Federal Government
Ironically, the entire nation supported the Stone Mountian Memorial Association's efforts to
create a memorial to the men who fought for the Confederate States of America. Even the
federal government, the same government that had spent over 300, 000 lives to crush the
Confederacy sixty years before, joined in the effort to honor the soldiers of the South. Two
Presidents, Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge, issued statements publicly supporting the
carving. Coolidge put federal money behind his statement, signing the Stone Mountain Memorial
Coinage Act in 1924. The Act provided for the minting of 5 million Confederate Half Dollars, which, when sold, would earn the Memorial
Association up to 2.5 million dollars.
When the Georgia State Government took over the project in the 1950s, federal support for the
project was almost nonexistant. The White House's reaction to the dedication of the carving in
1970 typified the government's more removed role. Richard Nixon refused to attend the
ceremony, sending scandal-ridden Vice President Spiro Agnew instead.
