SLRC UPDATE:
27 June 2004

SLRC Weekly Update

Edgerton’s "March on Richmond" breaks media silence barrier

RICHMOND, VA -- H K. Edgerton, Chairman of the SLRC’s Board of Advisors, climaxed a 160-mile march from Littleton, North Carolina, to Richmond by joining Confederate heritage vigil keepers at DuPont Corporation’s Spruance Plant on M, scene of an ongoing heritage battle.

Edgerton undertook his march, he said, not only to show solidarity with those who have been picketing the plant for four years, but also to "shatter the conspiracy of silence" that has characterized media coverage of the DuPont situation.

"For four long years, DuPont employees have courageously stood their ground outside this plant where they are not allowed to display the symbols of their heritage, and yet the media have steadfastly ignored them and their persecution at the hands of this corporate giant," Edgerton said at the beginning of his march. "There is a complete media blackout going on. I intend to change that." And he did.

Edgerton’s march attracted lengthy and positive press coverage from several local newspapers and TV stations. He and his cause were the subject of lengthy articles in the Petersburg, Va., Progress-Index and the South Hill Enterprise. Even the now politically correct Richmond Times-Dispatch gave him largely objective coverage. "[DuPont] is a Fortune 500 company that is leading the way in dismantling the heritage of the South," the Times-Dispatch quoted Edgerton -- accurately -- as saying on his arrival in Richmond.

The March on Richmond began on Monday, May 17, with a ceremony at the monument to Confederate Private John Leach, a Littleton native and pioneer in the field of race relations. Leach’s monument shows two clasped marble hands, one black, one white, with the inscription, "This is what he meant - all men up! Erected by his colored friends." HK reached Richmond on May 27.

Related News

Lyons ponies up DuPont blood money

SLRC Chief Trial Counsel Kirk D. Lyons has tendered a check in the amount of $10,124.10 to the U.S. District Court Clerk of the Eastern District of Virginia. The sum represents Lyons’ share of $37,000 in sanctions imposed by the Court upon him and his clients, the seven Spruance Plant workers now famous as the "DuPont 7". So far, the Court has only moved against Lyons in carrying out the sanctions process; no effort has as yet been made to collect from the plaintiffs. DuPont also sought to collect sanctions from the SLRC itself, which was not even a party to the suit; the SLRC has counterattacked by filing a suit for sanctions against the DuPont attorneys, on the ground that their attempt to include the SLRC is frivolous. Lyons’ sanctions money will be held by the Clerk of the District court pending the appeal process.

Lyons himself was philosophical about the money. "Well, there goes my raise!  Ten thousand dollars is an enormous amount for hardscrabble lawyer with a wife and five children," he said. "In fact, it’s about a third of my salary -- or what my salary’s supposed to be. But we’re doing this by the book; the clerk can hold the stakes while we fight for a "fair shake" from the Court of Appeals," he said. The SLRC has indemnified Lyons.

Ed. Note: The saga of "The DuPont Seven" is featured in the current issue of The Southern Mercury.   www.southernmercury.com

Last Confederate widow, former SLRC Client, passes away

ENTERPRISE, AL -- Mrs. Alberta Martin, the last surviving widow of a Confederate soldier, died in an Enterprise nursing home on May 31of complications from a heart attack she had suffered on May 7. She was 97.

Mrs. Martin was the widow of William Jasper Martin, who saw service in Northern Virginia with Company K of the 4th Alabama Infantry. She married him when she was in her 20’s and he was 81.

The SLRC represented Mrs. Martin in 1998 after author Tony Horwitz, in his book Confederates in the Attic, ridiculed her personally and accused her husband of desertion. (Horwitz claimed to have carefully researched his allegations, but an examination of the 4th Alabama’s records revealed at least two other William Martins serving in the same company. The state of Alabama awarded Martin a Confederate pension, which if he had deserted he would certainly have never received.). The SLRC also got Mrs. Martin a pension increase.

For the most part, national media reported Mrs. Martin’s passing with the same thinly veiled amused contempt it used in reporting on her when she was alive. An Associated Press story by Phillip Rawls spoke of her "unlikely ascent from poor sharecropper’s daughter to the belle of 21st century Confederate history buffs who paraded her across the south."

Mrs. Martin was buried beside her husband at New Ebenezer Baptist Church near Elba, Alabama, on June 12, with full Confederate honors.

