Harold Gater and Geoff Pender

The (Jackson, Miss.) Clarion-Ledger

A Mississippi lawmaker recommended lynching over the weekend for New Orleans' leaders who have had four Confederate monuments dismantled in the past month, and it took until Monday — under pressure from state politicians — for him to apologize.

In a Saturday Facebook post, state Rep. Karl Oliver, a Republican from Winona, also compared the actions of Crescent City officials to Nazis.

The last of the Confederate-era monuments was removed early Friday. The 16-foot-tall bronze statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee was removed from its perch high above St. Charles Avenue on Lee Circle where the Confederate general had stood watch for 133 years.

The destruction of these monuments, erected in the loving memory of our family and fellow Southern Americans, is both heinous and horrific. If the, and I use this term extremely loosely, "leadership" of Louisiana wishes to, in a Nazi-ish fashion, burn books or destroy historical monuments of OUR HISTORY, they should be LYNCHED! Let it be known, I will do all in my power to prevent this from happening in our State.

"Rep. Oliver's language is unacceptable and has no place in civil discourse," Gov. Phil Bryant, also a Republican, said about Oliver's Facebook post.

► Monday:Confederate monuments aren't going away

► Sunday:Racial slurs thrown at Texas lawmaker who called for Trump impeachment

► March:Marking 125 years since lynching that launched Ida B. Wells' campaign

In a written statement issued in late morning Monday, the first-term legislator apologized and then removed his Facebook post.

I, first and foremost, wish to extend this apology for any embarrassment I have caused to both my colleagues and fellow Mississippians. In an effort to express my passion for preserving all historical monuments, I acknowledge the word 'lynched' was wrong. I am very sorry. It is in no way, ever, an appropriate term. I deeply regret that I chose this word, and I do not condone the actions I referenced, nor do I believe them in my heart. I freely admit my choice of words was horribly wrong, and I humbly ask your forgiveness.

Republican House Speaker Philip Gunn has supported removal of the Confederate emblem from the Mississippi state flag but said he cannot get enought support from his GOP House caucus. Before Oliver's apology, he also condemned the Winona lawmaker's social-media comments.

"They do not reflect the views of the Republican Party, the leadership of the House of Representatives or the House as a whole. Using the word lynched is inappropriate and offensive," Gunn said.

Oliver, who is in his first term, has been a mostly quiet back-bencher in the Mississippi State Legislature.

► February:Why you need to see the Emmett Till exhibit at the Smithsonian

► November:University of Pennsylvania investigating racist 'lynching' group thread

But last year, he responded to the concerns of a resident of Gulfport, Miss., about cuts to public education, foster care and other programs that the Legislature was considering with an email saying he "could care less" about her views because she was not a Mississippi native. He also suggested that people in Illinois would love to see her return.

When he's not doing legislative business, Oliver is president and director of Oliver Funeral Home in Winona, about 90 miles north of Jackson, Miss.

Rep. Sonya Williams-Barnes of Gulfport, chairwoman of the state Legislative Black Caucus, said an apology from Oliver "is not enough."

► March 2016:Mississippi lawmaker to voter: 'I could care less'

“Although lynching may not be the mindset of all the members of the Legislature, the support for maintaining Confederate monuments, the state flag, etc. exemplifies there is a mindset of continuing the daunting negative symbolism of Mississippi’s past," Williams-Barnes said. "If these comments are truly not the mindset of the body, then change the flag!”

House and Senate Democratic caucus chairmen Rep. David Baria and Sen. Bill Stone issued a joint statement calling Oliver's remarks "repugnant."

"The use of such inflammatory rhetoric in the context of public discourse is repugnant and does damage to the considerable advances that have been made in healing the wounds caused by state-supported racism of the past," the statement said. "In 2017, no elected official in the state of Mississippi should be speaking in this manner regardless of any strongly held opinions concerning Confederate statues."

Follow Harold Gater and Geoff Pender on Twitter: @haroldgater and @GeoffPender

Confederate memorials removed

In December 2015, New Orleans City Council voted 6-1 to remove four Confederate monuments erected over three decades after the Reconstruction.

• April 24. Liberty Place monument, a 35-foot-tall obelisk that commemorated a deadly fight in 1874 between the white-supremacist Crescent City White League opposed to New Orleans integrated police force and state militia, on Canal Street near the French Quarter, erected in 1891.

• May 11. Jefferson Davis, a 6-foot bronze statue of the president of the Confederacy on a 12-foot column, on Jefferson Davis Parkway at Canal Street in Mid-City, dedicated in 1911.

• Wednesday. Gen. Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard, 20-foot bronze sculpture of the Confederate general on horseback on a granite base, at the entrance to City Park, erected in 1915.

• Friday. Gen. Robert E. Lee, a 16-foot bronze statue on a 60-foot pedestal at Lee Circle on St. Charles Avenue near downtown, dedicated in 1884.