♪ > Welcome to This Week In South Carolina I'm Gavin Jackson.

This week, we look back at the life and legacy of South Carolina native, the late Reverend Jesse Jackson, a civil rights leader and icon.

But first, we start with former state senator and current mayor of Camden and now author Vincent Sheheen to discuss his book, The Concise Guide to South Carolina State Government .

I opened by asking him what motivated him to write this book and why it's needed.

> Well, I was teaching at USC's Honors College.

I had taught there for four or five years, and I was using a book with the class that was, oh, probably 30 years old.

I was literally marking out chapters that weren't relevant anymore.

And then it was out of circulation and I couldn't find the book anyway.

I said to myself, "How could no one have written a book about how South Carolina government works, with the great changes we've seen over the last 30 years?"

And, I decided to do it.

And really, I think the other motivating factor was people just don't pay attention to state government anymore.

Everything is nationalized.

And I want people to, I want people to be able to understand their own government.

Gavin> And I know you have different titles too including podcaster which is a title we both share.

That's what we both try and do on our podcast is try... you know, break down that misunderstanding about the State House.

Because people don't realize that they have a state representative, state senator.

That's there working for them.

And do you hope that will do that in this book?

Mayor Sheheen> I do, and I think, I think ETV is one of the last bastions of covering state government.

It's so important.

I hope that the book itself will say, this is how our government works, but not just, you know, the academic side.

Also an insider's view of that.

I served in the State Senate for 16 years, the State House of Representatives for four.

This talks about how it really works, as well.

And when I say really works, I don't mean some scandal.

I mean really works on a day to day basis.

And then to make it fun and interesting, I also talk about some seriously interesting figures in state government from years past.

And how our government came to be what it is.

Going back all the way to the Colonial and Pre-Colonial Eras.

Gavin> And we'll definitely talk about that.

But I want to get your pulse on just how you, how you see our state government, like you said, you were up there in Columbia, since... up until 2020.

<Yes> How do you compare us to other states, too?

I mean, you see up there, I mean, obviously the Democrats are in the minority now.

They're in the super minority in both chambers.

But at the same time, you know, when you go around there, it's not like there's vitriol, it's not overly negative.

Obviously, some debates do get very heated.

<Sure> But how do you compare us to maybe other states or even Washington, D.C.?

Mayor Sheheen> It's hard to compare because each state is different.

We are very different than D.C., although we've become more like D.C.

Historically, I mean, even the State Senate for most of its history didn't organize along party lines.

It only began organizing along party lines 25 years ago.

There's still that camaraderie.

There's still a, some sharing of power.

It's not just party line votes every day.

In fact, I think the starkest difference is in D.C.

for the speaker of the House to be elected, he essentially, or she, has to get every vote from their party.

That's not what happens here.

I talk about it in the book.

The speakers traditionally try to get votes from Democrats, try to get votes from Republicans.

And that was true when Democrats were speakers and when, now that Republicans are speakers.

So I'd say there's still more collegiality.

We ebbed or excuse me, we kind of gradually came into the one party Republican rule in our state, whereas in other states it happened... [fingers snapping] very quickly.

And I think that has allowed us to continue to get along a little more than if the whipsaw had occurred, quite as quickly.

Gavin> And so, Senator, you opened this book with the classic James Pettigrew quote, that "South Carolina is too small for a republic, but too large for an insane asylum."

That quote seems to resonate for so many people.

Why did you choose to use that one?

What does it mean to you?

[laughter] Mayor Sheheen> Well, first of all, he was a remarkable human being.

He was a very prominent statesman in the South before the Civil War.

And almost all of the leaders were for secession, and this man was brave enough to say "no, we need to continue to be in the Union."

And that was a really difficult position.

So first, I wanted to draw attention to the strength of character that can be in leaders.

But secondly, yeah, when I used to sit in the Senate and I thought about how crazy stuff was that was going on, I would think to myself of that quote, just to remind me that, you know, this has been going on a long time, and we're still here.

