LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — While the nation honored the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. on Monday, three states celebrate another man as well.
In Arkansas, Alabama and Mississippi, the slain civil rights leader shares a state holiday with Robert E. Lee, commanding officer of the Confederate Army.
The two figures seem to coexist in the very fabric of the Arkansas’ capital city, where streets bear each of their names.
In 1983, lawmakers voted to recognize King Day as an official state holiday, but required state employees to choose which two holidays they wanted off — either King’s birthday on Jan. 15, Lee’s birthday on Jan. 19 or the employee’s birthday.
During the next regular legislative session in 1985, they voted to combine King and Lee’s holiday commemorations for the third Monday in January. Employees got to keep their birthdays as a holiday.
The large number of events celebrating King’s life always outweigh the nearly silent response to the Confederate general, said state Sen. Tracy Steele. He said some people hope to separate the overlapping honors for Lee and King.
But the president of the Arkansas chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People said in 1997 that it seemed inappropriate to honor King on the same day.
“Dr. King worked hard to unify the country,” Dale Charles said. “I wouldn’t say General Lee would be in the same notion of Martin Luther King. He was a great general and all, but he didn’t come close to what Martin Luther King was about.”
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