More than 650 people in the rural southern tip of the state turned out over the last two weeks to learn more about the federal Promise Zone designation that seeks to provide better access to major grants to change people’s lives. This week, Colleton County residents (pictured above) discussed their dreams for the region, as did people in Hampton and Jasper counties. Last week, town halls were held in Allendale, Bamberg and Barnwell counties. More: SCPromiseZone.org. (Photo by Andy Brack)
NEWSPossible candidates already eyeing governor’s mansion
By Andy Brack
JULY 17, 2015 | It might seem early to some, but potential candidates who want to be the state’s next governor are already looking at whether a bid to succeed Gov. Nikki Haley is winnable.
“It would not surprise me if the two candidates from the 2014 lieutenant governor’s race decided to run for governor in 2018,” said Gibbs Knotts, head of the political science department at the College of Charleston. “Henry McMaster is the sitting lieutenant governor and Bakari Sellers has experience running a statewide campaign.”
Other sources say McMaster, a Republican, is happy being lieutenant governor and Sellers, a Democrat who may be eyeing 2018, also is interested in serving in Congress should Sixth District U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn decide to retire.
Many suggest that two-term Republican Attorney General Alan Wilson is the hands-on favorite for now for Republicans. Why? Because he’s vigorously opposed several hot-button big issues, such as Obamacare and gay marriage, by joining federal lawsuits.
Knotts said it would not be surprising if a current member of Congress decided to try to become governor. “It is possible, though not likely, that U.S. Sen. Tim Scott could run in 2018,” he said.
Others point to GOP Congressman Mick Mulvaney of the Rock Hill area. He’s got a harder edge, they say. And early front-runners often lose in primaries, one insider suggested.
Also mentioned as possibilities to top the 2018 GOP ticket are U.S. Rep. Jeff Duncan, state Treasurer Curtis Loftis, former state Department of Health and Environmental Control head Catherine Templeton and (wait for it) former Gov. and current U.S. Rep. Mark Sanford. Update: Also reportedly considering a race is House Speaker Pro Tem Tommy Pope, R-York.
On the Democratic side besides Sellers, two popular officials often also are mentioned: Columbia Mayor Steve Benjamin and state Rep. James Smith, also of Columbia. Both have put in long years in party politics, but are relatively young and would bring fresh approaches, observers suggest.
What will it take to win?
At this point, the state is likely to vote in a Republican in 2018 because South Carolina is deeply red, Knotts said.
“Whoever gets the Republican nomination will have a tremendous advantage,” he said. “It is not impossible for a Democrat to win, but a Republican starts with a big head start.”
Louis Jacobson, a Washington columnist with Politico, observed this week that Republicans seem to have an advantage in gubernatorial elections in mid-term elections, which is what would happen in 2018. And that is borne out in data — currently there are 31 GOP governors, 18 Democrats and one independent.
“Mid-term electorates tend to be smaller, whiter, older and more Republican,” Jacobson wrote. “Presidential electorates tend to be larger, more demographically diverse and more Democratic.”
For a Republican to become governor in 2018 in South Carolina, pushing what’s already been successful — jobs, jobs, jobs — is what voters likely will hear.
“The winning formula for Republicans has been a low-tax, fiscally-conservative, job-friendly agenda,” Knotts said. “I would continue that approach. Demographic shifts will make it increasingly difficult for Republicans to take far right positions on social issues, however.”
Democrats, who last won the governorship in 1998, will have a tougher time, he said.
“They would need to unite a coalition of minority voters and women. Education and health care could be issues that help Democrats.”
One insider cautioned that if a Democrat becomes president in 2016, it would be harder in South Carolina for a Democrat to become governor because of how elections have become nationalized. In other words, the GOP at a national level would heap criticism on a Democratic president, which would drive issues in any gubernatorial race.
But if a Republican becomes president in 2016, the same logic would benefit Democratic candidates in the Palmetto State. They would be able to highlight GOP problems at a national level in statewide campaigns.
A key Democratic operative observed: “We have to ride a positive wave if we are going to win. They can have a bad national wave and they can still win.”
Election Day 2018 is 1,201 days away.
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Study ranks state above average in fiscal health
South Carolina ranks 17th out of the 50 states in fiscal health, according to a new study by the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. That’s considered a “moderate” rating, the study shows.