Gavin> It definitely still holds up.

But of this book itself, I mean, you're talking about how you were teaching and you had a book that was 30 years old, and how it was out of date.

I mean, I feel like even this book, you know, there have been changes since it's been published.

<Yes> So you'll be making future editions of this, too.

Why is that the case?

I mean, we're talking about, even... I think you do have some of the changes when it comes to the breakup of DHEC, with the Department of Environmental Services and the Department of Public Health.

<Yes> But we've also seen changes, to the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities.

So there's all this movement.

Can you maybe talk to us about why there's always such movement, consolidation, breakup?

I mean, you've been there for it, you've seen it.

Tinkering with different organizational structures.

What's the meaning behind it?

Everyone just has to touch it and make it their own or what?

Mayor Sheheen> Well, when I came into government, I was a big believer that we needed to reorganize things, make them work better.

And I thought that if we reorganize things, they would work better.

What I learned while I was there that yes, reorganization does need to occur, but that does not mean you get better government.

It really boils down to what kind of leaders do you have?

So, you know, in the old form of government we had in this state where the General Assembly literally ran everything, sometimes you had great leaders and you had good results.

Now that we have a, government where the executive branch the leader of that branch, the governor, appoints most officials in the state, you know, sometimes that's good, sometimes it's bad.

It depends on the governor and who they appoint.

Why do we do it over and over?

I think it's human nature to want to change things, try to perfect them.

And yeah, one of the biggest challenges in the book was keeping up with what was happening while I was writing it.

So when I originally wrote it and submitted it, DHEC was a thing?

And then I had time to go back and change it to reflect that it wasn't a thing.

But by the time that we saw DDSN and others change, the book was off to the printer.

So, ten years from now, five years from now, you know, me or someone else will have to update the book.

Gavin> Yeah.

I mean, and even when we're talking about DOT which you talk about, Department of Transportation and how powerful that organization is, that agency is.

And we see that now, too, especially with some seven billion dollars of construction underway in the state because the gas tax was increased.

You were there for that too.

Mayor Sheheen> I was the chair of the committee?

Gavin> Which was a huge divisive debate.

And during that time you also restructured DOT.

<Yes> And now we are talking about restructuring DOT again with two bills.

I mean, round and round it goes.

Mayor Sheheen> My uncle served in the General Assembly before me and he said, "the one thing I know is that you will be talking about the same issues while you're there that I was talking about while, he was there."

And I think if you... that is human nature and it is what government is about.

It's also why when I left the General Assembly, I came away with the belief that much more important than the actual substantive issues that we take up, is how we do things.

The democracy that we have, the way that we conduct our government turns out, actually is more important than the substantive issues we deal with day by day.

Because those substantive issues will be the same substantive issues 20 and 30 and 40 years from now.

But if we don't have a democracy or a legislature or a government that actually works, then you can't really do anything on the substantive issues.

So by the time I left, my thoughts and approach really had completely changed.

Before I would have said substance matters more than process.

Now, I believe process really matters and it matters more than substance.

Gavin> And things are going smoothly right now in your take, your opinion?

Mayor Sheheen> Well, things never go smoothly.

Gavin> We're still working, I guess.

Mayor Sheheen> Yeah, I think South Carolina State Government by and large, reflects well on, in who we are and it works.

And when you look nationally and you see the dysfunction there, I think that old argument that was, "hey, we need to be more like the national government" has never, ever looked like a worse argument than it does now.

Our nation was established so that the states had their own representative governments that were different than the federal government.

That was purposeful.

And in the years past, we saw arguments, especially from Governor Mark Sanford and others, that we needed to be more like the federal government.

Like, who wants that now?

Not me.

Okay, I'm glad that we do things a little different in South Carolina.

Gavin> We always have, it seems like, that's the case.

And you do talk about the history.

There's little bits in there too.

<Yeah>.

