Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas mark Martin Luther King/Robert E. Lee Day - Arkansas Governor wants t
By Leada Gore | lgore@al.com
Alabama's combined Robert E. Lee/Dr. Martin Luther King holiday is set for Jan. 18. And while there seems to be no effort in Alabama to change the practice of commemorating the birth of the Confederate general and the civil rights leader on the same day, one state is making a move to end the practice.
Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, said he hopes the state's legislature will end the practice of the joint holiday by 2017. If that occurs, only Alabama and Mississippi would still combine the days, which are marked on the third Monday of January.
"I would like to see his special day, his Martin Luther King Day, be a separate day to himself and to the recognition of his role in the civil rights movement in our country," Hutchinson said Wednesday. "It's important that that day be distinguished and separate and focused on that civil rights struggle and what he personally did in that effort, the great leader he was during that cause. They need to be distinguished and separate."
Arkansas has recognized Lee's birthday since the 1940s. State lawmakers voted to recognize King's birthday as a state holiday in 1983, and combined the celebrations two years later.
Two previous efforts to separate the holidays in the last Arkansas legislative session failed to get out of committee.
Alabama will mark the combined holiday on Jan. 18.
Alabama currently has three holidays set aside to honor Confederate leaders. The birthday of Confederate President Jefferson Davis is celebrated on the first Monday in June and Confederate Memorial Day is marked each year in April. Alabama is the last state to have a legal holiday set aside to solely commemorate the birthday of Davis, the president of the Confederate States of America from 1861-1865.