Louisianians are gun-toting, monument supporters
25th April 2016 · 0 Comments
While many cities, towns and states across the U.S. have taken steps to remove the Confederate flag and other racially offensive symbols from public spaces, a new poll in Louisiana shows that the Pelican State is not yet prepared to leave the past in the past.
The 2016 Louisiana Survey, conducted by LSU’s Manship School of Mass Communications, found that the Pelican State remains conservative in its views on a number of hot-button issues including gun rights, same-sex marriage and Confederate monuments.
The annual survey, a project of the Reilly Center for Media and Public Affairs at LSU’s Manship School of Mass Communications, polled 1,001 Louisiana residents by telephone in February.
Michael Henderson, research director of the Public Policy Research Lab at LSU, released some of the survey results Monday at the Acadiana Press Club’s monthly forum in Lafayette.
The survey found that 73 percent of those polled said they oppose removing Confederate monuments from public places. Twenty percent favor removing the statues.
Results varied by political party. Ninety-two percent of Republicans oppose removing Confederate monuments compared with 54 percent of Democrats.
In Southwest Louisiana, a majority said they oppose removing Confederate statues. In every region of the state except New Orleans, more than 72 percent of respondents said Confederate monuments should not be removed. In the New Orleans area, 57 percent want the monuments to stay compared with 35 percent who want them removed.
The removal of Confederate monuments has become a hot issue in some Louisiana communities, including New Orleans and Lafayette. In February, several residents asked the Lafayette City-Parish Council to remove a statue of Confederate Gen. Alfred Mouton from city property on Jefferson Street. Another contingent strongly opposed removing the statue. The council took no action.
Gun control is a hot topic across the country in the wake of multiple mass shootings. The issue hit home in July when a lone gunman opened fire in a Lafayette movie theater, killing two women and injuring nine before turning the gun on himself.
Across the state, 55 percent of respondents surveyed said they favor stricter restrictions on access to guns, compared with 43 percent who oppose such restrictions, Henderson said.
Assault weapons are a different story. Sixty-one percent of those surveyed said they oppose a statewide ban on assault weapons, compared with 36 percent who favor a ban.
Some 40 bills were filed by the Louisiana Legislature this session to change gun policies, Henderson told WWL News. Two weeks ago, a committee rejected a bill that would have abolished the need for a concealed-carry permit.
Despite what researchers said is widespread support across the state for the four Confederate-era monuments in New Orleans slated to be removed from public spaces, two legal challenges in civil and federal court have failed to protect the monuments and two efforts in the state legislature to block the removal of the monuments have not been successful.
Additional information about the survey results is available online at http://pprllsu.com/projects/.
This article originally published in the April 25, 2016 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
