New York City Hall is Removing a Statue of Thomas Jefferson due to his Slaveholding Past

The New York City Hall yesterday approved the removal of the statue of Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers of the United States, placed in the boardroom more than a century ago because of the slave-owning past of politics, AFP reported, quoted by BTA.

A city government commission unanimously approved the removal of the statue in principle. Jefferson, one of the authors of the Declaration of Independence, kept more than 600 slaves on his plantation in Virginia. From one of his slaves he had six children.

Latin American and black city officials have been pushing for the statue to be removed for years. It will be moved to one of the halls of the Historical Society in New York.

The third president of the United States "Jefferson represents some of the most shameful pages in the long and nuanced history of our country," explained African-American Adrienne Adams, a city councilor in New York.

The debate over the statue's presence in City Hall has resumed with the development of the "Black Life Matters" movement, created in connection with the death of African-American George Floyd during a May 2020 arrest by a white police officer in Minneapolis.

/ClubZ