removal by December 22. Arlington National Cemetery said during the removal, the surrounding landscape, graves and headstones will be protected.
David McCallister, a spokesman for the Florida heritage group, said this case differs from the one that was dismissed because they now have evidence that the work is being done in a way that disturbs grave sites.
The statue, unveiled in 1914 and sculpted by Moses Ezekiel who is buried at the site, features a bronze woman, crowned with olive leaves, standing on a 32-foot pedestal, and was designed to represent the American South.
According to Arlington, the woman holds a laurel wreath, a plow stock and a pruning hook, with a Biblical inscription at her feet that says: 'They have beat their swords into plough-shares and their spears into pruning hooks.'
Some of the figures on the statue include a Black woman depicted as 'Mammy' holding what is said to be the child of a white officer, and an enslaved man following his owner to war.
McCallister said the memorial promotes reconciliation between North and South, and removing it erodes that reconciliation.
In 2022, an independent commission recommended that the memorial be taken down, as part of its final report to Congress on the renaming of military bases and assets that commemorate the Confederacy.
The statue, unveiled in 1914, features a bronze woman, crowned with olive leaves, standing on a 32-foot pedestal, and was designed to represent the American South
In 2022, an independent commission recommended that the memorial be taken down. A previous lawsuit to stop the removal was dismissed and more than 40 House Republicans said the commission overstepped its authority
In 2020, Congress mandated the Defense Department had to remove all 'names, symbols, displays, monuments, and paraphernalia that honor or commemorate the Confederate States of America' by 2024.
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin disagrees with the decision and plans to move the monument to the New Market Battlefield State Historical Park in the Shenandoah Valley, Youngkin spokeswoman Macaulay Porter said.
In a recent letter to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, more than 40 House Republicans said the commission overstepped its authority when it recommended that the monument be removed.
The congressmen contended the monument 'does not honor nor commemorate the Confederacy; the memorial commemorates reconciliation and national unity.'
'The Department of Defense must respect Congress' clear legislative intentions regarding the Naming Commission´s legislative authority,' the letter said.