In total, seven people spoke about the Confederate memorial, with three people in favor of removing the plaques and four voicing their opposition to the removal.

“I’d like to thank all the commissioners that had a hand in putting Sylva Sam back to his original state, cause that’s something I grew up with all my life,” said Chris Keener. “It’s not about where we were, it's about how far we’ve come, in my opinion.”

As with many debates involving public remembrance of the Civil War, speakers in favor of removing the plaques tended to invoke heritage.

“Your leadership and commitment to preserving the history of Jackson County are deeply appreciated by many in our community,” said Megan MacMick. “This monument has stood as a silent witness to generations of change, struggle and growth. While it may represent different things to different people, for many of us, it is a part of our heritage.”

Author David Joy also spoke at the meeting. Joy’s latest novel “Those We Thought We Knew” — winner of the 2023 Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary Award, Willie Morris Award for Southern Fiction and the 2024 Sir Walter Raleigh Award — explores the complicated history of race in Jackson County and the persistent legacy of not just the Confederacy, but white supremacy. Joy, critical of the covert decision by commissioners to remove the plaque, was quick to acknowledge his own family’s complicated history.

“I’m a 12th-generation North Carolinian… but to admit that I’m a 12th-generation anything in this country means that I’m most likely the direct descendant of enslavers. In my case, I am,” said Joy. “That’s not an easy thing to say.”

With the plaques now gone, the Confederate flag and the words “Our Heroes of the Confederacy” are once again visible on the base of the statue. Joy noted that the Confederate flag is a symbol that has different meanings to different people. 

“I grew up in a time where that flag and that history was revered, and when I look back, I think it was the conflation of that flag with southern identity,” Joy said. “It came to mean all of these other things. I grew up going to Lynyrd Skynyrd shows, and when they hit ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ and a 100-by-50-foot Confederate flag dropped at the back of the stage and everybody went nuts, my daddy was one of them.”

But then, Joy said, he grew up; he read books.

Joy pointed to the words of Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens who, in an 1861 speech defining the new southern government said its “foundations are laid, its cornerstone rests upon the great truth, that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery — subordination to the superior race — is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical and moral truth.”

“I don’t care about any kind of revisionist history that wishes to place it as something else, because it’s not that,” said Joy. “I think about the Black communities in Jackson County; I think about people who have descendants here who go back hundreds of years and what every one of you who voted for that is saying is that you revere a moment in time when their ancestors were in bondage.”

In a county that relies on tourism, Joy asked commissioners to think about how people of color from out of town will feel when they see a monument with the Confederate flag.

“I view your actions as an act of white supremacy,” said Joy. “I think it’s shameful.”

Other speakers said the statue is an appropriate memorial to the Jackson residents who lived during the Civil War, especially those who fought and died for their state in the struggle.

“Both sides of my family fought for the Confederacy,” said Denny Wood. “They didn’t go to the Civil War to fight for slavery; they went because the state of North Carolina called, and they answered that call. So did my grandpa, so did my daddy, so did I.”

Wood said that growing up, he never thought the statue was racist.

“It was a part of history. That’s what a bunch of them put up way back then. It’s a tribute to their family members that went and fought in the Confederacy,” Wood said. “Was slavery wrong? Absolutely.”

In Wood’s view, putting plaques on the statue dishonored the 163 men from Jackson County who died fighting in the Civil War.

“When they erected that, that was not for slavery,” said Wood. “It was a monument for them 163.”

But Teri Cole-Smith came to the podium with another set of numbers.

“Let’s contextualize Sylva Sam by acknowledging Jackson County’s culpability in also owning slaves,” said Cole-Smith. “163 people died in the war… 218 people were enslaved here in Jackson County, and they were owned by families with last names that we commemorate even today on our street signs.”

Renee Coward brought the issue into the present, saying that in the wake of Hurricane Helene, she saw the force of good in her community.

“Good folks banding together to help their less fortunate neighbors. We didn’t ask about each other’s politics, religions, place of origin or on which side their ancestors fought in any wars,” Coward said. “Banding together was bigger than all of that. Being loving and accepting and giving was bigger than all of that. That’s what makes Jackson County and Sylva and North Carolina and Western North Carolina strong. That’s the kind of statue that I want to represent my hometown. One that shouts, ‘e pluribus unum.’ Out of many, one. Take the statue down.”

While many people on both sides of the issue were not happy with the compromise plaques when they were placed in 2021, several speakers noted that at the very least, they were a result of vast public engagement.

“To have done that with no moment for public comment, to have done that just on a whim … it is shameful,” said Joy. “It’s trash.”

Jeffrey Hirsch was also concerned with the lack of notice or opportunity for public input prior to removal of the plaques. Hirsch said that four and a half years ago the town went through “quite a bit of public input, contention, understanding and argumentation” before deciding to put up the plaques.

“For you folks to, on your own, ignoring all that went on five years ago, from both sides, and basically just take one side and undo the compromise that we had reached displayed three things,” said Hirsch. “One, it was poor public governance … secondly, it was an insult to the citizens of Jackson County who spent a lot of time and energy finding ways to explain their side and come up with ideas that perhaps might get us through this … and third, it displayed a kid of cowardice that you chose that avenue to make that kind of decision without any kind of public input.”

“I think you should be ashamed of yourselves,” Hirsch continued.

Still, others saw the quick, covert decision as an efficient way to right a wrong.

“Everybody’s saying, ‘well this should have been some public forum,’” said Wood. “I come up here and talked with the other set of commissioners … and I got treated like a dog. Alright? So y’all took the opportunity to right a wrong and I appreciate it.”

Cole-Smith admitted a confidence in the county commission’s response to public concern.

“I’m not really under any illusion that this current board of commissioners is going to be swayed by any of the public opinion that we’re hearing tonight regarding the recent removal of the compromise plaque that was installed after the very public debate regarding the statue beginning in 2020,” Cole-Smith said.

County Manager Kevin King said the board did not need a vote to remove the plaques from the statue.

“Each board member, individually, shared concerns regarding the plaque added to the historic statue at the old courthouse in 2020 [sic],” King told The Smoky Mountain News. “After consulting with legal counsel, it was determined the plaque could be removed.”

Cole-Smith and other speakers questioned the validity of this statement, saying that even if a vote was not required, commissioners should still have brought it up in a public meeting for the purpose of transparency.

“I find it highly disingenuous to suggest that removal of the plaque is simply daily management of a piece of public property, especially in light of the intensity of the debate as was just mentioned in 2020 that surrounded the decision to add this plaque rather than relocating the statue, adding additional historical context or adding commemoration of any kind for those who were slaves, died or suffered, that were not Confederate soldiers,” said Cole-Smith.

No commissioners, save Commission Chairman Mark Letson, who was opposed to the plaque removal, has responded to requests for comment from The Smoky Mountain News.