Across the Southand beyond, Americans of all races, ethnicities and creeds are askingwhy our country has so many symbols and memorials that honor the Confederacy — a government that made war against the United States to maintain human bondage of Black people and uphold the anti-democratic and unjust system of white supremacy.
The movement to rid our country of these symbols of white supremacy is grassroots, driven by local activists, community leaders, educators and young people raising questions and making decisions about their values.
Over the past decade, their voices have been heard in city after city. In 2015, Alabama removed the Confederate flag from its state Capitol. In 2016, a Dallas, Texas, middle school named for a Confederate general changed its name. In 2017, the city of Gainesville, Florida, removed a Confederate memorial from the front of an administrative building. In 2018, activists removed a Confederate statue from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In 2019, Confederate Avenue in Atlanta, Georgia, was renamed United Avenue. In 2020, two schools named for Confederate leaders changed their names in Jackson, Mississippi. In 2021, the school board in Duval County, Florida, voted to remove Confederate names from six schools. In 2020, Lee High School in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, became Liberty High School. In 2023, all nine military bases named for Confederates changed their names, and Arlington National Cemetery removed its Confederate memorial. In 2024, the city of Grenada, Mississippi, removed a Confederate memorial from the courthouse square.
For many people, local efforts like these across the South may be their first experience in local activism. Removing harmful Confederate symbols can be a long and difficult task. The following resource provides guidance for building a campaign, including:
- General best practices for organizing a campaign to remove a Confederate symbol.
- Advice for countering objections to the removal of a symbol.
- Facts about the history of the Confederacy and Confederate symbols.
- Resources to connect with other community groups who have successfully removed Confederate symbols or are currently organizing for removals.
Even if communities cannot succeed right away, the organizing work they put in can carry over to other efforts to build a more democratic and just community. In addition, artists, educators and activists across the country have advocated creating memorials to truthful history and racial justice near Confederate symbols.
What you can do in your community
Removing symbols of the Confederacy from public spaces can be daunting, but with proper planning, you can launch a successful campaign.
Research the symbol
Examine the history of the symbol in your community. You can conduct research online at the local library, university or college, or historical society. The popular lore about why the symbol is displayed may not reflect the true history of how it got there. Historical markers and brochures for some symbols often reflect inaccurate history.
Keep the following tips and questions in mind:
- Go to records, such as newspaper reports, to get a better understanding of the history — and the motivation — behind the display of the symbol.
- If the symbol is the name of a figure from the Confederacy, research that person’s history. Document why their legacy doesn’t reflect justice and fairness. You should also document the person, people or organization responsible for the symbol’s commission and display.
- Find out when the symbol was first displayed in your community. Many Confederate symbols began appearing after the U.S. Supreme Court’s school desegregation ruling in 1954 and continued to appear in the 1960s to protest the Civil Rights Movement, as shown through this guide’s companion report.
Confederate battle flags were raised on government property throughout the South to commemorate the Civil War centennial during the 1960s. If that’s why the flag is displayed on government property in your community, don’t let it stop your efforts. Find out why it continues to fly decades after the commemoration.
Map the path to change
Whatever your effort’s goals — removal of a symbol from a site, renaming of an existing monument, placing of a marker alongside a symbol to contextualize and communicate accurate history, creating a mural or education walk of public art made by communities that tells accurate history — documenting the official process early is crucial.
Find out what governmental body is responsible for overseeing or maintaining the display. If the symbol is the name of a city park, for example, the city council and mayor would be the parties to contact. If it is a public school’s name, the local school board would be the appropriate entity. An online search or call to your city hall, county courthouse or state legislature can point you in the right direction.
Once you’ve determined the pertinent governmental body, ask about the process for removing the symbol. You might, for example, need to appear before your city council or county commission, or you might need to persuade your state legislator to sponsor a bill. A clear understanding of the process is crucial for building and streamlining a successful effort.
Organize and raise awareness
After you conduct the research, it’s important to build public support. Policymakers may be hesitant to remove the symbol if they believe there is no public demand for such action or that it will raise the ire of constituents. Demonstrating public support for the symbol’s removal can overcome this obstacle.
Here are ways to build support for your effort:
Identify community groups and leaders that may support your effort. Enlisting these groups and individuals early can quickly amplify your campaign. These groups can contact their members and offer support in various ways, including signing on to a letter to the appropriate governmental body. Community groups you should consider include faith-based organizations, civic clubs, labor unions and advocacy groups.
Research success stories in other communities and the process you must follow for removing the symbol. Reach out and network with the groups who led those successful campaigns. Some examples of such groups are referenced both in this and past editions of the SPLC’s Whose Heritage? report and in this guide.
