GREGG COUNTY, Texas — A Confederate statue will remain on the Gregg County Courthouse lawn.
According to CBS19's Payton Weidman, commissioners refused to second a motion to remove the statue.
On Friday, a small group of people made one last plea for the removal of the Confederate monument in front of the Gregg County Courthouse.
Roughly two dozen people gathered for a rally Friday evening in advance of the Gregg County Commissioners Court vote on whether to remove the state or leave it in place.
“I do want to place emphasis on the fact that we’re not talking about destroying history,” Longview City Council member Nona Snoddy said. “We’re just talking about putting it in a place where it would be more appropriate.”
For the last 109 years, the statue’s place has been on the lawn of the Gregg County Courthouse. Inscribed on one side is a dedication to “our confederate heroes.”
“The statue is a monument to white supremacy,” LaDarian Brown, Senior Pastor of Parkview Baptist Church, said, “and honestly has no place on the lawn of a courthouse that’s supposed to stand for justice.”
“The Confederate monument, in so many ways, represents that history that’s so painful for people who look like me,” Longview City Council member Ray Wade added.
Chelsea Laury created an online petition to urge the county commissioners to remove the monument, which has more than 4,000 signatures. She spoke about the monument’s history. It was built in 1911, a time of great racial unrest and violence in Longview.