Nathan Bedford Forrest Bust Removal Process Underway, But It Might Take Awhile

NASHVILLE, TN — The rather convoluted process to remove the controversial bust of slave trader, Confederate general and early Ku Klux Klan leader Nathan Bedford Forrest from the Tennessee State Capitol is underway.

The Capitol Commission, an obscure body that's met only 36 times in the last 30 years, will meet 11 a.m. September 1 in the Nashville Room in the Tennessee Tower to discuss the removal of the bust that's sat in the rotunda of the capitol since 1978.

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Under the Tennessee Heritage Protection Act of 2016 — passed largely in response to an effort in Memphis to remove a statue of Forrest from a city park — a monument on public property can only be removed or altered with the approval of two-thirds of the Tennessee Historical Commission. Removal of monuments and statues at the State Capitol and Bicentennial Mall must be approved by the Capitol Commission as well.

But even if the Capitol Commission gives the OK, it doesn't mean the bust is in an immediate peril. The THPA requires 60 days pass between the filing of a petition for removal and an initial hearing before the Historical Commission and that the final hearing on such a petition not occur sooner than 180 days from the filing. The THPA requires that these hearings take place at "regular meetings" of the THC, which occur the third Friday in February, June and October.

The THC's October 13 meeting would, obviously, not meet those requirements. The initial hearing could take place at the February 16 meeting — 168 days after September 1 — with the final hearing at the June 15 meeting.

The Capitol Commission's members are:

• Finance & Administration Commissioner Larry Martin
• General Services Commissioner Bob Oglesby
• Environment & Conservation Commissioner Bob Martineau
• Secretary of State Tre Hargett
• State Treasurer David Lillard
• Comptroller Justin Wilson
• THC Chair Reavis Mitchell, a Fisk University history professor
• Sen. Jack Johnson, Republican of Franklin
• Rep. Curtis Johnson, Republican of Clarksville
• Davidson County Criminal Court Clerk Howard Gentry
• Tammy White, President & CEO of Leadership Knoxville
• Memphis attorney King Rogers

Though the bust of Forrest has been controversial virtually from the time it was erected, calls for its removal have intensified in the wake of the deadly white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va. that was organized ostensibly to protest the removal of a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee there. Both of Tennessee's Republican U.S. Senators and Gov. Bill Haslam have supported the removal of the bust.

Image via Wikimedia Commons user Kaldari, used under Creative Commons