S.C. Gov. Signs Bill to Remove Confederate Flag From Capitol Grounds
"We will bring it down with dignity and we will make sure it is stored in its rightful place."
By JEFFREY COLLINS ••
SouthCarolina Gov. Nikki Haley signed a bill into law Thursday that will bring down the Confederate flag outside the Statehouse, a move that seemed unthinkable only a month ago in this Deep Southstate that was the first to secede from the Union.
The law requires the battle flag to be gone within 24 hours; her staff said it would be removed during a ceremony at 10 a.m. Friday and relegated to the state's Confederate Relic Room.
"The Confederate flag is coming off the grounds of the SouthCarolina Statehouse," Haley said. "We will bring it down with dignity and we will make sure it is stored in its rightful place."
The flag first flew over the Statehouse dome in 1961 to mark the 100th anniversary of the Civil War and was kept there as a symbol of official opposition to the civil rights movement. Mass protests decades later led to a compromise in 2000 with lawmakers who insisted that the flag symbolized Southern heritage and state's rights.
They agreed then to move it to a 30-foot pole next to a Confederate monument out front. But even from that lower perch, the historic but divisive symbol remained clearly visible in the center of town, and flag supporters remained a powerful bloc in the state.
The massacre 22 days ago of nine people inside their historic black church in Charleston suddenly changed this dynamic, not only in SouthCarolina but around the nation.
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Police said the shootings inside the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church were racially motivated, and by posing with the Confederate flag before the shootings, suspect Dylann Storm Roof, who has not yet entered a plea to nine counts of murder, re-ignited a debate over the flag's history as a symbol of white superiority and racial oppression.
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People join hands against the backdrop of an American flag as thousands of marchers meet in the middle of Charleston's main bridge in a show of unity after nine black church parishioners were gunned down during a Bible study, Sunday, June 21, 2015, in Charleston, S.C.
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Pallbearers release doves over the casket of Ethel Lance during her burial service, June 25, 2015, in Charleston, S.C.
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South Carolina Highway Patrol honor guards stand over Sen. Clementa Pinckneyu2019s body as members of the public file past in the Statehouse, Wednesday, June 24, 2015, in Columbia, S.C.
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Doris Simmons, of Charleston, S.C. stands across the street from Emanuel AME Church, the scene of last week's mass shooting, as the sun rises June 26, 2015, in Charleston.
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People join hands against the backdrop of an American flag as thousands of marchers meet in the middle of Charleston's main bridge in a show of unity after nine black church parishioners were gunned down during a Bible study, June 21, 2015, in Charleston, S.C.
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Parishioners pray at the Emanuel A.M.E. Church June 21, 2015, in Charleston, S.C., four days after a mass shooting that claimed the lives of it's pastor and eight others.
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Najee Washington holds a photo of her grandmother Ethel Lance, one of the nine people killed in Wednesday's shooting at Emanuel AME Church, June 19, 2015, in Charleston, S.C.
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Parishioners sing four days after a mass shooting that claimed nine lives at the historic Emanuel African Methodist Church. Elders at the Charleston, South Carolina, church decided to hold the regularly scheduled Sunday school and worship service as they continue to grieve.
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FBI forensic experts work the parking lot behind the AME Emanuel Church, June 19, 2015 in Charleston, S.C.
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Olina Ortega, left, and Austin Gibbs light candles at a memorial in front of Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C., June 18, 2015.
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Dylann Roof, 21, appears via video before a judge in Charleston, S.C, on June 19, 2015. Roof made his first court appearance Friday, with the victims' relatives making tearful statements.
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From left, Patricia Hamock, of Decatur, Ga., Cynthia Carmichael, of Decatur, Ga., and Angela Dixon, of Marietta, Ga., sing together at the interfaith prayer vigil at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta on Thursday, June 18, 2015. The vigil is to mourn the killing of nine people from Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, SC. (AP Photo/Rebecca Breyer)
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People of all faiths come together at the interfaith prayer vigil at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta on Thursday, June 18, 2015. The vigil is to mourn the killing of nine people from Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, SC. (AP Photo/Rebecca Breyer)
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Olina Ortega, left, and Austin Gibbs light candles at a memorial in front of Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C., June 18, 2015.
The victims include Clementa Pinckney, Cynthia Hurd, Rev. Depayne Middleton Doctor, Rev. Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, Susie Jackson, Ethel Lance, Rev. Daniel Simmons, Myra Thompson, Tywanza Sanders.
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President Barack Obama, accompanied by Vice President Joe Biden, pauses while speaking in the Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House in Washington, Thursday, June 18, 2015, on the church shooting in Charleston, S.C., prior to his departure to Los Angeles.