This is a great complement to what we've seen in some other books that have been published, like Walter Edgar's South Carolina A History .

And then also recently I talked to Congressman Jim Clyburn about his book, The First Eight.

And that was just super fascinating, too.

So a lot, talking about those formative years to the constitutions that were crafted as well.

And you really drill down on these agencies and the three different branches.

And I want to talk about the executive branch, too, because people are always talking about just how weak our governor is compared to the legislature.

Can you give us some background on that, and just how it seems like the governor has actually clawed back some power bit by bit.

We were talking about appointments, but how does that stand right now?

Mayor Sheheen> Yeah.

So one of the purposes of this book was to, to really push back on some of what I would say are the, the common thoughts we have.

Because historically the governor was super weak in South Carolina.

Talk about it in the book when the governor was first established in the Colonial Period and Post-Colonial Period, rather.

The governor served two years, was elected by the General Assembly.

Why was that so?

It was because our people hated the Crown, hated the King, hated the Lord proprietors who had been in charge of the colony.

They did not want consolidation of power.

They wanted power in the elected officials who were closest to the people.

And that was the legislature.

That continued through, really until the modern era, through different governing, structures, through the Civil War or Reconstruction, Post-Reconstruction.

But what has happened in the last 30 to 40 years, starting off with John Carl West, who was from Camden and Dick Riley and legislative leaders in Carol Campbell and Mark Sanford and into the future, was that we saw governors really become powerful.

And they are very powerful now in South Carolina, Governors can serve two terms.

They serve four year terms.

That's not how it started.

We, they now select their lieutenant governor.

They appoint the adjutant general, those used to be elected.

And really, every major agency in this state that does anything important is appointed by the governor, the director's appointed by the governor or the commission that runs it is appointed by the governor.

It used to be the legislature appointed those people.

Does the legislature still have great power?

Of course, and it should.

But the governor is a really powerful position in South Carolina, now.

And I would say it's probably, in my opinion, about average from around the states.

There are some with weaker governors, and there are some with even stronger.

Gavin> You were talking about appointing the heads and then you said commission heads too, I was a little worried for ETV, of course.

[laughter] But, Mayor Shane, you've also run for governor, too.

<Yes> Twice, you were the nominee for the Democratic Party in the state in 2010, 2014, with Nikki Haley running as a Republican.

But you also really, like you talked about Dick Riley, there in 1979-87.

He was the first one to get those two terms.

<Yes> But you also talk about, Ben Tillman who was there in 1890 to 1894.

Interesting to pick those two.

Mayor Sheheen> Yes.

Well, it was purposeful.

It was to show the commonality that a person in the governor's office can have great power because both of them did.

Even though Ben Tillman's power formally was very weak, informally, he was probably the most powerful official ever in the state of South Carolina.

And that's saying something.

I also chose them because one in my mind really represents the light, the, moving us forward, trying to make the state a better place.

And that, of course, is Dick Riley.

And Ben Tillman, although he was massively powerful, and was a big progressive on things like higher education and education, was also a vicious racist.

Made no apologies for it.

Really, really led to the disenfranchisement and the brutal murders of African-Americans in South Carolina.

And what we saw in the Post-Reconstruction Era when the White leadership in the state really, the rural White leadership overthrew the, the classic White leadership and then just really, decimated the Black voting ability, the Black ability to make, Black people's ability to make a living.

And so I think we need to recognize those things in South Carolina.

Yeah, somebody can be super powerful and the results can be really bad.

And that is what happened with Ben Tillman.

He set us back 100 years.

Gavin> You see that Reconstruction Era?

I mean, I feel like that again... you talk a little bit about it too, but, Congressman Clyburn's book is really super fascinating because it looks at those eight congressmen that came before him.

And then the 95 year gap between the last one and him getting to Congress.

And that's what you're talking about 100 years.

And I don't think we talk about Reconstruction enough.

Mayor Sheheen> I don't and, you know, I learned things while I was researching the book.