The study by researcher Eileen Norcross, which is based on fiscal year 2013 state financial reports, used 14 metrics to determine whether states could meet their short- and long-term obligations. Here’s how South Carolina ranked on five indicators, with 1 being the best:
- Cash solvency: 18th. This indicator measures the state’s cash position relative to current or short-term liabilities.
- Budget solvency: 14th. This is a measure of whether a state can meet its fiscal year obligations.
- Long-run solvency: 11th. This metric illustrates the state’s long-term liabilities relative to total assets.
- Service-level solvency: 25th. This measure gives an idea of how much room a state government has room to raise taxes or increase spending.
- Trust fund solvency: 33rd. This is another measure of the state’s indebtedness.
The highest performers overall were Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska and Florida. The lowest performers were New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Illinois.
COMMENTARYSome news is just not fit to print
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher
JULY 17, 2015 | So now come some members of the generally milquetoast South Carolina media who are pawing and whining about a state trial judge. They complain he’s keeping them from hearing 911 phone calls or seeing graphic photos of the Emanuel AME Church shooting that left nine dead.
Ninth Circuit Judge J.C. Nicholson should stand his ground and keep a gag order in place so images and sounds don’t spread throughout the world in an Internet flash. If they become public, that’s what will happen in about two seconds. Almost as fast: More pain and horror for the victims’ families and the Charleston community.
These images and sounds eventually will be heard — during a trial. Until then, the court, prosecutors and defense lawyers should insist they remain private to keep from inflaming public opinion.
Why? First, it’s the right thing to do. As healing continues, it is not time to pour salt on fresh wounds, despite any moaning by self-important editors and reporters about their rights to have the information.
Second, the media zealots who want the information to be released are conveniently forgetting to tell the full story. Yes, they have a pretty good argument that they have a constitutional right to get access to photos or tapes of phone calls.
But in a rush to sell more newspapers or grab more Internet eyeballs, they’re not sharing the other side. They seem to forget that in American jurisprudence, anyone who is accused of a crime has a right to a fair trial — no matter how much people may not like that for one reason or another.
If these photos or phone calls from the Emanuel church shooting scene hit the Internet because of a media more interested in their own bottom line than in doing what is best for the city and state, then there’s almost no guarantee potential jurors won’t be prejudiced against the accused shooter.
Even worse, think about what hate groups would do with these pictures or sounds. Home-grown haters would use them to brag about their impact and try to recruit more haters. Even worse are overseas terrorists who hate the United States — they would use them to promote anti-Americanism to recruit more haters.
So this is where a judge comes in. In our society, judges have a heavy responsibility to balance rights of the media with the rights of the accused. Judges must ensure trials don’t become circuses. They can do things during a trial, such as sequestering jurors or having strong voir dire processes (interviews) with potential jurors to make sure they’ll be fair. But those things are months away. There’s a duty now to keep from tainting people with information and images that could be highly prejudicial.
Fortunately, there’s a U.S. Supreme Court case that suggests what should happen. In a 1966 opinion involving the 1954 murder conviction of Ohio Dr. Sam Sheppard, the court held 8-1 to return the case to a lower court and release the doctor unless he was charged again in a reasonable time.
In the opinion, the court found publicity about the case created a “carnival atmosphere.” The high court noted the state judge could have done some things to control the media, such as insulating witnesses or curbing the “release of leads, information and gossip to the press by police officers, witnesses, and counsel for both sides.”
Ultimately, the trial judge “did not fulfill his duty to protect Sheppard from the inherently prejudicial publicity which saturated the community and to control disruptive influences in the courtroom.”
See the parallel? And that was almost 50 years ago when there were three national networks and no cable, Internet or smartphones. Since then, media have oozed into every corner of our lives. To suggest that it will be less pervasive today is simply laughable.
Today’s media that are trying to get any bloody photos or 911 tapes need to stop being petulant, spoiled brats. They need to remember the tag line for The New York Times is “All the news that’s fit to print.” The operative word is “fit.” Right now, this information isn’t fit to be printed just because salacious media want it.
Andy Brack is editor and publisher of Statehouse Report. Send feedback to: feedback@statehousereport.com.