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Charleston police Lt. S. Siprko removes flowers from the backseat of a patrol car, Thursday, June 18, 2015 to a makeshift memorial in front of the Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C. The alleged shooter, Dylann Storm Roof, 21, spent nearly an hour inside the church Wednesday night before killing six women and three men, then tried to outrun an all-night manhunt before a citizen in the next state spotted his car and tipped police, Charleston Police Chief Greg Mullen said.
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The great-grandnephews of Susie Jackson, who died in Wednesday's shooting, play hide and seek during a family gathering outside Jackson's home June 18, 2015, in Charleston, S.C.
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Charleston, S.C., shooting suspect Dylann Storm Roof sits inside a police car as he is escorted from the Sheby Police Department in Shelby, N.C., June 18, 2015.
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Charleston, S.C., shooting suspect Dylann Storm Roof, second from left, is escorted from the Shelby Police Department in Shelby, N.C., Thursday, June 18, 2015. Roof is a suspect in the shooting of several people Wednesday night at the historic The Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C.
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A group of women pray together at a make-shift memorial on the sidewalk in front of the Emanuel AME Church, Thursday, June 18, 2015 in Charleston, S.C.
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State Senator Vincent Sheheen (D-Kershaw) gets emtional as he sits next to the draped desk of state Sen. Clementa Pinckney, Thursday, June 18, 2015, at the Statehouse in Columbia, S.C. Pinckney was one of those killed, Wednesday night in a shooting at the Emanuel AME Church in Charleston.
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A passing motorist looks out her window as she stops at an intersection down the street from the Emanuel AME Church early Thursday, June 18, 2015 following a shooting Wednesday night in Charleston, S.C.
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Police close off a section of Calhoun Street near the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C.
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Lisa Doctor joins a prayer circle down the street from the Emanuel AME Church early Thursday, June 18, 2015 following a shooting Wednesday night in Charleston, S.C.
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Worshippers gather to pray down the street from the Emanuel AME Church following a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C.
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Police and EMT fireman outside the historic Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church where a gunman opened fire on a prayer meeting killing nine people on June 17, 2015 in Charleston, South Carolina.
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A distraught man is comforted as a group of concerned people arrive inquiring about a shooting across the street Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C.
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Worshippers embrace following a group prayer across the street from the scene of a shooting Wednesday, June 17, 2015, in Charleston, S.C.
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Noah Nicolaisen, of Charleston, S.C., kneels at a makeshift memorial, Thursday, June 18, 2015, down the street from where a man opened fire Wednesday night during a prayer meeting inside the Emanuel AME Church, killing several people in what authorities are calling a hate crime.
Haley moved first, calling on SouthCarolina lawmakers to vote the flag down, and very quickly thereafter, other Republican lawmakers who have long cultivated the votes of Confederate flag supporters were announcing that other Civil War symbols no longer deserve places of honor.
"These nine pens are going to the families of the Emanuel Nine," Haley said after signing the bill into law. "Nine amazing individuals who have forever changed SouthCarolina history."
SouthCarolina's flag removal bill passed easily in the Senate, where state Sen. Clementa Pinckney, the pastor gunned down at the church, had served, but was stalled by debate in the House as dozens of amendments were proposed. Any changes to the Senate bill could have delayed the flag's removal by weeks or months, perhaps blunting momentum that has grown since the massacre.
House members deliberated well into the night, amid anger, tears and shared memories of Civil War ancestors.
Archaeologists have found nearly 10,000 Native American artifacts at two sites in Camden, New Jersey.
Supporters of the flag talked about grandparents passing down family treasures. Some lamented that the flag had been "hijacked" or "abducted" by racists.
Rep. Mike Pitts recalled playing with a Confederate ancestor's cavalry sword while growing up. He said that for him, the flag is a reminder of how many dirt-poor Southern farmers fought Yankees, not because they hated blacks or sought to preserve white supremacy, but because their land was being invaded.
Black Democrats, frustrated at being asked to honor the Civil War soldiers who also fought to preserve slavery, offered their own family histories as a counterpoint. Rep. Joe Neal talked about tracing his ancestry back to four brothers who were brought to America in chains. A slave owner named Neal bought them, changed their last names and pulled them apart from their families.
"The whole world is asking, is SouthCarolina really going to change, or will it hold to an ugly tradition of prejudice and discrimination and hide behind heritage as an excuse for it?" Neal said.
Rep. Jenny Horne, a white Republican who said she is a descendent of Confederate President Jefferson Davis, scolded her party members for stalling.
"I cannot believe that we do not have the heart in this body to do something meaningful such as take a symbol of hate off these grounds on Friday. And if any of you vote to amend, you are ensuring that this flag will fly beyond Friday. And for the widow of Sen. Pinckney and his two young daughters, that would be adding insult to injury and I will not be a part of it!" Horne screamed into the microphone.
The bill ultimately passed 93-27 in the House — well above the two-thirds supermajority needed to make changes to the state's "heritage" symbols. Some lawmakers hugged, cried and high-fived, while others snapped selfies and pumped their fists.
