♪ <Gavin> Welcome to This Week in South Carolina, I'm Gavin Jackson.

This week, I speak with Dr. Lydia Mattice Brandt.

She's the author of the South Carolina Statehouse Grounds, a new book that looks at the political and social history of the Capitol complex and the monuments on its grounds.

But first, Bryan Sterling, executive director of the Department of Corrections, joins us to discuss a new law that affects how the death penalty is carried out in South Carolina.

Director Sterling, thanks for joining me.

Thank you for having me.

So before we get into the latest developments on what's going with the death penalty, Bryan, I want to ask you just a little bit about the background.

Kind of walk us through how we got to this point where we're on the eve of having our first executions in more than 10 years.

How do we get here in this situation?

<Bryan> Well, time will tell if we have those executions.

As you know, the court put a stop to them last week.

So we've got to notify them when we have the firing squad available and then they'll make a decision.

I'm sure there'll be other lawsuits that will follow that decision by the court or that order by the court.

When I first took over in October of 2013, I was briefed on many things.

One of the things was lack of drugs to carry out a court order of execution.

I asked my team to research how we could get more drugs, and I was told we couldn't.

Other states that were able to procure the drugs had a thing called a shield law that would shield the manufacturer, producer, compounding pharmacy, from getting public, getting that information, being supplied and information.

I asked the attorney general's office for an opinion on the shield law and if our law that we had on the books now was strong enough, we took that to manufacturers and compounding pharmacies and they still, without an actual law on the books, a stronger law on the books like other states have, they would not sell us the drugs.

The drugs had expired about a month before I took over.

One of the things that we, the Obama administration did was they said you could not import drugs for purposes of executions.

So we set about trying to find it and we couldn't.

So I went to the legislature and testified that other states had done this.

My role is not to advocate is just to educate, went to the legislature and educated them on how other states are able to carry out these executions, get these drugs.

Those bills never really went anywhere.

They were introduced.

There were hearings and things of that nature.

And one of them passed one body but didn't make it through the other, never made it to the governor's desk for signature.

And this year I testified several years.

But this year they they came up with the firing squad as an alternative.

And that passed that was signed by the governor about a month and a half ago or so.

And before then, we started doing some research until the ink was dry on the bill.

We then started doing some more research and working with other states, Utah being one that has a firing squad to see how to go about policies and procedures.

The law requires us to develop policies and procedures.

And that's where we are right now.

<Gavin> And Bryan and part of that law that was signed into part of the bill that was signed into law by the governor in May was making the electric chair, which we've had as a method of execution since the early 1900's, making that the default method because we couldn't get these drugs.

And then they added firing squad, like you said.

So that kind of set things up to where they were now, where you guys were going forward with two planned executions.

But then the Supreme Court intervened.

Kind of tell us a little about that situation and how we got to this point right now where there is an injunction and we're still waiting on things to proceed.

<Bryan> So the court said, reading the law, that they interpreted what the legislature wanted was a choice, Once the law passed, we were instructed previously to let the court know when they stayed the other executions actually vacated their last order.

So there's no nothing set right now.

There's nothing on paper.

There's nothing to be done except develop the firing squad.

But the court read the law that there should be a choice.

We sent a letter to the court saying we have executions available.

They then issued order.

We have four Fridays to carry it out.

We proceeded down that path, multiple lawsuits.

The court then later last week vacated that order and said that there should be a choice and let us know when the firing squad is available.

So we will do that once it's available.

I don't have a time frame.

We are working diligently on it.

However, we do need to take our time.

Taking someone's life is one of the biggest things that a government can do.

We want to make sure we do it right.

We want to make sure we have the proper policies and procedures in place.

And that's what we're working on.

But that does not mean that we haven't stopped trying to find the drugs, find a way to get the drugs to carry out an execution by lethal injection.

Also, we can do it by electrocution.

Right now.

That's not a problem.

And the firing squad will be available eventually.

And if we can find a drugs or a way to get the drugs, we will we will let the court know that at the time also.

<Gavin> And so, like we said, that law was signed in May.

This has been in the works.

What kind of what made you think how did you realize that this was actually going to come to fruition this year, actually get signed into law?

Like you said, I've been covering this with you for several years now.

We've been talking about this for years.

What made the difference this year, in your opinion?

Was it some changes in the makeup of the legislature this go round since the 2020 elections or was a bigger push by the governor?

