Council Votes to Take Down Confederate War Memorial Near Dallas City Hall

The Dallas City Council on Wednesday {snip} in a 11-4 vote approved the removal of the structure deemed a “non-contributing structure for the historic overlay district,” The Dallas Morning News reported.

“We have to acknowledge the sins of the past, and what kind of Dallas do we want going forward,” Mayor Pro Tempore Casey Thomas said. “Today is not unfinished business. It’s finishing the business that we started.”

The council proposed a $480,000 plan to remove and store the massive monument, which currently rests in the Pioneer Cemetery across from the Dallas City Hall.

The monument features a 65-foot obelisk topped with a Confederate soldier, and statues of Confederate leaders — including Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson — form a ring around it.

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Officials in Austin, Texas, last month removed a Confederate plaque from the state Capitol that claimed slavery was not the root cause of the Civil War.

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