Every January, Alabama is one of only three states to celebrate a statewide holiday honoring Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee’s birthday.
Every April, Alabama is one of only three states to recognize Confederate Memorial Day as an official state holiday, complete with closed state offices.
All of which brings us today, and this report from Gawker:
Yes, it is another first Monday in June, which means it is Jefferson Davis Day, Alabama’s official commemoration of the Confederate States’ first and only president. A holiday still celebrated by two thirds of state residents. The only state holiday, in fact, to commemorate ol’ JD. Offices are closed, just like they would be on Confederate Memorial Day and Robert E. Lee Day in Alabama!It’s a peculiar holiday, given that Jefferson Davis’ birthday is actually on June 3, and also given that Davis was born in Kentucky, ruled in Virginia, fled through the Carolinas and Georgia, retired in Tennessee, and settled in Mississippi, with only the briefest of layovers in Alabama.
In case this isn’t obvious, it’s probably worth noting that this isn’t a joke. Alabama journalist Leada Gore wrote in a piece this morning that if you need to do business with the state of Alabama today, “you’re out of luck.”
Alabama is the only state the nation to still have an official holiday honoring the Confederate leader. It’s also the only state in the nation to pull off the trifecta, honoring Davis, Lee, and Confederate Memorial Day.
The Civil War ended 150 years ago. It seemed like a detail worth mentioning.
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Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."