House Speaker Nancy Pelosi orders official portraits of four of her predecessors removed due to their Confederate ties
NANCY Pelosi has ordered that official portraits of four of her predecessors are removed due to their Confederate ties.
The House Speaker announced her order on Thursday.
“There is no room in the hallowed halls of Congress or in any place of honor for memorializing men who embody the violent bigotry and grotesque racism of the Confederacy,” she wrote in a letter to Cheryl Johnson, clerk of the House of Representatives, obtained by NBC.
Pelosi has requested the immediate removal of the portraits of Robert Hunter of Virginia, Howell Cobbs of Georgia, James Orr of South Carolina and Charles Crisp of Georgia.
“We cannot honor men such as James Orr, who swore on the House Floor to ‘preserve and perpetuate’ slavery in order to ‘enjoy our property in peace, quiet and security,’ or Robert Hunter, who served at nearly every level of the Confederacy, including in the Confederate Provincial Congress, as Confederate Secretary of State, in the Confederate Senate and in the Confederate Army,” Pelosi explained.
most read in us news
“The portraits of these men are symbols that set back our nation’s work to confront and combat bigotry.”
During her weekly press conference, Pelosi said that she was unaware that the paintings existed inside the Capitol.
The Speaker said her and her team didn’t realize until “we were taking inventory of the statues and the curator told us” about the four paintings of the Confederate speakers.