Robert E. Lee Day facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Robert E. Lee Day |
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Robert E. Lee in 1870
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| Also called | Lee's Birthday |
| Observed by |
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| Type | State holiday |
| Significance | Confederate General in Chief's birthday |
| Date | Third Monday in January |
| 2023 date | January 16 |
| 2024 date | January 15 |
| 2025 date | January 20 |
| 2026 date | January 19 |
| Frequency | Annual |
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Robert E. Lee Day is a state holiday in parts of the Southern US, commemorating the Confederate general Robert E. Lee.
It has been celebrated it on Lee's Birthday (January 19) in Tennessee, Florida (where by and large it is not observed) and in Texas as Confederate Heroes Day.
Alabama and Mississippiobserve it on the third Monday in January, the federal holiday Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
Arkansas combined the observance of Robert E. Lee Day with Martin Luther King, Jr. Day in 1985, after two years of requiring state employees to select between the two holidays or their own birthday as a day off from work. In 2017, it passed a law removing General Lee's name from the January holiday and instead establishing a state memorial day on the second Saturday of October in honor of Lee. In 2000 Virginia experimented with splitting Lee–Jackson–King Day into a separate Lee–Jackson Day on the Friday before Martin Luther King Jr. Day, dropping the latter in 2020. Georgia formerly called the Friday after Thanksgiving Robert E. Lee Day; now it is only an unnamed paid holiday.
