A junior at the University of Alabama wants her school to rename a building to honour Harper Lee instead of a Ku Klux Klan leader.
Jessica Hauger, a history major at the university, created a Change.org petition calling on administrators to ditch the name “Morgan Hall,” the current home of school’s English department.
Hauger argues that it makes more sense to honour Lee — the revered “To Kill A Mockingbird” author and one of the school’s most prominent alumni — instead of the Confederate general and unabashed racist John Tyler Morgan.
So far, she’s received more than 2,400 digital signatures.
“It’s appalling to me that students of color have to walk around buildings named after people who wouldn’t have wanted them to get an education and might have even wanted to harm them,” Hauger told The Crimson White, the university’s student newspaper.
“We have so many amazing people who went to this University, why not name a building like Morgan Hall after Harper Lee instead of some KKK Dragon?”
According to the student newspaper, a plaque inside the building praises former Alabama senator and segregation advocate for his “high character and great qualities of head and heart.”
Morgan also worked hard to revoke black people’s right to vote.
Lisa Lindquist Dorr, a history professor at UA, told The Washington Post that the university was “almost entirely” burned down by Union troops during the Civil War. The KKK leader was a major figure who raised enough money to rebuild the university.
Still, the student newspaper wrote a scathing editorial calling the building's name a "disgrace" to anyone who steps foot on UA campus in 2016.
“His name is a disgrace to the English department housed inside Morgan Hall. His name is a disgrace to the students, faculty and staff of all colors who have to pass through its doors," the editorial reads.
"His name is a disgrace to a campus striving to re-define itself as an inclusive, national academic power.”
