South Carolina Lawmakers to Begin Confederate Flag Debate
COLUMBIA, S.C., July 6 (UPI) — The South Carolina General Assembly in Columbia is prepared to take up the controversial debate over the Confederate flag on Monday.
The Confederate flag and a conclusion of budget issues will be on the assembly’s schedule. No final decision is expected until a later date and a two-thirds majority both in the state’s Senate and House of Representatives would be needed to remove the flag from the Capitol grounds.
South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley has called for the flag to be taken down following the deadly shooting at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston on June 17, where nine church members were killed by an apparent white supremacist during a Bible study session.
“You always want to think that today is better than yesterday — that we’re growing as a state, we’re growing as a country. When something like this happens, you reflect, and you say: Have we changed enough?” Haley told NBC’s Today on Saturday.
“I don’t think this is going to be easy. I don’t think that it’s going to be painless, but I do think that it will be respectful, and that it will move swiftly,” Haley said.
Several surveys of lawmakers has shown the state’s legislature has enough votes to remove the Confederate flag, but there has been vocal opposition to the move.
Automated telephone calls were reportedly received by voters last week, urging them to call their representatives to tell them “not stand with leftist fanatics who want to destroy the South we love.”
“What’s next? This attack on our values is sick and un-American and it has to stop right here and right now in South Carolina,” the automated message said.