Write letters to the editor of your local newspaper. If you have already enlisted other groups and their members in your cause, encourage each group to send its own letter to the local newspaper to show broad support. Align the timing of your efforts in ways that support your overall plan. Continue to look for opportunities to submit pieces like op-eds and letters to the editor whenever strategic. Simple-to-use templates for developing such pieces are available online.
Contact local media. Try to get the news media in your community to cover your campaign. Call your local newspaper as well as television and radio stations. Ask to speak to an assignment editor. Explain your campaign but be brief and to the point. Ask for the name and contact information of someone to whom you can email a press release or other information updating them on the campaign’s progress. Maintain a list of local media contacts, with names, phone numbers and email addresses.
Build an email list of supporters. You can use this list to send regular updates about the campaign, to send alerts about meetings or rallies, and to have discussions about strategies.
Use social media to raise awareness. Don’t stop with just introducing the topic to people. Give them a reason to follow you on social media. Update them with your progress. Set up a Facebook page and use it and other social media outlets to regularly provide facts from your research that show why this symbol should be removed. Share success stories from other communities or other news related to your campaign. Work to connect and add followers via an email list.
Develop an online petition. This serves as a call to action that helps document, support and develop momentum. As it receives signatures, update your social media followers. Mention the petition and signature count in letters to the editor or op-eds and when you speak with officials and potential supporters. Embedding the petition in all your emails to followers, linking to it prominently in your social media bios and/or pinning it at the top of your accounts’ feeds are easy ways to raise visibility and to encourage engagement.
Organize a rally or other type of peaceful demonstration to raise awareness and generate media interest. Designate a spokesperson to speak at the event and to any media. Develop your main message: Keep your messaging and calls to action simple. Support your spokesperson by helping them practice delivering your message. Be sure to alert your local news media with information about the time and place for your event and be conscious of the timing so it occurs far enough in advance of the noon or evening TV news programs to be included in broadcasts. Try to make your event visually interesting (signs and banners can help) so that photojournalists and videographers will be able to capture compelling images that will make it more likely your event will make the news and generate interest among viewers and readers.
Contact policymakers about supporting your effort. These can be policymakers with the governmental body that has the authority to remove the symbol or other influential officials. Call the office of the appropriate public official to arrange a meeting. Use your research to clearly explain why the symbol should be removed. You might describe how it’s a divisive symbol rooted in the enslavement of Black people and racism.
Officially make your case. The process for removing a Confederate symbol from your community may require you — or a spokesperson for your effort — to speak before a governmental body. Be prepared. Use your research as the basis for a clear, concise and fact-based presentation. Do not allow hecklers or opponents to rattle you or throw you off your prepared remarks. Stick to your points.
Be prepared for other speakers — and policymakers — to oppose your effort. Your presentation should include historical facts to counter objections. Describe how the display was racially motivated or how it represents values that have no place in your community today. Knowing when the symbol was first displayed and what persons or groups supported or facilitated its installation can provide important details about the true motivations for the display. The SPLC’s “Whose Heritage?” database and map may help you determine those facts. The display may be part of an area’s history, but you should emphasize that the community must answer the question, “Who are we as a community today?” Ask what message the display sends to visitors and residents.
Responding to Objections and Myths
When you begin your campaign, you will likely encounter opposition. In fact, you may encounter very vocal, even hostile, opposition. You should be prepared to respond in a manner that shows you have given thoughtful consideration to the issue and have taken into account the sentiments of people opposing your effort.
The following are common claims used to defend public displays of Confederate symbols. Sample responses you can adapt for your campaign are provided. Please keep in mind that no list like this can include every possible claim and response. Every campaign and each community is unique.
As you prepare your campaign, brainstorm more objections that may be raised and document those that arise. Reconnect with those you were able to contact who have led successful campaigns in other communities for advice and feedback. Continue to use the internet to research campaigns in other communities. Study the statements made by critics of those efforts. How did those campaigns respond? How can you adapt those responses?
Claim: “It’s heritage, not hate.”
Response: Whose heritage? Not the heritage of Black people whose ancestors were enslaved by the millions and later subjected to brutal oppression under Jim Crow. Not the heritage of the 300,000 white Southerners and 150,000 Black Southerners who fought for the Union and emancipation in the Civil War. Democracy is our heritage, and public institutions should not display symbols that undermine democratic values and continue to harm members of our community whose ancestors were enslaved.
Claim: “The Confederate battle flag is not racist. It is simply a symbol from the past.”