Polka Dolts: Texas festival bans SCV participation

Harasses members on private property

ENNIS, TX -- This small Texas town’s annual Polka Festival, which celebrates its Czech immigrant origins, is the high point of its civic year. But when members of a nearby Sons of Confederate Veterans camp applied for a vendor permit at the event, they discovered what many SCV camps across the country already knew: diversity is great, and celebrating heritage is wonderful ... as long as your heritage isn’t Confederate.

A delegation of the SCV’s William Henry Parsons Camp #415 applied to the Ennis Chamber of Commerce for a booth permit, looking to sell some Confederate-themed merchandise and distribute membership literature. They were turned down flat, although it was later reported that other vendors sold Confederate merchandise at their booths during the festival.

So on SLRC advice, Camp 415 tried a different tactic: it secured permission to set up its booth on a piece of private property nearby. What happened next was summarized in a guest editorial written by SCV member Robert N. Jones, Jr., who was there:

"On Saturday morning," Jones wrote, "we put out a few pictures of Civil War battles, some old books, Confederate flags, commemorative t-shirts from our [annual] re-enactment, and miscellaneous Confederate items to sell. Hardly had we set up than two Ennis police cruisers and a city inspection vehicle came screeching to a halt at our booth.

"The police officers and the inspector, looking obviously embarrassed, had been sent on a distasteful mission of harassment," Jones continued. "We were told that we were lawbreakers."

Jones wondered aloud how a bona fide nonprofit organization was breaking the law by selling lawful merchandise on private property. He was told that the SCV was "different". Camp 415 was then told to strike its booth and skedaddle, private property or no, or go to jail. A cell phone call to Chief Trial Counsel Lyons soon backed them off!

"The next time [a] youth group wants to hold a garage sale in Ennis," Jones concluded, "will [it] be forced to clear what [it] is selling with the police authorities? How long will it be before government decides your church is ’different’? Or your PTA? Or your Rotary Club?"

Stuart Lyons continues to recover eyesight

BLACK MOUNTAIN, NC -- Stuart Lyons, 10-year-old son of Kirk and Brenna Lyons, continues to improve after undergoing surgery to repair a torn cornea he sustained in an accident in March.

Young Lyons was injured by a stick while playing at home. Originally he suffered substantial loss of sight in his left eye, but the cornea repair -- eleven tiny stitches -- has been remarkably successful according to his doctors. In the process of healing itself, the cornea has already burst nine of the 11 stitches, resulting in a substantial restoration of sight.

"We want to thank everybody who prayed for Stuart," said Brenna Lyons, Stuart’s mother. "It worked!"

Breaking News

Texas GOP pledges to restore Confederate plaques

AUSTIN, TX -- At its 2004 convention on June 4, the Republican Party of Texas adopted a platform plank calling for the restoration of the Confederate plaques which were removed from the Texas Supreme Court Building in 1999.

The plaques were removed on orders from then Gov. George W. Bush, himself a Republican. The SLRC, representing the Sons of Confederate Veterans subsequently sued the State of Texas to have the plaques, which were originally paid for by the Confederate Widows’ Pension Fund, restored.

The platform plank, as adopted, reads:

Symbols of American Heritage -- We call upon governmental entities to protect monuments, national parks, waterways, cemeteries and all other symbols of our American heritage from being altered, removed or placed under international control. The party calls for the restoration of the plaques honoring the Confederate Widows’ Pension Fund contribution that were illegally removed from the Texas Supreme Court and other state buildings.

The adoption of the plank by the Texas republicans followed an intense grassroots lobbying effort led by Michael Franks of Wharton, TX. Franks, a descendant of one of the first families of Texas and longtime state GOP activist, canvassed individual Republican state legislators, haunted precinct caucuses and finally, as the convention opened, launched a campaign featuring stickers bearing the likeness of Robert E. Lee and the slogan, "Put back the Plaque."

"This is of course a very significant development," said SLRC Chief Trial Counsel Kirk Lyons. "It’s a huge step in the right direction, but it will now be up to Texas Republicans to monitor their party and make sure it honors this important plank and acts on it."

Because the interest in this case is great and developments are ongoing, the SLRC has installed a separate page for it at our website: www.slrc-csa.org/site/misc/txplaques/txplaques.php

Fourth Circuit reinstates Coburg Dairy case

RICHMOND, VA -- The U. S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has reinstated the lawsuit filed by a South Carolina mechanic who was fired from Coburg Dairy in Charleston for displaying Confederate flag stickers on his toolbox.

