Mississippi Governor Once Again Declares April Confederate Heritage Month

Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves is standing by his decision to name April Confederate Heritage Month again.

On Friday, April 8th, the Republican governor signed the proclamation. It made no mention of slavery, which was Mississippi’s stated reason for trying to secede from the U.S. in 1861. Despite the state trying to distance itself from the Confederate flag in recent years, Reeves said he didn’t believe this was the year to stop the proclamation, which four state governors have done in the past.

Reeves signed a law in 2020 that abolished the United States’ only state flag with a Confederate battle emblem. The state replaced the Confederate-themed state flag with one featuring a magnolia and has removed Confederacy monuments. However, Mississippi still has a Confederate Heritage Day in April, which is a paid holiday for state employees.

Former Mississippi Governor Ray Mabus, a Democrat, slammed Reeves for the proclamation. During Mabus’s term from 1988 to 1992, he did not issue a Confederate Heritage Month proclamation, which he says was started by an “overt White supremacist.”

“His ‘Confederate Heritage Month’ proclamation sounds like he’s endorsing critical race theory: learn from the past etc,” Mabus stated in a tweet. “Heritage of Confederacy is treason and slavery. 

His “Confederate Heritage Month” proclamation sounds like he’s endorsing critical race theory: learn from the past etc. Heritage of Confederacy is treason and slavery.We should learn from those things just maybe not in way he imagines https://t.co/OCfWRW3Ymf

— Ray Mabus (@SECNAV75) April 13, 2022