Because during that Reconstruction Era, the constitution that came out of that was very progressive.

It established free public education in South Carolina.

It established the Secretary of Education in South Carolina.

It began to empower, local government, cities and counties.

All that was turned back except the education part by the Tillmans, by Tillman and the Tillmanites.

But also, one of the things I learned was that it wasn't like, you know, Blacks were in control of the state, which they were.

They were a majority, during the Reconstruction Era.

And then they just said, "oh, well, White people, you can have the power back."

That is not what happened.

There was vicious battles and fights for years between the rural White folks, led by Ben Tillman and Black folks who were trying to maintain some semblance of dignity and ability and power.

And they were real battles.

And I think we don't teach that really in South Carolina.

But there was battles in Edgefield, there was battles all across the state.

And, of course, that White supremacy movement, as we all know, won.

And we saw the Great Migration really as a result of that.

And that was Black citizens from the South in South Carolina as well, leaving and going up north where they thought they could have more opportunity.

Gavin> A lot of fog from the assassination of Lincoln on and on through the years <Yes> and years in the federal state.

Mayor Sheheen> And the reason I talk about it in the book is because it directly affects the government we have now.

The Colonial Period, the Revolutionary War directly affects the government we have now.

We have elected our judges from the legislature since that Colonial Period.

That was true during Reconstruction when we had Black majority rule.

It was true once we had the White majority rule come back into play.

So our government, you can see it really it really has changed greatly.

But there are some things that remain the same.

Gavin> And I will say the book is very nonpartisan too.

It's very objective.

Of course, it's history.

Mayor Sheheen> And listen, the parties have changed over the years, right?

Like Democrats aren't like they were in 1870 and Republicans aren't like they were in 1870 either.

So, history is history.

Gavin> To that end, talk about the legislative branch, we have less than five minutes.

I mean, you were there, like we said, up through 2020, from 2001, in the House and the Senate.

So you get both of those perspectives.

How much have those institutions changed maybe in your time, and also maybe you take the historic perspective, is it really down to leadership there is it because of party makeup?

I mean, I feel like you might have a lot more contentiousness when those margins were slimmer.

Now here again, you have these super majorities.

Mayor Sheheen> Yeah, I think things ebb and flow and I learned that from the book.

You know, when Tillman was ascendant, he ran everything and the Tillmanites ran everything.

They were Democrats, but they threw out the Democrats that were there before them.

So we kind of see that now again, in one party rule with Republicans.

We have the Freedom Caucus and what we would call the "traditional" Republicans fighting.

I think the one constant in the book is that we are a one party state.

There was about a maybe 20 or 30 year period from 1975 to, you know, 2000, we'll say 2010, when I ran for governor, when, when the parties either party could have been elected to statewide office.

And the General Assembly make up was contentious or close.

But I think the consistent in the book, you'll see, is that we truly are a one party state.

I think that honestly goes back to the racial divide in the state and how that is played out in politics, whether consciously or subconsciously.

The General Assembly is, you know, has changed as well.

It used to be we had one senator per county.

The federal government ruled that unconstitutional.

And so now we don't, we are more proportional.

But we still have a Senate where, things tend to work slower and a House where things tend to work quicker.

So there's continuity as well as change.

Gavin> And again, I mean kind of talking about your 2010 run.

That was a very close margin there.

<Yes> And then it expanded, like it has for successive candidates who've run for the Democratic Party since.

I mean, it's difficult to break that ten point margin.

And that's not really changing based on the growth habits, unlike the Georgias and the North Carolinas of the world.

Mayor Sheheen> So we've seen in South Carolina, the big, immigrant group into the state.

When I say immigrant, I mean within the country, is older people and older White people.

And so they live in Myrtle Beach and Beaufort and these areas.

And that tends to reinforce the, the Republican tendencies of the state that existed.

You see in North Carolina or Georgia, you see lots of young people moving there and we know from those demographics that they may vote more Democratic.

And so you have a healthier divide.

