Johnny Cash Statue to Be Unveiled at U.S. Capitol to Represent Arkansas

A bronze statue of country musician Johnny Cash is set to be unveiled Tuesday at the U.S. Capitol, one of two state statues to be erected there to represent the state of Arkansas.

U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries were scheduled to join the state’s congressional delegation, Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders and family members of the late Grammy-winning singer at the unveiling.

Cash was born in the small town of Kingsland, just outside Little Rock. He became one of the best-selling artists of all time, selling 90 million records. He was inducted into the Country Music and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame during his lifetime. He died in 2003 at the age of 71.

Arkansas lawmakers agreed in 2019 to replace statues of two little-known figures that represented the state in the collection of the National Statuery Hall in the U.S. Capitol. Each state is entitled to two famous figures in the collection.

Cash will join a statue of civil rights leader Daisy Bates, a member of the Little Rock Nine who was a key figure in integrating racially segregated public schools. Her statue was unveiled in May.

The two new statues replace those honoring Uriah Rose and James Paul Clarke. Rose helped found the American Bar Association and was a Confederate sympathizer. Clarke was a state lawmaker in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Two statues of Rose and Clarke have been in the Capitol for more than 100 years.

State lawmakers sought to “reflect Arkansas in a more contemporary way, reflecting some of the contemporary historical figures in the state,” Rick Crawford, a Republican state congressman, told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette earlier this year.

Artist Kevin Kresse created a sculpture of Cash that depicts the musician with a guitar slung across his back and his hand on the strap of the instrument across his chest.

When Cash’s daughter, Rosanne Cash, who is also a singer-songwriter, saw a clay model of the statue in 2022, she said, “It’s amazing how he brought soul to that statue. It’s surprising and beautiful.”

Associated Press contributed to this report