The court’s unanimous decision returned the case to Judge Weston Houk, who dismissed the original suit last May. Houk now has instructions to forward the case to the South Carolina Court of Common Please, where it originated. Coburg attorneys had had the case moved to Federal court, where they expected an easy dismissal.

In a press release dated May 26, the SLRC applauded the Fourth Circuit’s decision, saying, "the travesty [has been] that Mr. Dixon’s lawsuit has been delayed and delayed while Coburg used the federal court system to delay the day of reckoning and deny Mathew Dixon his day in court. "The SLRC warmly commends the hard work and perseverance of Mr. Dixon’s attorneys, Samuel Howell IV and Michael Scarborough."

Case Notes

Bechtel

Richard Smith, our client and the plaintiff in the action against the Bechtel Savannah River Plant, endured more than four hours of testimony and questioning during recent depositions in Columbia, SC. He did an excellent job of detailing the harassment he experienced at the hands of his employer, including the year’s probation he received for wearing an SCV ball cap to work. A Bechtel representative was present and heard Richard’s testimony. More depositions will follow soon; we will keep you posted. Bechtel, tearing a page out of DuPont's book, is threatening sanctions if Richard does not dismiss.

Jacksonville FAA

We have just filed a notice of appeal with the 11th Circuit, based largely on the fact that the judge who heard the original case in effect denied that First Amendment rights even apply in the workplace! At this juncture we are working with the opposing counsel on a joint appendix for the appeal itself.

Lawrence County

Depositions in this important case have been postponed twice. It is reported that Ricky Nichols, principal of the high school where Confederate symbols were banned and a co-defendant in the case, has been summoned again to active military duty, although for a limited period of time. As we have noted before, this case can have as much impact, in terms of protecting our students and their heritage, as Castorina. Please pledge your support so that we may continue our active involvement!

A Message from the Chief Trial Counsel

Dear Supporters:

As you can tell from the contents of this issue, it's going to be a long, hot summer for Confederate heritage. The forces of so-called political correctness are growing ever bolder and more aggressive in their efforts to obliterate our culture and to persecute into submission those who are attempting to rescue it.

At the SLRC, this translates into even more financial urgency than usual. We just paid out more than $10,000 in sanctions in the DuPont case, which we are still keeping alive. A large corporate law firm with substantial reserves, to whom $10,000 would be lunch money, would pay the sanctions and not bat an eye ... but there are no high-roller law practices working to defend Southern heritage and culture, just us. And to us, $10,000 is a substantial hit. Our enemies, with their own deep pockets, know this well, and word gets around. Hence, Bechtel is now rattling the sanctions saber. There will be others; our judicial system all too often operates according to the Golden Rule: he who has the gold makes the rules. Additionally, as other cases heat up, our travel and research expenses increase proportionally.

So we tighten our belt one more notch: the operations of the SLRC are supposed to be overseen by a full-time Executive Director, but at present we don't have one because we can't fund the salary for that position. This is frustrating because since our E.D. job came open some months ago a couple of handsomely qualified people have expressed an interest. They have even offered to take salary cuts in order to work here ... but we'd still have to pay them a living wage and at the present we just can't do that. This leaves us all sharing the responsibility for handling day-to-day operations, which in turn means we are spread even thinner.

Your contributions are literally what keep us going, so please contribute as generously as you can. The SLRC is making a difference but we have to be able to continue the fight. Bless you, our readers and supporters, for your steadfastness; and God bless Dixie!

Faithfully,

Kirk D. Lyons

Please visit our website at www.slrc-csa.org and click on the "How You Can Help" tab.  We accept Visa , MasterCard, Discover http://www.slrc-csa.org/site/helpus.php and paypal: https://www.paypal.com/xclick/business=slrc%40slrc-csa.org

Please send in your pledge or donation today.  ALL PLEDGES OR DONATIONS ARE TAX-DEDUCTIBLE!

Our address is SLRC, P.O. Box 1235, Black Mountain, NC 28711. Phone:  828-669-5189

For more background on the plaques see our Texas Plaques webpage at:

http://www.slrc-csa.org/site/misc/txplaques/txplaques.php

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Allison Schaum
Case Manager SLRC
slrc@crystalink.com

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