Texas Senator Ted Cruz urged the state of Tennessee to change a law requiring its governor to sign a proclamation ordering a day to honor Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, an early leader of the Ku Klux Klan.
‘This is WRONG,’ Cruz wrote in the tweet posted on Friday. ‘Tennessee should not have an official day (tomorrow) honoring him. Change the law.’
Tennessee Governor Bill Lee told reporters this week that a 1969 state law required him to sign the proclamation, which he did, and July 13 was once again designated as ‘Nathan Bedford Forrest Day.’
Lee, who was photographed in Confederate soldier costume at a fraternity party in college, told the Tennessean on Friday: ‘I signed the bill because the law requires that I do that and I haven’t looked at changing that law.’
Lee’s proclamation praised Forrest as ‘a recognized military figure in American history and a native Tennessean.’
Forrest was a Confederate cavalry general who had amassed a fortune as a plantation owner and slave trader in Memphis before the Civil War.
Forrest was also a delegate to the 1868 Democratic Convention, held that year at Tammany Hall in New York City.
The slogan of that convention was: ‘This is a White Man’s Country, Let White Men Rule.’
By Friday, Lee was receiving pushback from both Republicans and Democrats for signing the proclamation.
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Source: Christian Post
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