Tennessee governor wants to amend day that honors KKK leader
Source: Associated Press
Kimberlee Kruesi and Jonathan Mattise, Associated Press
Updated 3:42 pm CST, Saturday, January 18, 2020
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- Gov. Bill Lee will introduce legislation this year that would amend a law requiring Tennessee to honor Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest, an early leader of the Ku Klux Klan.
Lee's office confirmed Friday that the Republican, who has previously expressed his displeasure over the honor, was working on the bill. The office did not provide further details.
According to the law in question, Tennessee governors must sign six proclamations throughout the year designating the following days of special observance: Robert E. Lee Day (January 19), Abraham Lincoln Day (February 12), Andrew Jackson Day (March 15), Confederate Decoration Day (June 3), Nathan Bedford Forrest Day (July 13) and Veterans' Day (November 11).
. . .
Lee received national backlash in July when he not only signed the Nathan Bedford Forrest proclamation, but also declined to answer reporter questions over whether he thought the law should change. Lee later clarified that he didn't like signing the proclamation and would prefer to see the law changed.
Read more: https://www.chron.com/news/us/article/Lee-working-to-amend-Confederate-general-14986323.php
Wearing the pink paint of honor applied by citizens.
evertonfc
(1,713 posts)He has allowed TN to accept refugees ( we have the largest Kurdish refugee population in Amwrica). He instituted the most generous Family Leave and Medical Act in America for state employees and has been very generous to state employees. We will take what we can get
yellowdogintexas
(22,119 posts)from my daughter's father in law. The family is Kurdish, and when he found out I had lived in Nashville for 15 years he got very excited! Then I looked up the info on the internet and found out there are over 10,000 Kurds just in Davidson County!
Even he did not know the numbers were that high.
Nashville has had a very diverse population for as long as I can remember; lots of foreign students at the many colleges and universities.
The Mouth
(3,123 posts)Utterly brilliant commander. Instinctively figured out and applied some of the deadliest strategies ever. As with Hannibal, Guderian, or Ariel Sharon, anyone who doesn't study them closely is going to lose to someone who did.
But a reprehensible person; his unites essentially didn't TAKE black prisoners, they shot them on attempted surrender. And he later helped found the KKK. He was studied by every subsequent military commander (Zukhov and Giap and Rommel amongst them), but nasty person.
redstateblues
(10,565 posts)So happy when some brave soul gave it a paint bath!
Evolve Dammit
(16,632 posts)oasis
(49,151 posts)BlueWI
(1,736 posts)if it were 1878.
It's past time to quit commemorative tributes to traitors and join the 21st century.
NNadir
(33,368 posts)In 1946 Joachim Pieper, the Nazi war criminal who massacred Americans who had surrendered during the Battle of the Bulge at Malmedy, was sentenced to death.
He was not executed however. He was incarcerated at Landau Prison until 1958, after which he was released. He became an interpreter working for Volkswagen and Porche, and moved to France.
This was not satisfactory to some unknown victim, who apparently burned him alive in his house. The "crime" was never solved.
Lt. Col. Joachim Peipers Grisly Death After the Battle of the Bulge
There are no statues of Pieper commemorating him, although he remains popular with modern Nazis in Germany and elsewhere.
It would not have really been a crime if some vigilante had murdered Forrest either; it would be understandable.
Forrest probably should have been sentenced for his crimes.
It is disgusting that a Governor would sign a bill requiring the "honor" of Forrest. He was a horrible human being.
Odoreida
(1,549 posts)Nathan Bedford Forrest's claim to fame isn't simply that he was a rebel general.
Let alone one of Robert E Lee's military distinction before he was a rebel (in the Mexican War).
It's that after the surrender he founded a terrorist group.
That is what he's famous for. So the usual rant about "heritage" does not apply.