I will say, though, that the one area of the state that attracts lots of young people is Charleston, and it's the one area of the state that has become blue or purple, where it's, it used to be Republican.

So who knows what the future holds.

Gavin> And part of that is still part of the Sixth Congressional District, the only Democrat district in the state.

<Yes> Gerrymandering at work right there.

But before we get out here, I want to talk about the judicial branch, because you mentioned how judges have been reelected easily, absent allegations of incompetence, scandal or bad behavior, which helps foster that nonpartisan nature of the judiciary.

<Yeah> Is that changing, especially in terms of what we're seeing play out maybe right now with the current State Supreme Court race for Justice John Cannon Few's seat.

That's happening March 4th... March 4th in the State House.

We're seeing some divisions there.

I don't know if you want to weigh in on that or if you want to look maybe more historically, but just how we approach the judicial branch in South Carolina.

Mayor Sheheen> Well, in recent years, there's been a lot of heat about the legislature electing the judicial branch.

One of the things I talk about in the book, though, is that, first of all, that is very historic, and it was related to the formation of this country.

But secondly, the result has been a nonpartisan judiciary.

Like, you don't know if a judge is Republican or Democratic.

We don't have Obama judges and Trump judges in South Carolina's judiciary because they need to attract votes from Democratic and Republican members of the General Assembly.

And so they tend to be just lawyers who work hard and are willing to go and try to be a judge, which has been a real positive.

Not a lot of scandal compared to other states where they may be run in public elections and have to raise money, or they're campaign donors to a governor.

But one of the things that has made that work is the General Assembly has reelect judges traditionally, unless there's been some major problem, scandal, etc.

You're right, there's a Supreme Court race right now where a sitting incumbent justice may not win reelection.

That is different from what we have seen in the past.

I think part of that is likely personality driven.

But, are things changing?

Maybe, maybe not.

And I think by and large, this is probably a one off.

And I think the best telling point of that is that a former democratically elected African-American General Assembly member was the chief justice of our state while Republicans controlled it.

And that was because the tradition was the most senior sitting justice would become the chief justice.

And my former colleagues in the General Assembly respected tradition.

Gavin> And I guess, I mean, I would love to hear more about your opinion on the judiciary and how you guys foster that relationship across the street from the State House to the Supreme Court.

I'm sure you have plenty to talk about.

<Oh, yeah.> But folks, can listen to that on your Bourbon in the Backroom podcast if they want to.

Mayor Sheheen> Absolutely.

Or maybe I'll get invited to yours and we talk about it there.

Gavin> We'll see, March 4th.

We'll talk about it.

That's Mayor of Camden Vincent Sheheen and author now of The Concise Guide to South Carolina Government.

Thank you so much.

Mayor Sheheen> Thank you very much.

It was great being on the show.

Gavin> Now we look back at the life of Greenville's Reverend Jesse Jackson, who died this week at the age of 84.

South Carolinian and longtime civil rights leader Reverend Jesse Jackson died February 17th, surrounded by his family in Chicago at the age of 84.

Jackson suffered from a rare progressive neurological disorder that affected his ability to move and speak.

Jesse Jackson was born and raised in Greenville, South Carolina.

He became a part of the Civil Rights Movement in 1960.

And served as the point man in the Greensboro sit-ins.

He quickly gained notoriety by rallying Chicago's Black clergymen behind Reverend Dr.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

He joined King's march from Selma to Montgomery in 1965.

And was there when the civil rights icon was assassinated in 1968.

In 1971, Reverend Jesse Jackson founded Operation Push, which stands for People United to Save Humanity.

He served as president of this national organization since its formation, and during the time of this 1982 interview with Listervelt Middleton, host of For the People on SCETV.

Listervelt> And that one of the criticisms of the civil rights movement is that its biggest beneficiaries have been middle income and educated people.

Do you think of that as a valid criticism and what can be done to broaden the range of people who can benefit in Black prosperity?