IN THE SPOTLIGHTSouth Carolina Policy Council
The public spiritedness of our underwriters allows us to bring Statehouse Report to you at no cost. This issue’s underwriter is the South Carolina Policy Council. Since 1986, the Policy Council has brought together civic, community and business leaders from all over our state to discuss innovative policy ideas that advance the principles of limited government and free enterprise. No other think tank in South Carolina can match the Policy Council’s success in assembling the top national and state experts on taxes, education, environmental policy, health care and numerous other issues. That ability to bring new ideas to the forefront, lead the policy debate and create a broad base of support for sensible reform is what makes our organization the leader in turning good ideas into good state policy.- For more information, go to: www.scpolicycouncil.com.
The “art” of politics and reimagining South Carolina
By Jim Rex
JULY 17, 2015 | After Gov. Nikki Haley’s public reversal on her position regarding the Confederate flag and the ensuing stampede by politicians of both parties to affiliate with the rapidly-growing consensus among South Carolinians supporting its removal, CNN interviewed former Gov. Mark Sanford. When asked why he hadn’t taken the opportunity to support the removal of the flag during his eight years in office as governor, he blithely responded, “Because politics is the art of the possible.”
Perhaps not surprisingly, this was a less than truthful, nor complete, description of the reality of our politics in South Carolina — or America. In reality, politics is, “the art of staying in office.” Often it recognizes the “probable” and then, and only then, to position oneself publicly as the champion of that already predestined outcome. Low risk, high reward — the cardinal rule for becoming and remaining a career politician!
The political system and the elected officials in it did not bring down the Confederate flag. The people of South Carolina, led by the amazing families of the slain victims in Charleston, brought down that flag. In doing so, they gave us a brief and, unfortunately, fleeting glimpse of what a political system could look like if it were not so terribly dysfunctional. [That means] elected officials working together to quickly and effectively address a need and a longstanding wrong. The same political system that put the flag up and protected it for half a century removed it in a matter of days because the majority of our citizens collectively demanded a different outcome, a different political response.
Another way to describe this remarkable past month in South Carolina is to say that a majority of South Carolinians “reimagined” our state. They envisioned a different outcome and that collective vision moved the system to reject the status quo. And while the removal of the flag is certainly important, the real work of reimagining our state still lies before us. And as any serious observer understands, if we are ever to successfully reimagine South Carolina, we must at the same time reimagine our broken political system.
Toward that end, the American Party of South Carolina is organizing and holding a series of “Reimagine SC” meetings around our state in the months ahead. We are calling for dialogues on a community-by-community basis about the future of our state. We are encouraging citizens to reimagine South Carolina as the peaceful and prosperous home we know it can be.
Throughout history, our country has been shaped by the creativity and energy of engaged, everyday citizens. If we envision the future together, we can build it together. This past remarkable, painful and productive month has shown us that this possibility still exists.
Contact us at: www.americanpartysc.com or 888-386-8083 and let’s get started, together!
Former Democratic state Superintendent of Education Jim Rex is chair of the American Party of South.
FEEDBACKProud of Lee Bright
To the editor:
I am proud to call Lee Bright my state senator. He understands that the real issue in our country is defiance to the word of God by calling homosexual relationships marriage and the slaughter of the unborn.
What would you do if an invading army entered your community looting, burning and killing? Would you take up arms and defend your property? That is exactly what my ancestor did when Virginia was invaded.
We can find good and evil associated with cherished symbols; I see the cross as a Christian symbol. Didn’t the KKK use the Cross as one of their symbols? Some see the Confederate Flag as a symbol of resistance to tyranny.
— Carol Sue Martin, Spartanburg, S.C.
Hurrah for Jenny Horne
To the editor:
Interestingly, I had always heard the upstate of S.C. was considered the “Bible Belt.” The representatives from that area obviously don’t believe in “love your fellow man as yourself” as they don’t seem to be able to see what the African Americans have had endure under the Confederate flag.
Hurrah for [state Rep.] Jenny Horne! She expressed the frustration what many of us white South Carolinians descended from slave owners felt about the flag flying on the Statehouse grounds. We are able, unlike those representatives who voted to keep the flag flying, to feel the pain our African American sisters and brothers have felt living under what has become a symbol of hate.
I am afraid if the murder of nine people didn’t change them, nothing will and more time will be wasted in the Statehouse arguing about this issue instead of moving South Carolina forward. They continue to deny their motives are racial but as the old saying goes, “If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.”
— Katharine D. Beard, Camden, S.C.
