Haley signs flag bill, banner to come down Friday

COLUMBIA The Confederate battle flag, a banner of the South's Lost Cause 150 years ago and a symbol despised by South Carolina's African-American population for decades, will be lowered for the last time Friday morning from its capitol perch.

Gov. Nikki Haley on Thursday signed a bill to remove the flag, requiring it to be taken off the 30-foot flagpole where it was placed in 2000 as part of a compromise to take another version of the flag off the Statehouse dome.

Her signature means the flag must be removed Friday by law and Haley said the banner would be officially retired "with dignity" at 10 am.

"The Confederate flag is coming off the grounds of the South Carolina Statehouse," she said to cheers and applause from a rotunda packed with hundreds of people and dozens of television cameras.

Thursday's signing ceremony marked the end of a process that began when a white gunman sat with others in a Bible study meeting in a black historic church in Charleston on June 17 and then opened fire, killing nine, including the church's pastor, Sen. Clementa Pinckney.

The following week, Haley, accompanied by the state's two United States senators, called for lawmakers to remove the flag, saying it was a symbol of divisiveness in the state. The man accused in the Charleston shootings displayed a Confederate license plate on his car and online photos showed him waving Confederate flags and burning or stomping on American flags.

Members of victims families were present for the signing ceremony and Haley paid tribute to them in her remarks.

"This is a story of the history of South Carolina and how the action of nine individuals laid out this long chain of events that forever showed the state of South Carolina what love and forgiveness looks like," she said. "Twenty-two days ago, I didn't know if I would ever be able to say this again. But today I am very proud to say it is a great day in South Carolina."

Haley had a pen for each of the nine victim's families.

The governor was surrounded by dozens of lawmakers, cabinet officials and former Govs. David Beasley, who tried while in office to bring down the flag; Jim Hodges, and Dick Riley. Cabinet officers, Sotuh Carolina NAACP President Dr. Lonnie Randolph and Jesse Jackson also watched.

The battle flag in one version or another has flown at the Statehouse for more than 50 years, going up in 1961 to recognize the 100th anniversary of the Civil War and staying up the following year as a protest of the civil rights movement.

It was removed from inside the Statehouse and on top of the dome in 2000 as part of a legislative compromise that raised a battle flag behind the Confederate Soldier's Monument and also created the African-American History Monument on the Statehouse grounds.

Senators took up the flag issue Monday and passed a bill 37-3 to remove the flag and flagpole and place the banner in the Confederate Relic Room.

The House took up the issue Wednesday and spent a marathon session that began with expressions of goodwill and respect but evolved into tears, suspicion and anger as lawmakers struggled to handle almost 60 amendments without aggravating 200-year-old racial wounds.

They gave the bill final approval 94-20 a little after 1 am Thursday after rejected all proposed amendments.

Flag opponents, especially black Democrats, feared any amendment might trigger negotiations with the Senate and make the flag stay up longer. They especially wanted it removed in advance of a planned rally by North Carolina members of the Ku Klux Klan on July 18.

Flag supporters appeared close earlier Wednesday evening to winning support for a proposal to replace the battle flag with another flag.

Then Rep. Jenny Horne, a Dorchester County Republican, took to the floor in tears to shout at her colleagues not to amend the bill, which she said would add further pain to the families of the nine victims shot to death, including Pinckney.

"I do not 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," she said. "If any of you vote to amend, you are ensuring that the flag will fly beyond Friday. And for the widow of Sen. Picnkney and his two young daughters, that would be adding insult to injury. And I will not be a part of it!"

The amendment failed shortly afterward.

House lawmakers talked of lost sleep, weeping, consulting pastors, wives and friends, enduring abusive phone calls or threats on the controversial issue. Some said it could cost them their seats.

"If this has to be my sayonara, so be it," said Rep. Grady Brown, a Lee County Democrat who said he favored lowering the flag. "I think it is, in God's eyes, the right thing to do."

Flag supporters and opponents went to the well of the House Wednesday to talk of family history and the pain ancestors had suffered.

Flag supporters talked of ancestors killed or wounded in Confederate battles and of the sufferings of family members after the war. They talked of southern heritage and honoring fallen ancestors with the flag. They asked for grace from opponents by allowing another flag to be substituted for the battle flag.

African-American lawmakers talked of ancestors brought to the country as slaves, their horrors and hundreds of years of enduring racial discrimination. They said grace would be the removal of the flag and flagpole and were offended by any notion of compromise.