What do you think made the difference here?

<Bryan> Well, with everything, I think it's a combination of things this time.

This is the first time where, if I recall correctly, we've actually had an order for the longest time when I was asked by folks in the media "Has an execution been stopped because you don't have the drugs?"

And the answer was always "no."

This is the first time that executions had been stopped because we didn't have the access to the drugs.

I think that played a part.

I think Govenor McMaster saying, you know, we have valid orders out there we need to proceed.

And frankly, I think Senator Harpootlian and Senator Hembree being former solicitors and being involved in these type of cases, speaking with a common voice in the Senate is why it was added in the Senate.

And then it went back over to the House and it was adopted.

And there was a lot of impassioned speeches, as you remember, against and for the bill.

Again, my role as a person to carry out these laws and these court orders is not to advocate.

It's just to educate the legislature.

And that's what I felt like I did during this time.

So I think that's why it passed.

It was a combination of things coming together.

<Gavin> And then with that law, we became the fourth state to have a firing squad.

You were talking about how things are still progressing.

Give us the latest on that.

How does this work?

I mean, you knew this was kind of on the on the radar that this was a likelihood.

So I'm sure you've been doing some planning or what needs to happen.

I mean, are you going to create a chamber out of Broad River?

Is there going to be how do you pick the people for this firing squad?

Has this kind of work at this point?

<Bryan> It's the people to do.

The firing squad will be all volunteers like everybody else that's involved in executions.

We are researching whether we're going to have to build a chamber or not.

I don't think we're going to have to.

We're looking at other states.

What they do.

We may have to make some adjustments, but that's where we are right now in developing the policies and procedures from the physical structure to actual policies and procedures.

This is very heavily litigated area as it should be.

So we're going to do this with with a lot of diligence and make sure that we do it correctly.

<Gavin> And in terms of just a timeline, I know you said there's no set timeline, but could it possibly be this year?

I mean, what are you guys looking at in terms of how long this might take?

<Bryan> I'm not going to give a timeline.

I'm just going to tell you that we're working diligently on it and doing the research and developing the policies and procedures and looking at the physical structures.

We'll update you in the court when when that time has arrived.

<Gavin> And Bryan, before this, we have these two death row inmates who were set to be executed in June.

Like we said, the Supreme Court has stated that they had vacted that order.

Since we don't have that option for the firing squad.

What does death row look like right now?

The makeup I mean, is it is there an overcrowding situation there?

Obviously, you haven't been able to execute someone for more than ten years.

Is that also a factor when it comes to upholding these sentences?

<Bryan> It's not.

We set to execute someone last Friday and then tomorrow.

But no, it's not death row.

It's not overcrowded.

<Gavin> Since 1912.

Bryan out of 248.

Electrocutions in the state six have been botched, including giving off smoke and inmates catching fire.

That's according to an Amherst College professor.

Meanwhile, states with firing squads have a zero percent botched rate when it comes to executions.

Are you confident in whichever method is used in the future that there will be they will be done as correctly and humanely as possible, that there won't be any issues?

I mean, what kind of assurances to people have when you talk about an electric chair from 1912?

<Bryan> Yes, sir.

So, yes, I am confident that we will do everything we can to make sure that it's not botched, we train, we check obviously the electricity and things of that nature to make sure that it is working properly.

We take that very seriously.

<Gavin> And I know you said that these people who carry out these executions, these employees, they volunteer for this.

But I'm wondering if you ever noticed a toll.

I mean, I guess these executions happened before your tenure there.

But are you concerned at all going forward that there might be any mental health issues for these employees?

I've read a recent op ed by a former warden in Florida State Penitentiary who said that this just took a big toll on a lot of his employees, especially when he did witness a really botched execution down there, not saying that this would be the case here, but just overall that there could be mental health issues.

Are you prepared to handle of that for your employees?

Should that be the case, whether it's a firing squad or the electric chair?

<Bryan> Yes, we're prepared.

Our folks who work in corrections see sometimes the worst of the worst of humanity.

So that's already in place.

The mental health help is already in place where they can access that.

We have teams that can go in when there's events that would require mental health to work with folks.

We train on that.

And we've been doing that for years.

We've had trainers come in from other states on how to handle that.

So if the folks that are involved do need to reach out and talk to someone, those resources are definitely available.

