A prominent attorney and former lawmaker in Alabama is receiving death threats after removing confederate flags from city property last week, WSFA reports.
Accompanied by his family on Mother’s Day, former State Senator and County Commissioner Myron Penn (D-AL) picked up miniature confederate flags from the graves of soldiers on city property in Union Springs, Alabama. The confiscated flags now sit in a bag at City Hall, awaiting retrieval from their original owners.
Penn, who is black, tells WSFA he removed the offending flags with the impressions of his four-year-old son in mind: “The reason why we picked them up is because the image of the flags in our community, a lot of people feel that they’re a symbol of divisiveness and oppression… I would think that no one in our community would have a problem with… my actions at all.”
Apryl Marie Fogel, the publisher of Alabama Today, believes Penn’s actions in the public cemetery were tantamount to “disrespecting history.” In an opinion piece on Sunday, Fogel asserts that, “Penn was wrong but he was more than that. What he did appears to have broken the law.” As supporting evidence, Fogel points out that it is illegal to deface gravestones.
Moreover, Fogel insists there’s nothing in the public display of confederate flags for Penn to have been offended by in the first place. “Experts have long noted the flag was never intended to be a symbol of racism and slavery,” Fogel charges. The former Republican congressional staffer goes on to describe the confederate flag as “a symbol to honor the sacrifice of patriots who were willing to die to protect this country and make sure it remained as the founders intended, as well as the history of the south. Not racism.”
Meanwhile, a spokesperson with a local Sons of Confederate Veterans chapter tells WSFA he’s “considering legal action” against Penn for removing confederate flags from the Union Springs cemetery. Another organization mobilizing against Penn is the Defenders of the Confederate Cross, Alabama Division.
The latter group is planning a protest — advertised on Facebook here — in Union Springs on June 19 and June 20. “A local Attorney removed flags off of Confederate Solders graves and the police did nothing,” the event description reads. “We will flag and rally for our heritage and fight back!”
In a statement, the Defenders of the Confederate Cross notes: “While we DO NOT CONDONE acts of violence against any one, this has nothing to do with race, slavery, or oppression. This has alot to do with people walking on and disregarding Confederate heritage. In 1958 congress ruled confederate veterans are AMERICAN veterans and D.C.C. will see that they are treated as such. We will replace the flags that were illegally removed and keep a ever present eye on all Confederate Veterans graves!”
WSFA reports that Penn’s Mother’s Day actions have attracted the attorney “death threats and hate mail” as well as calls for arrest and disbarment.
But Penn tells WSFA that his vision for his community is “one of inclusion. We don’t want to hurt anybody. We don’t want to remind anyone of an oppressive past. We want to move our community forward economically and socially. I did this not just for my child, but for all the children and all the parents who would want to do the same kind of thing to make sure that they do not grow up in a community that does not appear to be divided.”
Source: Alabama Democrat receives death threats for removing Confederate flags from public property
I am sorry but what he did was wrong. He has no right to take those Confederate flags. If a person wants to fly one or put it at a grave of a loved one let them do so. The Confederate flag is all about southern pride and that is all. It was never about slavery, the civil war was never about slavery!
The Civil wasn’t about slavery?
The primary source of income for the south from 1612 to 1865 was the free labor they exploited from their kidnap victims.
Where as even after our enslaved grandparents were freed, racist, KKK, rapist and serial killers adopted the confederate flag as their war flag against black people. Many of our families have a long history of stories dating back to the terrorism and death brought to our people by southerners waving that flag.
So for you to even make a ignorant remark like “the civil war was never about slavery” tells me one of two things.
Either you’ve never passed a single history class in your life. Our you’ve been raised by racist who have actually conditioned you to completely ignore the historical reality experienced and documented by over 45 million Afrikan people. The most famous being the Emancipation Declaration, the peace treaty, the negotiations for the southern whites relocate their enslaved prisoners, or the 50 years of documented terrorism by racist “Confederates” who were bitter for having to actually MIGRATE away from their homes to make human living conditions for the freed Afrikan people. All of which can be found in the US government documents stating the insertion of federal troops SPECIFICALLY to prevent racist from terrorizing, murdering and hanging those free Afrikans that they now found themselves having to compete with for work.
I know southern white people have a tendency to teach their children false hoods like “the confederate flag is about southern pride”. But their just trying to save face from telling the truth. The confederate flag wasn’t even made until the civil war. OVER 100 years after America was founded. So apparently their wasn’t that much southern pride until they had to band together to fight to keep their enslaved people.