House Speaker Pro Tempore Tommy Pope, a York County Republican, said he was willing to show grace by voting to remove the flag. He urged others to show grace by honoring those whose ancestors were Confederate soldiers.

"Today doesn't need to be about hate," he said. "It doesn't need to be about evil. It needs to be about grace."

Pope asked the House to "show some grace" by approving a proposal to substitute a flag that flew ovedr Fort Sumter for the battle flag.

Rep. Joe Neal, a Richland County Democrat and minister, told the House his ancestors were South Carolina slaves and noted that none of the lawmakers discussing the heritage of their Confederate ancestors talked about slavery and the pain it caused.

He said pro-flag lawmakers asking for grace by opponents of the flag needed to recognize grace is "not a one-way street." He said grace is something given, not asked for.

"Grace is not something that should be used as a political maneuver," he said. "Grace means remove that flag and do it now."

Neal said the "whole world is watching and is "asking if South Carolina is really going to change."

Many of those who voted against the bill are from the Upstate. Some said they felt the majority of their constituents wanted to keep the flag up.

House members voting no on second reading were Eric M. Bedingfield, R-Greenville County; James Mikell Burns, R-Taylors; William M. Chumley, R-Woodruff; Christopher A. Corley, R-Aiken County; F. Gregory Delleney Jr., R-Chester; Craig Gagnon, R-Abbeville; Kevin Hardee, R-Horry County; Jonathon Hill, R-Anderson County; Jeffrey E. Johnson, R-Conway; Ralph Shealy Kennedy Jr., R-Lexington County; Dwight A. Loftis, R-Greenville; Dennis C. Moss, R-Gaffney; V. Stephen Moss, R-Cherokee County; Wendy K. Nanney, R-Greenville; Michael A. Pitts, R-Laurens; Joshua A. Putnam, R-Piedmont; Mike Ryhal, R-Myrtle Beach; William E. Sandifer III, R-Seneca; J. Gary Simrill, R-Rock Hill; Edward L. Southard, R-Moncks Corner; L. Kit Spires, R-Lexington County; Tommy M. Stringer, R-Greer; Bill Taylor, R-Aiken; Anne J. Thayer, R-Anderson County; McLain R. Toole, R-Lexington County; W. Brian White, R-Anderson; and William R. Whitmire, R-Walhalla.

The bill passed third reading with Gagnon switching his vote and Pitts, Ryhal, Sandifer, Southard, Toole and Whitmire not voting.

Sandifer told the House prior to the vote that the Senate had "manipulated" the way the votes were cast in the House on the flag issue and he hoped the bill would not pass.

Rep. Todd Rutherford, leader of House Democrats and a participant in the 2000 flag compromise, said he never expected to stand in the Statehouse on a night – or morning – when the Legislature voted to take the flag down.

"To now be at a point where South Carolina can move forward without a symbol of division on its front lawn is huge for all of us," he said.

Rep. Garry Smith, a Simpsonville Republican who came into the debate undecided and represents constituents who fiercely opposed removing the flag, said he wasn't completely satisfied with the final bill, but voted for it.

He wanted the compromise so a flag could honor the war dead, but when it became clear that wouldn't happen, he supported the bill.

"It's one of those emotional issues that's going to be very controversial. There's going to be a lot of conflict and all involved with it," Smith said. "So it's something that I don't think I'm totally satisfied with, but I think it's something that's good for South Carolina."

Rep. Mike Pitts, a Laurens Republican and ardent flag supporter, sought numerous amendments unsuccessfully, indicating he was willing to risk the wrath of constituents by agreeing to lower the flag but hoped the House would offer some concessions.

He said he did not see an issue with flying the flag and grew up with it as part of his heritage. But he said if it offended some of his African-American colleagues in the House, including Rep. Lonnie Hosey, whom he described as his hero because of his service as a Marine in the Vietnam War, he would support its removal.

"Lonnie Hosey, if that flag hurts your heart, it hurts my heart," he said.

Pitts proposed 12 amendments that would each remove a different monument from the Statehouse grounds. Pitts explained that he was proposing removal because each might come under attack from someone at some point in the future.

Democrats argued that each of his proposals was not germane to the issue of the Confederate battle flag. House Speaker Jay Lucas agreed.

"I'm starting to understand how Lee felt at Appomattox," Pitts said.