Council members in Knoxville, Iowa learned what happens when they don’t listen to their constituents.

Two council members who voted in favor of removing a veterans memorial at the local Young’s Park on Monday were out of power by Tuesday, the Des Moines Register reports.

Council members Carolyn Formanek and April Verwers voted in favor of moving the memorial – a wooden silhouette of a soldier kneeling by a cross – after Americans United for Separation of Church and State sent the city a letter in August threatening litigation if they city did not take action.

“Carolyn Formanek won roughly 15.3 percent of Tuesday’s votes and April Verwers won about 14.3 percent,” KWWL reports. “Their opponents won more than 20 percent each.”

Americans United for Separation of Church and State alleged the memorial contained a religious symbol and therefore violated constitutional protections and must be banned from public property. The issue was festering for weeks, and residents expressed their opposition to removing the monument during a heated council meeting in September, on the Facebook page Stop the Insanity, and through local rallies, according to KCCI.

“I think they needed to listen to the constituents along with the rallies,” said Rick Kingery, a strong supporter of the memorial who was elected to replace one of the outgoing council members.

“The people put out 2,000 wooden crosses across town. That is a huge number. People wanted their voices herd, and they were not listened to.”

According to the Register, “The silhouette was placed in Young’s Park by the local chapter of the American Veterans, who also maintain a painted Freedom Rock on the site. Al Larsen, a Knoxville resident and Vietnam War veteran, has said he made the silhouette as a memorial to an Army private who was killed in the war.”

Larsen said the cross depicted in the memorial was designed to be reminiscent of the small white crosses at Normandy American Cemetery in France, but Americans United for Separation of Church and State argued religious protections outlined in the U.S. Constitution.

Council members Monday voted to remove Larsen’s silhouette and replace it with a bronze statue of a rifle and soldier’s helmet during a Nov. 11 ceremony. The plan is to move Larsen’s work across the street to private property.

“I hope it brings some closure to it,” Mayor Brian Hatch said after the vote, according to the Register. “I hope we can kind of achieve the best of both worlds. We avoid a costly lawsuit and at the same time we still have the silhouette memorial up honoring the veterans, right across the road hopefully, on private property.”

But voters disagreed, and brought their own closure to the matter by pushing to oust those in favor of the “compromise” through the Stop the Insanity page.

“If they don’t support our community, why support them?” the group wrote in urging the Facebook page’s 2,769 followers to vote the incumbents out.

“We did it!” the group posted after the election results, according to the Register.

Larsen, meanwhile, also enlisted the help of the nonprofit Liberty Institute to advocate for keeping his memorial in Young’s Park, though the Institute’s senior attorney, Roger Byron, would not discuss whether he’ll pursue legal action against the city for alleged violations of his client’s free-speech rights.

“It’s completely unnecessary to move it,” he told the Register. “It’s completely lawful where it is. … We’re talking over our options with our client.”