UNC System says it won’t focus on Silent Sam after judge orders statue and money returned
The UNC System Board of Governors must find a new solution to the dispute over the Silent Sam Confederate monument. But chairman Randy Ramsey made clear at a board meeting Friday that the statue is not going to be the board’s primary focus.
“That monument does not educate students. It does not run the universities. It does not make governance decisions regarding our university,” Ramsey said after the meeting. “As much as it may be a newsmaker, I’m not going to let it distract this board going forward.”
Ramsey and UNC System interim President Bill Roper said there are many more important issues facing the Board of Governors and that members will not spend their time talking about the monument.
Ramsey’s comments came after a judge ordered the North Carolina Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans to return Silent Sam to the UNC System within 45 days. The remaining balance of the $2.5 million trust fund set up for the statue must also be returned to the university within 10 days.
Orange County Superior Court Judge Allen Baddour filed his written order Thursday dismissing the controversial case between the SCV and the UNC System and the Board of Governors and voiding the settlement. Baddour had dismissed the lawsuit and voided the settlement in court last week and determined the SCV lacked the legal standing to sue, but he did not give his reasoning at the time.
The deal, negotiated behind closed doors, was originally settled in November 2019 and gave the SCV ownership of the statue and access to $2.5 million to preserve and display it.
Ramsey said Friday he hoped the Silent Sam settlement would allow the university system to focus on its core responsibilities while keeping Chapel Hill safe.
While Ramsey was disappointed that the decision was overturned by the court earlier this month, he said they are getting the university’s money back.
“We will secure the monument away from campus, and we will deal with it in due course,” Ramsey said.
He mentioned the ongoing UNC System presidential search, several chancellor searches and setting tuition and fees at campuses as issues that need the board’s attention.
“That’s where we need to focus our time,” Ramsey said, “not on the monument at this point.”
After the board meeting Friday, Roper said the system will be working with others to find a lasting, lawful and safe solution. He said Silent Sam will not go back on UNC-Chapel Hill’s campus.
Ramsey also said that the board does not want to endanger any campuses and that safety will be a priority as it considers options.
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Why was the Silent Sam case dismissed and the settlement voided?
Baddour’s written order filed Thursday says the United Daughters of the Confederacy, which raised funds for the Silent Sam statue and gifted it to UNC-Chapel Hill, no longer owned the statue once it was put on campus in 1913.
In order to pursue this lawsuit, the SCV obtained rights from the modern United Daughters of the Confederacy group to establish ownership of the statue. But there’s no evidence that the two UDC groups are directly related, according to the written order.
Baddour wrote that the SCV lacked the standing to bring the lawsuit against the UNC System because it did not establish that the modern UDC ever owned the statue and therefore, the SCV had no legal claim to it.
The UNC System owns Silent Sam and will again need to figure out what to do with the Confederate soldier statue that was toppled by students in August 2018.
What happens to the Silent Sam statue?
Baddour ordered that the SCV must return Silent Sam to the UNC system within 45 days, ensuring it is safely transported and delivered.
They will need to notify the court if they can’t agree on a plan to transfer the property within 30 days.
The order and the meetings come a few days after Ripley Rand, the UNC System’s attorney, wrote Baddour asking for help in getting Silent Sam back and seeking advice on next steps.
The Board of Governors will “work to find a lasting and lawful solution to the dispute over the monument,” Rand said in a statement after the hearing last week.
He said their goals in deciding what to do with the Confederate monument are “to protect public safety of the University community, restore normality to campus, and be compliant with the Monument Law.”
The 2015 monuments law bans removing, relocating or altering monuments, memorials and other “objects of remembrance” on public property without permission from the N.C. Historical Commission.
What happens to the money?
The trustee of the $2.5 million fund was ordered to provide the court with an accounting of any money spent from the trust within 10 days. That includes the amount, date and payee of each transaction as well as any outstanding payments.
If there are no “unsatisfied obligations,” then the trustee is ordered to return the remaining balance to the UNC System within 10 days, the order states.
Baddour said the trustee can hold money in the trust for those outstanding payments and “seek leave of the Court before taking any action or disbursing reserved funds.”
SCV attorney Boyd Sturges said the SCV has already used $52,000 from the trust for his fees as an attorney in this case.
Once the accounting of all payments is sent to the court, the trust will be dissolved.
