next to the king mausoleum we come to the monument to john tyler morgan. john tyler morgan was born in 1824 in the state of tennessee. in 1855 he moved to selma and married a local selma girl. in 1861 he attended the alabama secession convention in montgomery, alabama. he voted to secede from the union because he was a strong states rights supporter. he felt the federal government was overstepping its bounds in trying to regulate slavery in the state of alabama and in other southern states he voted to secede along with the majority from the union. and he served in the civil war, rising to the rank of general. in 1876 in reconstruction he was appointed senator from the state of alabama and probably the most important thing he was known for, he was known as an expansion us. he was very much in fare of the united states acquiring hawaii, cuba, and the philippines. and the second thing, he's known as the father of the panama canal because he very much thought the united states should be voed in a canal system that went through central america. the french starte