Response: The flag we now call the Confederate battle flag was one of many battle flags used by the Confederate forces during the Civil War. It largely disappeared after the war and was not commonly seen again until the 1950s, when white supremacists resurrected it as a clear symbol of their opposition to integration and the Civil Rights Movement. Since then, hate groups have continued to use this flag as a symbol of white supremacy, hatred and violence. A white supremacist proudly posed with it before murdering nine people at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015, and some insurrectionists carried the flag into the U.S. Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021.
Claim: “The Civil War wasn’t about slavery. It was about states’ rights.”
Response: Before and during the Civil War, Confederate leaders stated explicitly and constantly that they were fighting for slavery and white supremacy. State articles of secession clearly explain that their primary motivation was slavery. Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens said plainly that “the cornerstone of the Confederacy” is white supremacy. In Congress, before the Civil War, Southern slave states consistently voted to violate states’ rights when it came to the rights of Northern states to outlaw slavery. Defeated Confederates created the myth of states’ rights after they lost the Civil War.
Claim: “Hate groups hijacked the flag, causing people to associate it with racism.”
Response: Hate groups didn’t transform the flag into a symbol of white supremacy. The Confederacy was founded on the very idea of white supremacy. Regardless of the individual motives of any single historical figure, each Confederate was involved in an explicit project to preserve the indefensible institution of chattel slavery. In his “Cornerstone Speech,” the vice president of the Confederacy, Alexander Stephens, noted that the new government’s foundation rested “upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man.”
Claim: “Slaves fought for the Confederacy, which proves the Civil War wasn’t about slavery.”
Response: For most of the war, the Confederacy did not allow enslaved men to serve. It changed its policy only in the final weeks of the war — a time when it desperately needed men. Few joined voluntarily.
Claim: “We shouldn’t remove things just because someone may be offended. What about the First Amendment’s guarantee of freedom of expression? If we remove this symbol, what’s next?”
Response: Individuals still have the First Amendment right to display a Confederate flag — even if it offends people. But our government, which represents all citizens, shouldn’t endorse a symbol of white supremacy. This is not an individual freedom-of-expression issue.ion issue.
Claim: “Slavery existed under the American flag, too. Does that mean we should take it down?”
Response: There’s no denying that slavery existed under the U.S. flag. There is, however, a key difference: The U.S. flag represents a country that ultimately freed enslaved people. The Confederate flag represents a violent secessionist organization founded solely to preserve slavery.
Claim: “There are great figures in American history who were not members of the Confederacy but were slave owners. Should we tear down statues and other monuments to them?”
Response: That’s not what we’re asking for here. The difference is that, unlike the Confederacy, those historical figures are not generally being honored because of legacies so closely associated with white supremacism and violent race-based oppression.
Claim: “Removing this Confederate symbol is erasing history in the name of political correctness.”
Response: This is not an attempt to erase history. It is an effort to end government endorsement and celebration of a symbol that has always represented the oppression of Black people.
Claim: “This symbol can’t be racist because I want to keep it, and I’m not racist.”
Response: Our personal beliefs can’t change the history of the Confederacy, which was founded upon a belief in white supremacy — nor can they change the effect a symbol has on others.
Claim: “This [school/team/mascot] has long been named after a Confederate leader. There’s no need to change it. It’s just part of the community.”
Response: The students are as much a part of this community as this name. It sends the wrong message to these students — especially students of color — when their school honors someone loyal to a government founded on the idea that one group of people is inherently superior to another and should be able to enslave them. It also sends the wrong message about and to our community.
If applicable to your school, an additional response may look similar to this: We should look not only at the history of the school’s namesake, but also our community’s history. This school was not named shortly after the Civil War. It was named during the Civil Rights Movement, when many schools in this country were named or renamed after Confederate leaders as a protest against the integration of public schools. Our community shouldn’t continue sending this message. Most schools named after Confederates were named shortly after the Brown v. Board of Education decision mandated school integration. Those who named the school after [this Confederate leader] did so to send a clear message that no matter what the law may say, this school is for whites only.
Claim: “My ancestor bravely served the Confederacy in the Civil War. He didn’t own slaves. He was just defending his home. Removing this symbol disrespects him and the ancestors of others in this community.”
Response: This issue isn’t about the personal motivations of one soldier. It is clear that as a government the Confederacy endorsed slavery and white supremacy. It can be found in the Confederate Constitution, in the recorded statements of the Confederacy’s leadership and in the secession documents of the states.This symbol represents the Confederate government, which endorsed these beliefs. It is worth noting that many Confederate veterans attended “Blue and Gray” reunions after the Civil War. These reunions brought veterans from both sides of the war together for reconciliation and celebration of their collective identity as Americans.
Illustration at top by Simón Prades.