Three Vietnam War veterans filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration, seeking to prevent it from building the proposed triumphal arch. The veterans argue that the development is unlawful without the approval of Congress.
“By statute, congressional approval is required for construction of symbolic and commemorative works in the Nation’s capital. Furthermore, a host of other statutes impose procedural requirements that must be satisfied before erecting a monument on Memorial Circle,” the lawsuit states. It adds that failing to seek congressional approval is a “violation of the President’s duty to take care that the laws are faithfully executed and is ultra vires.”
It further criticizes that the arch will obstruct the view of other monuments. “It will block historically significant reciprocal views between those two memorials that were consciously designed and that have existed for nearly a century,” the filing states. “It will dominate the views of and the relationship between the surrounding memorials. With the erection of the Arch, Arlington House will no longer be visible from the Lincoln Memorial, and the view of the Lincoln Memorial from Arlington House will be obscured, disrupting the historic and symbolic link between the two.”
The monument, designed to be similar to the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, will be privately funded.
Discussing plans for the construction in October, President Trump said the arch will be built at the Arlington Memorial Bridge, explaining that at the end of the bridge, there is “a circle that was built 150 years ago, nobody knows really when, and in fact they put a couple of columns on each side, you have two columns on one side, two columns on the other. But yet, in the middle, there’s a circle and everyone that passes it says something was supposed to be built there. But a thing called the Civil War interfered.”
Later, in 1902, President Trump described, “they were gonna put a statue of Robert E. Lee up. Would’ve been okay with me, a lot of people wouldn’t have liked it, would’ve been okay with me, would’ve been okay with a lot of other people in this room, but they didn’t do that.”
“So for years and years it sat, and every time somebody rides over the beautiful bridge going right to the Lincoln Memorial, it’s so beautiful, they literally say something supposed to be here,” he added.
