Who are the figures whose statues the House voted to remove? – By Charles Hilu (Washington Examiner) / June 30 2021
The House of Representatives voted on Tuesday to remove statues of historical figures who had racist attitudes toward black people, which manifested in their political careers. Here are the figures who will no longer be honored in the United States Capitol, as well as two who were removed last year.
HOUSE VOTES TO SWEEP OUT CAPITOL STATUES DEEMED OFFENSIVE
Chief Justice Roger B. Taney
Roger B. Taney served as the fifth chief justice of the Supreme Court from 1836 until his death in 1864. His most notorious ruling was in the 1857 case of Dred Scott v. Sandford, in which the court ruled that slavery was constitutional.
“They had for more than a century before been regarded as beings of an inferior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social or political relations; and so far inferior, that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect; and that the negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit,” Taney wrote in delivering the opinion of the court.
An enemy of President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War, Taney ruled Lincoln’s suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, which guarantees the right to trial by jury, unconstitutional. Lincoln ignored the decision.
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