Brenda Blagg: Separate the unequal

State lawmakers should split King, Lee observances

Arkansas just celebrated another of those dual holidays, claiming to honor both Dr. Martin Luther King and Robert E. Lee.

Will it be the last time?

Ask your legislator.

The state Legislature can correct this absurdity, if it will.

As of early this week, no bill had been filed, but Gov. Asa Hutchinson is urging lawmakers to separate these state observances of King and Lee.

This state has the distinction of being only one of three in the nation that attempts to honor the black civil rights leader on the same day as the white Civil War general. The others are Mississippi and Alabama.

There is just no way to justify the combination.

One man fought to defend slavery and worked to keep black people from voting. The other led the civil rights movement in this country, seeking better lives for America's blacks. Each is the antithesis of the other.

Nevertheless, Arkansas established the dual holiday back in the 1980s after the U.S. Congress declared the third Monday in January as a federal holiday to honor King.

Arkansas had made Lee's Jan. 19 birthday an official state holiday in the 1940s. That was more than 80 years past the end of the Civil War but at a time when the racial climate in Arkansas and the rest of the country was particularly tense.

By 1957, Arkansas would earn national attention over the integration crisis at Little Rock's Central High School. The reputation the state gained as a result of that conflict, which included federal troops having to protect the first black students attending Central High, still hovers over Arkansas.

Another decade would pass before King's fight for civil rights would lead him on a path of nonviolent civil disobedience. In 1968, he was gunned down in Memphis, where he had gone to march with sanitation workers.

It would be more than another decade before the nation decided to honor King by making the third Monday in January a federal holiday -- and Arkansas decided to move the Lee holiday to coincide.

Here we are in 2017 still marking a joint holiday.

It's not that no one has tried to change things. As recently as 2015, there was a serious effort in the Legislature to split the observances.

It failed after a legislative committee hearing drew crowds defending the continued celebration of both King and Lee. After several tries, the bill died in committee.

Gov. Hutchinson, who supported changing the law then, promised to be more involved this time around.

He included the need to separate the holidays in remarks leading up to the ongoing session. And this item was among his stated goals for this year when he addressed the Legislature.

Most recently, he again said separating the holidays is "the right thing to do," although he acknowledged it was up to state lawmakers to make it happen.

He made the comment at an interfaith prayer breakfast in Little Rock on Monday celebrating King.

The breakfast was one of many observances honoring King and his legacy that were held throughout Arkansas.

If there were any celebrations for Lee anywhere in Arkansas on Monday, they didn't make the news.

According to reports out of Little Rock, Hutchinson is looking for a lawmaker to sponsor the proposal this year.

Someone needs to step up and take that challenge.

As the governor put it, celebration of King's legacy "deserves a day unto itself" without distraction or a conflicting message.

Commentary on 01/18/2017

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