Rev. Billy Graham could be 1st new statue at NC Capitol since Confederates removed
The state Capitol in downtown Raleigh could have its first new statue in several years, if a provision in the House budget becomes law and private funding is raised to pay for it.
Republican House budget writers have proposed adding a statue of the late Rev. Billy Graham to the Capitol, either on the grounds or inside the building. Their plan doesn’t provide funding for it.
The proposal is from Rep. John Torbett, a Gaston County Republican and chair of the House budget committee that’s in charge of several government agencies.
“We need to honor those people that have done great things for the people of this state. And I think no one would say that Billy Graham did not do great things for people of this state,” Torbett told The News & Observer.
Graham has statue at US Capitol
The Raleigh statue would be a duplicate of the Graham statue in Congress’ Statuary Hall Collection.
“We put one in DC, Statuary Hall, on behalf of the people in North Carolina. I thought, well, maybe the people in North Carolina won’t be able to see that up there, so maybe we should have a duplicate made here,” Torbett told The N&O on Thursday.
“And so the thought was, either have it in our Capitol here or on the Capitol grounds, which we’re still open to — either or — but just duplicate that same statue that’s in Statuary Hall,” he said.
Graham, who was from North Carolina and became an internationally known evangelist preacher, died in 2018. The statue was given to the U.S. Capitol by the state in 2024 and was created by Chas Fagan. The unveiling ceremony in May 2024 was attended by Republicans and Democrats, including former Gov. Roy Cooper and U.S. Sens. Thom Tillis and Ted Budd, The N&O previously reported.
The Graham statue in Washington replaced a statue of Charles Aycock, a North Carolina governor who was a white supremacist.
The other North Carolinian in Statuary Hall is Zebulon Vance.
Long-stalled African American monument not in budget
Republican budget writers have put a long-planned monument to African Americans for the Capitol grounds in different versions of the state budget for at least six years, but the project is stalled without the General Assembly allocating funding.
The African Americans monument was in the 2019 state budget that former Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed and which never became law.
Then, plans to fund $2 million toward the project were rejected by Republican budget writers after protesters tore down monuments to the Confederacy in 2020 amid the George Floyd protests. Protesters took down some of the Confederate soldier statues on the Capitol grounds, and Cooper ordered the remaining ones removed, including a massive pillar and a monument to Confederate women.
In 2023, the African Americans monument again had support, from both Cooper and the Republican-controlled Senate, but it wasn’t in the final budget.
.JPG "RAL_031423-CAPITOL-DOME-DRONE-TEL-02 (1).JPG")
Asked about that project, Torbett said he wasn’t familiar with it, and was on a different committee during consideration of the last House proposal. He said he’d look at it if there was a new proposal.
“I think we need more monuments, not less monuments.”
Legislative budget writers funded a separate project a few years ago that celebrates the Black experience in North Carolina, NC Freedom Park, which was both publicly and privately funded. Freedom Park is located on the block in downtown Raleigh between the Legislative Building and the Executive Mansion, on Lane and Wilmington streets.
Freedom Park opened in 2023 and includes the Beacon of Freedom public art at its center, as well as quotes inscribed on low walls, including from Anna Julia Cooper, George Floyd, Pauli Murray and John Hope Franklin.
Torbett said the Graham statue would have private funding, not state, and said the state should “celebrate those people that did great things and put more monuments up, so kids can learn and adults can understand.”
Past studies about the Capitol grounds have shown that the most frequent visitors are school children. On any given days, school buses are parked near the General Assembly as hundreds of children arrive on field trips.
This story was originally published May 15, 2025 at 3:41 PM with the headline "Rev. Billy Graham could be 1st new statue at NC Capitol since Confederates removed."
.jpg)