NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — On Thursday, Tennessee's State Capitol Commission voted 9-2 to remove the bust of Nathan Bedford Forrest from the capitol building, but the statue won't be moving right away.
The historic vote came after weeks of protests surrounding the bust of Nathan Bedford Forrest, who was a Confederate general and Ku Klux Klan grand wizard. The bust has been in the Tennessee State Capitol since 1978, but protesters have called for it to be moved to the Tennessee State Museum.
Last week, Gov. Bill Lee called a special meeting of the Capitol Commission and urged members to vote to move the bust to the museum where context could be added.
"...the most appropriate way to add context is to move it to the museum where the bust can be seen in its full context," Lee said.
But the Capitol Commission's vote is just the first step in relocation, and now the decision goes to another state body.
"It has to come before the Tennessee Historical Commission," Kent Dollar said. Dollar is a history professor at Tennessee Tech University and is also a member of the Historical Commission.
In 2013, state lawmakers created the Tennessee Heritage Protection Act. The law gave the Historical Commission the power to approve or deny the relocation or renaming of any monument. The Capitol Commission now must request a waiver from the Historical Commission to allow the state to move the statue.
The Historical Commission is scheduled to meet on Friday, but Dollar said it is very unlikely that the Nathan Bedford Forrest bust would come up at that meeting.
"There's no way it will come before the commission at our meeting tomorrow because the state's going to have to post that they're doing this," Dollar said. "It probably will be slated for our October Meeting."
The commission also must wait 60 days after a waiver is requested to make a decision.
Dollar said at the meeting, attorneys on both sides of the issue will present evidence and make their case to the commission members. The commission will also have some time for public comment. Then, commissioners will vote on whether to approve the waiver. Twenty of the 29 commission members need to vote in favor of the move for the waiver to be approved.
"I don't like to predict future votes because there's so many factors that go into it," Dollar said.
