House to vote Wednesday on removing Confederate statues from Capitol

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The House on Wednesday will vote on removing Confederate statues from the Capitol, with Democrats saying "shameful reminders of systemic racism" no longer should be honored inside the home of U.S. democracy.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and members of the Congressional Black Caucus made the moral case for removing the statues that have symbolized America's history of slavery and oppression of African Americans.

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"This day is about doing better," Hoyer, D-Md., said in a news conference ahead of the floor debate. "Recognizing our faults, not honoring them. And relegating them, yes, to history, but not to honor."

The legislation would replace the bust of Roger Brooke Taney in the Old Supreme Court Chamber of the Capitol with a bust of Thurgood Marshall, who in 1967 became the first African American to serve on the Supreme Court. The legislation would also remove all statues of individuals "who voluntarily served the Confederate States of America from display in the United States Capitol."

Taney, a Maryland native and justice from 1836 to 1864, wrote the Dred Scott decision that found Black people were not American citizens. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi already identified 11 statues in the Capitol of Confederate leaders, including Jefferson Davis and Alexander Stephens, the former president and vice president of the Confederate states who were charged with treason against the United States.

The legislation would need passage in the Senate, too.

The vote Wednesday comes just days after the death of Rep. John Lewis, who died Friday at the age of 80 from cancer. House Democrats said the best way to honor Lewis's legacy is to pass a new Voting Rights Act, but removing the statues -- which represent the opposite of what he stood for -- is what the Georgia Democrat would have wanted.

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"If John were here, he would be speaking ... to you about this effort," Hoyer said.

Rep. Karen Bass, the head of the Congressional Black Caucus, said the vote is an appropriate way to honor Lewis.

"Just imagine what it feels like as an African American to know that my ancestors built the Capitol, but yet there are monuments to the very people that enslaved my ancestors," Bass, D-Calif., said. "...These individuals do not deserve to be honored."

Rep. G.K. Butterfield, D-N.C., spoke of his great grandmother being a slave and of his childhood growing up in the rural and segregated South.

"A nation cannot rewrite its history, I think we've all alluded to that. But we can, we should be intentional of who we honor," Butterfield said, calling the statues "shameful reminders of systemic racism."

HOYER SUPPORTS REMOVAL OF CONFEDERATE STATUES IN US CAPITOL, WANTS BUST OF JUDGE TAKEN DOWN IMMEDIATELY

Confederate statues -- and others including Christopher Columbus -- have been toppled and vandalized nationwide as protests and riots have continued since the death of George Floyd May 25 in Minneapolis. With police brutality, health disparities from the COVID-19 crisis and racism front and center, House Democrats said no longer glorifying symbols of slavery in the "people's house" is an important step forward.

Fox News' Caroline McKee contributed to this report.