Send us a letter. We love hearing from our readers and encourage you to share your opinions. Letters to the editor are published weekly. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity. We generally publish all comments about South Carolina politics or policy issues, unless they are libelous or unnecessarily inflammatory. One submission is allowed per month. Submission of a comment grants permission to us to reprint. Comments are limited to 250 words or less. Please include your name and contact information.
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Thumbs down to the KKK
Thumbs up
Clyburn. Hats off to U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., for introducing legislation to curtail gun sales until conclusion of criminal background checks. More.
Rededication. Good job to folks in Clarendon County for rededicating a memorial to George Stinney Jr., the youngest person executed in the county in the last century. More.
Dollar Tree. Thanks for making a $100 million investment in South Carolina. Folks in Cherokee and Spartanburg counties appreciate it.
NAACP. Thanks for dropping the economic boycott of South Carolina imposed after the Confederate flag moved on Statehouse grounds. Now that it’s gone, maybe we can get some college championship sports here.
In the middle
Lucas. We understand that House Speaker Jay Lucas doesn’t want debate around the Confederate flag to extend to other public properties, such as the now-controversial Ben Tillman statue on Statehouse grounds or the halls named for him at Winthrop and Clemson universities. But can — or should — he even attempt control this? Ever hear of free speech? More.
Haley. Congratulations to Gov. Nikki Haley, who many media outlets say is having her political start rise following her leadership on the Confederate flag’s removal. But it might be a little premature to be talking about being on the presidential ballot, as some are, considering her record and post.
Thumbs down
KKK. Sure, the Ku Klux Klan has the right to protest Saturday. But it would be better for everybody if they’d take their hate and go away. (And stop terrorizing neighborhoods by handing out flyers.)
S.C. ENCYCLOPEDIAMarshall Tucker Band
S.C. Encyclopedia | Formed in 1971, the Marshall Tucker Band (MTB) laced its rock and roll with doses of country, blues, and jazz, selling millions of albums in the 1970s and 1980s and influencing acts such as Waylon Jennings, Hank Williams, Jr., Charlie Daniels, and Kid Rock.
Named for a blind South Carolinian who tuned pianos, the group kept Spartanburg as a home base, a fact that allowed the upstate town to share the band’s limelight. The original MTB included lead guitarist and chief songwriter Toy Caldwell, bass player Tommy Caldwell, lead singer Doug Gray, drummer Paul Riddle, rhythm guitarist George McCorkle, and flutist/saxophone player Jerry Eubanks.
Signed to Capricorn Records, MTB released its self-titled debut album in 1973. That album contained a Toy Caldwell composition called “Can’t You See,” a song that would later be covered by Hank Williams, Jr., Waylon Jennings, and others. The band’s most successful album was Searchin’ for a Rainbow (1975), which included the McCorkle-penned “Fire on the Mountain,” a song whose lyrics are displayed at Nashville’s Country Music Hall of Fame. Other notable MTB songs include “Take the Highway,” “Long Hard Ride,” and the Top-Twenty single “Heard It in a Love Song.” Each of the band’s six albums with Capricorn sold at least 100,000 copies, with two selling more than one million. A late 1970s shift to Warner Brothers Records proved less fruitful.
Tommy Caldwell died in 1980 from injuries sustained in an automobile accident. Former Toy Factory bassist Franklin Wilkie then joined the band, which soon added keyboardist Ronnie Godfrey. Toy Caldwell, McCorkle, and Riddle left the group in 1984, with Caldwell going on to record a solo album in 1992. Caldwell passed away after a heart attack in 1993 at age forty-five. Gray and Eubanks carried on the MTB name, utilizing various supporting musicians, until Eubanks departed in 1996 and left Gray as MTB’s only remaining original member.
– Excerpted from the entry by Peter Cooper. To read more about this or 2,000 other entries about South Carolina, check out The South Carolina Encyclopedia by USC Press. (Information used by permission.)
CREDITSEditor and Publisher: Andy Brack
Senior Editor: Bill Davis
Contributing Photographers: Michael Kaynard, Linda W. Brown
Phone: 843.670.3996
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Excerpts from The South Carolina Encyclopedia are published with permission and copyrighted 2006 by the Humanities Council SC. Excerpts were edited by Walter Edgar and published by the University of South Carolina Press. Statehouse Report has partnered with USC Press to provide readers with this interesting weekly historical excerpt about the state. Republication is not allowed. For additional information about Statehouse Report, including information on underwriting, go to https://www.statehousereport.com/.
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