FRANKLIN, Tenn. (AP) — Two years after voting to remove the Confederate flag from its seal, a Tennessee county finally has the go-ahead to do so.
The Williamson County Commission voted in 2020 to request permission from the Tennessee Historical Commission to remove the flag from the upper-left quadrant of its 1960s-era seal. That decision came after months of discussion and the appointment of a task force that unanimously recommended removal.
The county had to go through the Historical Commission because the Tennessee Heritage Protection Act limits the removal or changing of historical memorials. On Friday, the county shifted tactics, asking the Historical Commission to declare that the law does not apply to the seal, The Tennessean reported.
“Williamson County now brings this petition for a declaratory order asking the Tennessee Historical Commission to hold that … the seal is not a ‘memorial’ as defined in the act,” County Attorney Jeff Moseley wrote in the petition. Even if it was a memorial, the petition continued, “it was not erected for, named, or dedicated on public property in honor of any historic conflict, historic entity, historic event, historic figure or historic organization.”
The Historical Commission unanimously accepted the county’s argument.
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