This is 2015 read a book.
Excuse me I’m ignorant? Sir you assume too much. The civil war was about how the Union made it hard for the Southerners to live. The Union treated their workers far worse than the people who did own slaves threat their slaves. If the war was about slavery than why is it that many Union newspapers said that the Confederates were fighting for their Southern freedom and not slavery? Oh that’s right, because you think I’m an ignorant woman. How about this, look up your history? Many white people didn’t own slaves! So why would they fight? Because they were tired of being put down and tired of the Union exploiting them! You sir should read a book and feel ashamed. In my opinion you are what’s wrong with this country now. Don’t mess with a true history major, especially one from the South. Dixie forever!
“The Union treated their workers far worse than the people who did own slaves treat their slaves.”
This statement alone makes you unqualified to speak to me.
That is literally the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.
Southerners raped our mothers, tied our fathers to horses, poured boiling tar on their naked bodies and got their horses to rip our fathers in 2 peaces while their children watched. Then they would beat our mothers to a pulp to for fun. Drown our siblings for punishments. And use our babies as alligator bait so they could make belts. And this was simply for talking back….
These were the most vicious beast ever recorded in human history. And whites wrote the books about it!
And your telling me the actual PAID workers in the north (by the way, where slavery was outlawed) were treated WAY WORSE than what I just described?
You ignorance is only surpassed by your erogance. And to actually have the nerve to even utter such stupidity to a actual descendant of the people who were enslaved by whites shows nothing more your racist up bringing.
You are the offspring of those people.
And many white people didn’t own enslaved people is bullshit. Slavery was the GLOBAL ECONOMY of that day. And even if they weren’t “fortunate” enough to purchase prisoners they still had a hand in the processing. Making the chains, driving the boats, killing the babies, watching over the plantation, guarding the houses, auctioning, etc. That’s like saying you actually live in today’s society but you’ve never bought gasoline. You’re inability to accept the most historically document event in human history, for fear of ridicule is the exact reason this country is going up in flames. You can’t fix problems with a people who never believed that them kidnappings families, brain washing them, and hiding their victims history was wrong in the first place.
Many white people did not own slaves. Do your research. You are the ignorant one. I am not. I know what really happened during that time period. I am more open minded than you ever hope to be.
How dare you! My ancestors were dirt poor, they coils barely feed their children. I am the offspring of the true South while you are nothing but a viper. You seem like a person full of hate. Get over yourself. What happened to your ancestors has nothing do to with you.
What happened to my grandparents(x) has nothing to do with me?
Nothing to do with who I am?
Nothing to do with where I come from?
Nothing to do with why I’m in America?
Nothing to do with the social conditions our families has been placed under by white people?
Nothing to do with why white people still call me a nigger?
Nothing to do with all the land that was stolen from them after they were murdered?
Nothing to do with why I don’t know my real name, cus white folks stole it and gave him theirs…which I’m forced to carry around for the rest of my life?
I retrack my previous statement. THAT was the dumbest shit I’ve ever heard.
So the history of YOUR ancestors has EVERYTHING to do with who you are but the history of MY ancestors doesn’t have anything to do with me?! 😒
So white people’s history matters and black peoples history doesn’t.
Right. Gotcha. Your a racist.
No I am not a racist. I will say this though: why is it that a lot of people both black and white think that we owe you something? You have the Union to blame for your questions. They screwed the South up which is why we have the problems we do now. I have tried to teach you something, but you refuse to listen. So I refuse to waste my time on such ignorance.
You do normal people think that black people are owed something? 😕
Maybe because of the 275 years of forced free labor with no pay placed on black people against their will.
Or the 100 years white people spent tearing down our neighborhoods, churches, businesses and schools we developed for ourselves during Reconstruction.
Or the time you promised us 40 acres and a mule for fighting the south.
Or the time the south promised us money and freedom if we fought the north. Yes the south promised us too. But since they didn’t win the point to the north when we asked for what they promised.
The list goes on and on….not that I expect a person like you to be able to know or comprehend any of these historical dated financial lies.
So you paid the Native Americas for what you did to them.
You paid the Japanese for what you did to them
You paid the Jews for what happen to them. AND AMERICA DIDNT EVEN HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH THAT!
But when it comes time to pay the black people who you enslaved and murdered into the 100 millions you have the audacity to get amnesia and say “why do you think we owe you”…are you serious?
Hypocrisy is the language of the white American.