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As a Democrat, the fact that I admire the politics of my adopted home state of South Carolina may surprise you. The state legislature is overwhelmingly Republican, and Palmetto has not elected a Democratic governor or senator for more than a quarter century.
But as right-wing comrades in Florida, Tennessee and Georgia routinely wage culture wars, dividing citizens and rallying Democratic voters across the country, South Carolina’s leaders believe that logic and reason can unite people. We have provided a strong example of the third method that can be done. A combination of different political parties, races and beliefs to really form a more perfect union and achieve common goals.
In 2016, neighboring North Carolina passed HB 2, also known as the “bathroom bill,” banning transgender citizens from using public facilities consistent with their individual gender identity. This has had a severe financial impact on the state, totaling billions of dollars in lost revenue. The unpopularity of the policy also contributed to the defeat of first-term Republican Governor Pat McCrory later that year.
US and South Carolina flags (Kevin Ferris/Fox News Digital)
At the same time, the government of the time. Nikki Haley opposed a similar bill in South Carolina, but it never passed the state Senate. More recently, South Carolina’s Supreme Court (elected only by a Republican-controlled Congress) rejected a bill banning six-week abortions. Today, most abortions are allowed until her 22 weeks in this highly conservative state. The drafter of the ruling was one of the state’s first female jurists and the spouse of a Republican state legislator.
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Most recently, the South Carolina legislature called for bipartisan consensus on some of the most contentious issues of our time. In 2022, as other Republican-led states battle laws restricting access to voters and ballots, South Carolina will unanimously adopt election reform bill H. 4919, giving counties at least six days, two Mandated to offer weekly in-person early voting. You voted a week before the election or runoff and no longer needed an excuse to vote early (out of state, disabled, etc.). Security measures for voter ID and installed ballots were also included for Republicans wary of election security.
While curriculum warfare rages in many states, particularly Florida, a bipartisan majority of the South Carolina Senate Education Committee last week sent a consensus education bill to the floor with broad support. This amazingly uncontroversial bill would essentially allow teachers to teach, creating a statewide process to challenge content at the local level that parents might deem problematic. Allow.
For example, South Carolina’s bill does not prohibit teaching about slavery or the Holocaust, or removing books from library shelves in bulk. Parents no longer have discretionary power to sue teachers or school districts, but the law allows a process to hear complaints at the local level.
State Capitol, Columbia, South Carolina (Epic/Getty Images)
And even the current language of what should (or shouldn’t) be taught in schools is pretty basic, something most reasonable people can agree on.
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When it comes to library content, the law is very simple. Local school boards emphatically decide that books should be age appropriate for school type, following the guidelines of the state Department of Education (a department overseen by elected Republicans). It is conducted statewide by voters with the state school board elected by the state legislature.
There is no doubt that Palmetto State has the potential to be an even better place, especially for northern transplants like me. For example, the state is one of her two states with no hate crime bills. The bill continues to pass the House, but is awaiting approval by the Senate.
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But as states across the country get tougher, we should look to red-hot South Carolina as an example of the civility, politeness, and bipartisan compromise needed in America’s legislative process.
When progressive Democrats and MAGA Republicans were able to unanimously agree on issues ranging from voting rights and voting access to school curricula in the former cradle of the Confederacy, perhaps, perhaps, other There is hope for state and congressional leaders in .
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