<Gavin> And switching from the death penalty, Bryan, to just the agency more broadly, you guys have always had a situation of problem recruiting and getting talent out there.

That's what you've been tackling during your tenure, kind of catches up on the latest, how that's going, especially with the recent budget that just got to the governor's desk.

Are you guys improving or are you closing that gap when it comes to recruitment for corrections officers?

<Bryan> Well, again, with everything else, it's not just one thing.

South Carolina, under Governor Haley and Governor McMaster, we've had record low unemployment.

We recruited international businesses to come in and we've got Volvo, which is right down the road from one of our level three prisons.

We've got BMW in the upstate Boeing.

We're competing against a lot of high paying, high tech rewarding, financially rewarding jobs.

And that hasn't changed.

One thing that is hurt us during the pandemic is this extra money for folks who get paid more, frankly, to stay home than they do to come to work.

I know Governor McMaster was the second governor in the country to issue an order to pull back some of that money.

And we have seen since that was announced, our applications go up 20 to 30 percent, I expect.

I think it's July 1st when that money runs out that folks.

We'll see more folks.

Our numbers have gone down significantly in our population.

When I took over, we had about 24,000 folks incarcerated.

We had seven more prisons.

Now we have just over fifteen thousand folks incarcerated, seven less prisons.

So it is easier to staff.

That all being said, though, just like other law enforcement, we are struggling to find folks come in.

Governor McMaster gave a raise to our correctional officers.

It's about five million dollars that will spread out amongst the officers.

When I first took over, the pay on average was under twenty seven thousand dollars a year.

You could literally go to Wal-Mart and make more money.

Nothing wrong with working at Wal-Mart.

But if you look at the responsibilities between stocking shelves and at a level three prison, being a law enforcement officer, clearly there is a lot more responsibility.

And I went to the governor, Governor Haley, at the time, Governor McMaster now and ask them and educated the General Assembly on the need for more money.

So with this five million, almost five million extra, we're going to be up about almost thirty five percent from where we were eight years ago.

Our average salary, I think, is going to be close to between thirty-six and thirty-seven thousand dollars a year.

That is not as much overtime as they can handle with safety concerns.

Obviously, they can't work too many shifts in a row.

So we're paying overtime.

We're paying more money.

Senator Leatherman, Senator Martin, Chairman Smith, GovenorMcMaster and others have met that challenge and funded us.

In addition, we're going to get more funding for our medical staff.

Our nurses are underpaid by community standards by about fifteen to twenty thousand dollars a year.

We're going to close that gap and get as close as we can to that community standard.

One of the things I said in some of our oversight meetings is we're not going to hire our way out of this.

We need to retain our way out of this so we can hire a couple people, but we don't need to lose as many.

And I had a meeting yesterday where I was where I was looking at retention rates and they are getting better.

We are keeping more folks.

I think they're feeling safer.

I think they're feeling more appreciated and supported by folks in Columbia, but also supported by their leadership at their institutions.

So hopefully all that combination will lead to.

<Gavin> More people and Bryan, are you when it comes to wages for these corrections officers?

Is there a number, or a set number you're going, you're going to try and get them to at some point like forty five or something like that, thousand dollars, or you just keep going until you feel <Bryan> I'm going to keep asking until they tell me no.

<Gavin> And then when it comes to other funding issues, you know, you guys have had requests for one hundred million dollars plus in years past.

What's going on with the current budget?

You have, you know, some facilities where the doors came unlocked.

And I know you also want to upgrade door technology in a lot of places.

Have you been getting those requests fulfilled as well?

<Bryan> We have.

So we fix those doors.

They're all fixed now.

They lock, but they were easily defeated, I guess is the best way to say it.

So once they lock, you could open them up because of an old system that wasn't maintained for a very long time.

The decay at the department didn't just start recently.

I would argue that it started back in the 90s when all the programs were taken away.

And then we went through a couple times where there just wasn't any raises.

When I took over, the officers hadn't had a raise in ten years.

Now they've had multiple, multiple raises for our structure and things of that nature.

What I would like to do is because our officers have to go in and lock and unlock every door multiple times a day, let folks out in for count and things of that nature.

We've asked the General Assembly and I've been told we're going to get this money in a later budget.

I think it's covid money that we're going to be getting some money for to be able to make these doors automatic, putting some more fencing, some more security, things of that nature cameras and things that will make the institutions safer.

