Despite legislative efforts to change Alabama’s holidays honoring the Confederacy, the state still combines the day honoring slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. with Confederate general Robert E. Lee.

The Lee/King Day is the first of three state holidays involving Confederate leaders. Confederate Memorial Day is marked in April and the birthday of Confederate President Jefferson Davis is in June. State offices are closed for all three days.

Only Alabama and Mississippi combine a holiday honoring Lee and King. Other states, including Florida and Tennessee, set aside a day for Lee but do not combine it with the King holiday and state offices remain open.

Alabama and Mississippi have commemorated Lee’s birthday since the late 1800s and King’s since 1983.

Multiple previous efforts to end the joint holiday have failed in the Alabama Legislature.

Southern states began celebrating days honoring Lee and other Confederate leaders shortly after the Civil War. Lee was born on Jan. 19, 1807 in Virginia and died Oct. 12, 1870.

King was born on Jan. 15, 1929. Efforts to designate a holiday for King began shortly after his assassination on April 4, 1968. It took until 1983 for Congress to pass the measure with the first official MLK Day observed on the third Monday of January 1986 but only recognized in 27 states. It was officially observed in all 50 states for the first time in 2000.