WHAT THE rIGHT SEEKS TO MEMORIALIZE:

The undersigned UNC School of Law faculty respectfully request that the UNC administration take immediate action to remove the monument of an armed Confederate soldier, known as Silent Sam, looming at the heart of UNC's main campus. While we do not favor shutting down the ability of individuals to voice disagreeable opinions, we believe that the statue sends a message of white supremacy that the university should refuse to endorse.

On June 2, 1913, at the monument's public dedication, Confederate war veteran Julian S. Carr said, "The present generation, I am persuaded, scarcely takes note of what the Confederate soldier meant to the welfare of the Anglo Saxon race. . . . if every State of the South had done what North Carolina did . . . the political geography of America would have been re-written." He then told this story: "less than ninety days perhaps after my return from Appomattox, I horse-whipped a negro wench until her skirts hung in shreds, because upon the streets of this quiet village she had publicly insulted and maligned a Southern lady, and then rushed for protection to these University buildings."

From the moment of its dedication, Carr's racist words cemented the monument as a symbol of white supremacy, violence and indignity. Even today, UNC's website acknowledges that many see Silent Sam as "a glorification of the Confederacy and thus a tacit defense of slavery."

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