<Gavin> Gotcha, and Bryan, we have to leave it there.

I know there's so much more to talk about, but we'll have to catch up another episode.

That's Bryan Sterling.

He's the director of the Department of Corrections in South Carolina.

Thanks so much, sir.

<Bryan> Thank you, Gavin.

And our officers and everybody has worked during this covid deserve a lot of praise and they are truly heroes.

Thank you very much.

<Gavin> Thank you to them.

Joining me to discuss her new book is University of South Carolina Professor Lydia Mattice Brandt.

Dr. Brandt.

Thanks for joining us.

My pleasure.

So, Dr. Brandt, you have a background in art, architectural history.

You've written a previous book in Mount Vernon.

I want to ask you really what has prompted you to write this book?

The South Carolina statehouse grounds a guidebook.

How long it took you, what you found out.

<Lydia> This book was prompted by lots of questions that I had and other people have asked me over the past 10 years, I've been in South Carolina and looking when I started to look around for a book or even a website, Wikipedia, to help me answer those questions, I couldn't find the answers.

And some of those questions were really basic.

When was this monument built?

Why did this building show up here or there?

And so I started working on this guidebook as an attempt to answer those questions and to provide a comprehensive story of this site that we all think we know really well in one place.

<Gavin> But you didn't start with it because you didn't start out planning to write a book, though, right?

<Lydia> No, not at all.

A lot of the research started just trying to piddle around and answer basic questions.

And then once I started to learn more and more and more and understand just how interesting the site is and how in many ways it reflects the history of South Carolina.

I decided to write a guidebook.

<Gavin> Mm hmm.

And then what do you what did you start observing when you started doing this research?

What did you start noticing maybe that, you know, the average person wouldn't pick up on because they are kind of walking around.

There are somebody different monuments scattered on the grounds.

About 23 acres, I think, is how big the whole complex is maybe.

And they're all over the place, too.

So what did you start noticing in your initial research?

<Lydia> One of the most interesting things and the most difficult to research, which as a historian makes it really fun, is how many of the monuments have moved and changed.

Almost all of the monuments on the statehouse grounds, especially those erected before the 1970s, have all moved at least once.

And so understanding why monuments moved, what their original configuration was and how that played into what they were originally intended to mean, that was fascinating to me, how they'd all changed.

And it reminded me that just like our identity as South Carolinians and our history is constantly evolving.

So is this place.

And that makes a lot of sense.

And so unraveling those changes over time was really interesting.

<Gavin> So, Dr. Pratt, there's a lot of historical context in your book that it provides that we don't really get from other resources, even at the state house.

Kind of tell us about some of the context, the historical context behind these monuments, specifically when it comes to race and white supremacy and why these monuments were put on the statehouse grounds in the first place.

<Lydia> So monuments are attempts by people in the present to put the past into context, that makes sense for them at the moment.

And so it's a lot of very convenient history.

And so the moments where you see South Carolinians, the South Carolinians in power, which until very recently were white men, the moments in which they really try to erect monuments and invest in the statehouse grounds are moments where they're trying to assert that power and to use the past and sometimes the really recent past in order to legitimize their decisions in the present.

And so what we see on the statehouse grounds is often a defense or an offense, a strategy by those in power to make arguments about what South Carolina has been and what it should be in the future.

And so a lot of the monuments are assertions of white supremacy, some done in reaction to the civil war, but more often in reaction to reconstruction.

South Carolina has a really important and really unique history during reconstruction.

We had the only still to this day a black majority state legislature in the history of the United States.

And so a lot of the monuments that are constructed beginning in the 1870s after the conclusion of reconstruction.

There might look like they're about the civil war, but they're really about asserting control after reconstruction and whites taking back power or what they called redeeming power.

And so when monuments like those to Wade Hampton and Ben Tillman are unveiled and those are unveiled almost 40 years apart from one another, what people are talking about at those ceremonies is about how the government in South Carolina will never again be ruled by black people.

And so they're very explicit in that they are about white supremacy.

And all you have to do is look either at the monuments themselves or at the words that people said when they first unveiled them.

<Gavin> What you do in your book, you provide that those first hand accounts, that really important context to back up the fact why they were put there in the first place.

Do you think that we're in any way trying to maybe remedy that past in any way with any current or new monuments at this point?