Rev.

Jackson> That's an invalid criticism.

In 1965, when we went to Selma, Alabama, to get the right to vote, there were 400 elected and appointed Black officials in this nation.

Today there almost 6000.

The economic reigns goes from the very bottom in many ways to the very top, from the very small unincorporated towns to cities like Gary, Detroit, Los Angeles and Newark, New Jersey.

We've gone from 3 Black congresspeople to 17.

And the range of education and economic class varies there.

That is an invalid accusation.

One might say that people who are more prepared often have a greater ability to seize opportunity once the door is open.

It's like if you are playing football and the line is open, it's open for whoever to run through to run through.

But those who run the fastest tend to get through there faster.

Which says something about education.

People who are educated tend to be able to run faster.

They tend to have more mobility.

They tend to be able to do more with what they got.

That's one reason why more people need to get education.

But the fact, is all people now have the right to use the bathroom downtown, have the right to use the hotel or motel of their choice.

All of them now have the right to register and now have the right to vote.

Our movement is incomplete because we got our civil rights.

We don't have our silver rights.

We got freedom, but we don't have equality.

So many people, have the right to take a vacation but can't afford it.

They have the right to open housing but can't afford to get a house.

They have the right to go to college but can't pay tuition.

And so the unfinished business of our liberation movement is indeed economic emancipation.

But to say that the civil rights movement somehow made a provision for a certain class of Blacks that was not made for other Blacks is invalid.

After all, when people tend to get their education and strive hard, they can change their class even though they can't change their cast.

For example, I mean, I was born on the poor side of town.

You know with the slop jar in the house, like other neighbors and the bathroom or the outhouse in the backyard.

And the tin top roof, and the coal being under the house.

And you cut kindling with the wood stove and you washed in the wash pot.

And you had the clothes lines hanging out in the backyard and you had the garden.

Everybody in the house and everybody in the neighborhood had a skeleton key to everybody else's house.

And I had to walk past the White schools to get to the Black schools.

And use the books four years after White children had used them.

And not have backs on those books, and couldn't bring those books home because six of us had to use that book.

So the fact is, that the fact that some of us with the grace of God, are willing to go above and beyond the call of duty.

I can't say that the public accommodations bill didn't help me and my family.

It did.

Or the voting rights bill didn't help me and my family.

It did.

But thanks be to God, I was so determined because my parents inspired me to use what I had, I simply took the most of what was available.

And so some choose the high road... <Okay> and some choose the low road.

But I think it is an unfair criticism to somehow suggest that Black leadership is less concerned about poor people than they really ought to be.

I don't think it's a fair criticism.

Gavin> Jackson ran twice for president, in 1984 and in 1988, when he won 13 primaries and caucuses for the Democratic nomination.

Jackson did work around the world for civil rights and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2000.

He was honored and remembered by members of the South Carolina House and Senate this week.

> All right, members and guests please rise for a moment of silence for Reverend Jesse Jackson.

Please bow your heads.

> And I'll leave you with this, I remember in 1984 being just a young man flying to San Francisco standing on that floor, the Reverend Jesse Jackson with the speaker of the House, Speaker Brown from California, who was Reverend Jackson's friend.

And there was a reception afterwards.

There was an age limit.

If you know anything about Speaker Brown, you understand why there could have been an age limit for that.

And we were going and I was just going back as a young man to my room.

And Reverend Jackson called the late Dr.

Walker Solomon, the late Kevin Gray, and he says, "I need you to go get Darrell because I need you to bring him here.

I need to introduce him to some political figures in California who are legislatures."

And I didn't know it.

And he looked at them and he looked at me and he said, "son, one day you can do what they are doing.

Just keep hope alive and remember that you will always be somebody."

So I salute my friend, my mentor, a great leader, a great humanitarian, the Reverend Jesse L. Jackson.

> Amen.

Gavin> For South Carolina ETV, I'm Gavin Jackson.

Be well, South Carolina.

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