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MARTIN LUTHER KING JR
PRAYER RREAKFAST
See Opinion page on A6
See Sports on page Bl*
The Chronicle
Volume45,Number 18 WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. THURSDAY, January 10,2019
Government shutdown closes National Black
Museum indefinitely
BY ERICK JOHNSON
SPECIAL TO THE CHRONICLE
The popular National Museum of African-American
History and Culture (NMAAHC) closed Wednesday, Jan.
2, the latest attraction to close due to the partial govern
ment shutdown. Hundreds of employees at the museum
have been furloughed as a result of the closure.
The closure threatens the travel plans of thousands of
black students and families who are wrapping up their
holiday breaks to explore their history on Constitution
Avenue.
The NMAAHC is among the Smithsonian’s 19 muse
ums, galleries and National Zoo that have closed as the
government shutdown heads into its 11th day.
All of the Smithsonian museums will be closed indef
initely as Congress and President Donald Trump continue
to clash over a budget that includes Trump’s plans to raise
$5 billion for a wall along the Mexican border. With bil
lions to go and partisan politics, lawmakers are far from
ending the stalemate anytime soon.
The U.S. Departments of Agriculture, Interior,
Commerce and Justice have been shuttered since the par
tial shutdown began Dec. 22. Other federal agencies and
attractions have kept their doors open with the help of
state funding and surplus budgets. One of those attrac
tions is the NMAAHC, which had a surplus budget that
carried over from the prior year, said Linda St. Thomas,
chief spokesman for the Smithsonian Museum Institution,
which oversees the NMAAHC and its other attractions.
With no federal budget, all of the government employ
ees at the Smithsonian’s attractions will be furloughed.
That means about 200 employees at NMAAHC won’t be
working until a federal budget has been hammered out.
“We are legally not allowed to stay open while there’s
no budget,” St. Thomas said.
The museum’s popular Sweet Home Cafe will close
as well, though the facility is run by an outside company
with non-government employees, St. Thomas said.
St. Thomas was unable to provide NMAAHC’s spe-
Photo by Michael Barnes
Photo courtesy of The Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture
cific annual operating budget because it shares a $51 mil
lion budget with the rest of Smithsonian’s attractions.
The NMAAHC is the only national museum devoted
exclusively to the documentation of African-American
life, history, and culture. Established by a federal law in
2003, the opening on Sept. 24,2016, followed decades of
efforts to promote and highlight the contributions of
African-Americans. The 400,000 square foot NMAAHC
has attracted nearly a million people who have viewed
thousands of artifacts spanning five floors. The museum
is the hottest museum in Washington, where busloads of
black churches and family reunions make the NMAAHC
a priority destination. To control record crowds, the free
museum continues to use timed passes to regulate the
flow of visitors.
It will be a rare scene for locals to see a closed
NMAAHC and an empty and quiet front entrance.
See Closed on A2
Daughters of
Confederacy
vow to fight
following order
to remove statue
BY TEVIN STINSON
THE CHRONICLE
For over a week now the corner of Fourth and Liberty
Streets has been the topic of discussions across the state
following the vandalization of a Confederate statue out
side the old Forsyth County Courthouse and the city’s
decision to allow the owners of the statue until the end of
the month to have it removed from the corner downtown.
Although the clock to have the monument removed is
set at less than 30 days, it seems as if the feud between the
United Daughters of the Confederacy and the City of
Winston Salem is just getting started.
Here’s what we know; the series of events began on
Christmas day. Just before 6 p.m. officers with the
Winston-Salem Police Department (WSPD) responded to
a call that the monument had been defaced. Upon arrival,
officers found the words “Cowards & Traitors” written in
permanent marker.
In response to the most recent case defacing, on the
last day of 2018, City Attorney Angela Carmon issued a
letter demanding that the statue erected in 1905 be
For the past few weeks the Confederate statue out
side the old Forsyth County Courthouse has been
the topic of discussion across the state after
“Cowards & Traitors' was written on the statue at
Christmas.
removed by Jan. 31 or face legal action from the city. The
city also offered to move the statue to Salem Cemetery
where more than 30 Confederate graves are located, but
the Daughters of the Confederacy declined.
During the city’s annual Emancipation Proclamation
ceremony, Mayor Allen Joines said, in its current place
downtown, the statue is creating a public nuisance. Over
the years the statue has been at the center of controversy
several times. In August of 2017, shortly after white
supremacist marched in Charlottesville, Virginia, two
sides of the statue were painted and the motto on the stat
ue, “Our Confederate Dead” was covered. Less than 24-
hours after that, men armed with shotguns and rifles spent
hours protecting the statue from other vandals.
One of the men protecting the statue who didn’t want
to give his full name said they were just trying to protect
a piece of history. He said, “We just don’t see the point in
taking these statues down. That’s our stance: preserving
history no matter good or bad. That’s how you learn from
it.” *
In the letter issued by Attorney Carmon, she explains
the removal of the statue is about public safety. She also
mentioned incidents in Charlottesville, Durham and
Chapel Hill over Confederate monuments that led to civil
unrest.
She wrote, “...vandals defaced the Confederate statue
with the inflammatory words “Cowards & Traitors” there
by invoking significant concern about the safety of the
statue and the potential for confrontation, breaches of the
peace and other nuisance type conduct similar to that
endured by other cities.
“It is clear that the tenor of the vandal’s message has
escalated and the intensity of the same is not likely to
wane with the passage of time. The city is not in a position
to provide constant security checks necessary for the pro
tection of the statue and to mitigate the recurring acts of
vandalism.”
In a statement released on Thursday, Jan. 4, the North
Carolina Division of the United Daughters of the
Confederacy say they plan to do everything in their power
to make sure the statue stays put.
The statement reads, “The North Carolina Division,
United Daughters of the Confederacy, wished to register
our dismay at recent actions and statements of the city
Winston-Salem regarding the Confederate memorial on
See Statue on A2
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U.S. Department of Education
opens claim against WS/FCS
BY TEVIN STINSON
THE CHRONICLE
Less than six months
after the complaint was
filed by the Action4Equity
Coalition, citing failure on
behalf of the Winston-
Salem/Forsyth County
School System to address
complaints about issues at
Ashley Elementary, the
Office of Civil Rights at
the U.S. Department of
Education has agreed to
look into the claim.
A coalition of organiza
tions including the local
branch of the NAACP, the
Submitted photo
Ashely Elementary School
Ministers' Conference of
See Claim on A2
Winston-Salem and
.WILSON.
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