<Lydia> Well, putting new monuments up on the statehouse grounds and taking or taking old monuments down is really difficult because of legislation that was enacted with the compromise to remove the Confederate flag from the top of the state house to the Confederate Monument.

And so until that legislation can change, there's really not going to be any political possibility of making those changes.

<Gavin> And we can talk about the Heritage Act in a moment to I just want to kind of piggyback on what you're saying about some of those statues, too.

I was interested when you talked about the George Washington statue that's right there in the front of the statehouse, you know, part of his chanes missing because of because of Sherman's troops and all that.

We can get to that as well.

But the reason that that Washington statue was there in the first place is quite interesting.

It's not necessarily because he was the first president, but because of some of his, I guess, beliefs.

Can you kind of go into that and expound upon that?

For some people, that would just assume, hey, that's the first president makes sense to put George Washington there.

<Lydia> Sure, George Washington and I wrote my first book about George Washington's memory and the memory of his home in Mount Vernon, so I dove in.

Yeah, but that's the view of George Washington.

And George Washington is a really helpful figure in American history because he's so famous.

He's been around so long that pretty much anybody can project anything they want on to him and use him to make a statement about their own ideas.

And so that's what South Carolinians were doing in 1858 when they purchased that statue of George Washington, which is a copy of an 18th century statue in Virginia for the new state house, which was then just under construction.

And they bought that statue to connect, South Carolina to colonial American history.

But more importantly, they bought that statue because they wanted to put it in the state house where they were going to assert South Carolinians, white South Carolinians ability or power, they believed under the Constitution to own and enslave other human beings.

And so Washington, as a slave owner, as probably the most famous slave owner in American history, served that purpose.

And that's something that not just South Carolinians are doing, but Southerners and the kind of pro confederates are doing all over the South in the 1850's using George Washington's memory as part of their arguments for why slavery is not only right, but part of what makes America, America.

<Gavin> So kind of disturbing that when you start to look at the history of that statue, but again, like you said, things can be projected onto a lot of these different statues on the campus grounds, including some of the of the difficult past that many of those folks embody, kind of fast forwarding to the 2000 Heritage Act that you're talking about.

You know, in order to move a monument or to rename a building in our state, you need two thirds of the state legislature, which is an arbitrary number, which is actually before a case in the state Supreme Court about how this law is in effect.

It's being challenged right now.

So things could change.

But what do you think needs to happen at this point when it comes to memorializing these folks?

Especially we look at Ben Tillman, you look at Dr. Marion Sims, you know, very conflicted past there, especially when you look at what's been done in New York with his statue versus what we do here with his monument.

What needs to be done?

Do you need to have panels?

Do you need to move these things or does your guidebook provide that missing link, essentially?

<Lydia> I try really hard not to tell people what to do with these monuments.

I feel like my my role as an architectural historian and is is to provide the background information that allows people to make more informed choices.

What happens to those monuments needs to be decided on by South Carolinians.

It needs to be decided on by groups of people that are are currently advocating for certain positions.

But before even that can happen, you have to know why they were there in the first place, because I really think that that information can inform what happens next.

I would really like to see more recognition of South Carolina's reconstruction history recognized in a positive way on the statehouse grounds.

It is so something to be proud of.

It is absolutely conflicted because it was such a short lived period in our history and in many ways could be considered could be considered a failure because white people were able to take back that power.

But that's a really complicated story and it's very, very interesting.

I worked on the monument to Richard T. Greener on the South Carolina State House.

Ah, I'm sorry.

I worked on the monument to Richard T. Greener on the USC campus, and he was the first black professor during reconstruction.

And that history is so important to recognize at USC, I think more of a of a recognition of that on the statehouse grounds is extremely important, not just on the African-American history monument, but elsewhere on the grounds.

<Gavin> Yeah, definitely need a lot more history, a lot more understanding of history.

And it's good to see that your guidebook does that.

And that's Lydia Matisse Brandt.

She's a University of South Carolina college professor and she has a new book out, the South Carolina Statehouse Grounds.

Dr. Brandt, thank you.

<Lydia> Thank you.

Good to see you.

<Gavin> To stay to today with the latest news throughout the week, check out the South Carolina Lead.

It's a podcast that I host on Tuesdays and Saturdays.

And you can find it on southcarolinapublicradio.org, or wherever you find podcasts.

For South Carolina ETV, I'm Gavin Jackson.

Be well, South Carolina.

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