US Capitol statue of teen civil rights leader Barbara Rose Johns to fill Robert E. Lee’s place

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Starting Tuesday, the U.S. Capitol will display a statue of a teenaged Barbara Rose Johns as she protested poor conditions at her segregated Virginia high school, a pointed replacement for a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee that was removed several years ago.

The unveiling ceremony of the statue representing Virginia in the Capitol will take place in Emancipation Hall, featuring Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson, Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin and Virginia's congressional delegation.

Johns was 16 years old in 1951 when she led a student strike for equal education at R.R. Moton High School in Farmville, Virginia. The students’ cause gained the support of NAACP lawyers, who filed a lawsuit that would become one of the five cases that the U.S. Supreme Court reviewed in Brown v. Board of Education. The high court’s landmark 1954 decision declared “separate but equal” public schools unconstitutional.

Johns later married the Rev. William Powell and became Barbara Rose Johns Powell, raised five children and was a librarian in the Philadelphia Public Schools. She died at 56 in 1991.

A model of the statue showed the young Johns standing to the side of a lectern, holding a tattered book over her head. Its pedestal is engraved with the words, “Are we going to just accept these conditions, or are we going to do something about it?” It also features a quote from the Book of Isaiah, “And a little child shall lead them.”

In a statement Monday, Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia said the Bible verse reminds him of Johns’ bravery and leadership.

“I’m thrilled that millions of visitors to the U.S. Capitol, including many young people, will now walk by her statue and learn about her story,” Kaine said. “May she continue to inspire generations to stand up for equality and justice.”

The statue replaces one of Lee that was removed in December 2020 from the Capitol, where it had represented Virginia for 111 years. The removal occurred during a time of renewed national attention over Confederate monuments after the death of George Floyd and was relocated to the Virginia Museum of History & Culture.

The Johns piece is part of the National Statuary Hall Collection at the Capitol, in which each state can contribute two statues. The other statue representing Virginia is of George Washington.

National Statuary Hall displays 35 of the statues. Others are in the Crypt, the Hall of Columns and the Capitol Visitor Center.

Former Democratic Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam had requested the removal of the Lee statue. In December 2020, a state commission recommended replacing Lee’s statue with a statue of Johns.

The Johns statue, sculpted by Steven Weitzman of Maryland, received final approval from the Architect of the Capitol and the Joint Committee on the Library in July.

Johns is also featured in a sculpture at the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial outside the state Capitol in Richmond.