Virginia's lone black statewide official sits out Robert E. Lee tribute

RICHMOND, VA - JAN 18: Virginia Lt Governor Justin Fairfax (D) stepped off the rostrum in the Virginia Senate as a member paid tribute to Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee January 18, 2019, in Richmond, Virginia. (Laura Vozzella/TWP)

By Laura Vozzella January 18 at 3:05 PM
RICHMOND — Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax, only the second African American elected to statewide office in Virginia, briefly bowed out of his duties in the state Senate on Friday in protest of a tribute to Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Fairfax (D), who normally presides over Richmond’s upper chamber, stepped off the dais and let a Republican wield the gavel while Sen. Richard Stuart (R-King George) marked Lee’s 212th birthday with praise for “a great Virginian and a great American.”

“I believe there are certain people in history we should honor that way in the Senate . . . and I don’t believe that he is one of them,” Fairfax, a descendant of slaves, said in an interview afterward. “I think it’s very divisive to do what was done there, particularly in light of the history that we’re now commemorating — 400 years since the first enslaved Africans came to the commonwealth of Virginia.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/virginias-lone-black-statewide-official-sits-out-robert-e-lee-tribute/2019/01/18/7b721ba4-1b4c-11e9-88fe-f9f77a3bcb6c_story.html?utm_term=.aa033bdf1e43&wpisrc=nl_buzz&wpmm=1