Dallas Council Votes To Remove Confederate Statue In Lee Park

[struggle4progress]

4. Judge Orders Halt to Removal

BY ALEX MACON

... The temporary restraining order was filed by Kirk Lyons, described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a "white supremacist lawyer," on behalf of Hiram Patterson and the Texas division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, who contend in the motion that the removal of the statue is a violation of their rights of free speech and due process. Lyons, who denies being a white supremacist and called himself a "Christian attorney of Southern ancestry" in an interview with the New York Times, filed a similar lawsuit against the University of Texas after it removed Confederate statues ...

"Defendants’ removal of the Monument without procedural due process will abridge the political speech of the monument. Defendants are state actors who are ordaining the political meaning of political symbols in a public forum. This government determination of political symbols in a public forum without a showing of any compelling interest in making the determination and without due process is a continuing irreparable harm" ...

Shortly after the .. Council’s vote Wednesday morning .. crews began work around the statue ... Workers .. said .. city records did not indicate how deeply anchored the bronze statue was into its mount, which may explain why it was still standing around 4:30 p.m., when crews ... were forced to stop working ...

https://www.dmagazine.com/frontburner/2017/09/judge-orders-halt-to-removal-of-robert-e-lee-statue-in-oak-lawn/