South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, after joining with other state leaders in calling for the Confederate flag to be removed from Statehouse grounds, could be in for a drawn-out legislative battle.
Under the state's own rules for even touching that Confederate flag, any changes are easier said than done.
“I would be shocked if there wasn’t considerable or even vehement opposition from legislators, particularly from small rural towns,” William Gaston, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, told FoxNews.com.
On Monday, Haley, surrounded by a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers, called for the removal of the Confederate flag from the grounds of the state Capitol. Her comments came less than a week after Dylann Roof, a 21-year-old white man, confessed to gunning down nine black members of the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church.
Renewed efforts to remove the flag gained momentum after images of Roof, posing with the flag, surfaced.
“The hate-filled murderer has a sick and twisted view of the flag,” Haley said. “We have changed through the times and we will continue to do so, but that doesn’t mean we forget our history.”
The Confederate battle flag first flew at the Statehouse in 1962 as part of a centennial commemoration. While many civil rights groups protested and demanded its removal for years, nothing changed until 2000. That year, the flag fight led to a political compromise that removed it from the Capitol Dome and moved it to a 30-foot flagpole at the Confederate Soldier Monument on Statehouse grounds.
Some say it’s that very same compromise that could present a challenge for the latest plans to remove it. The plan that was hammered out in 2000 requires a two-thirds majority in both the state House and Senate to remove it. It also requires a two-thirds majority to lower it, which is why when Haley ordered the U.S. and South Carolina flags to half-staff after the shooting, the Confederate flag remained flying at full-staff.
Republicans, who have a majority in both the House and Senate, have long been divided on the issue. But many Republicans have abandoned their past defense of the flag.
“I just didn’t have the balls for five years to do it, but when my friend was assassinated for being nothing more than a black man, I decided it was time for that thing to be off the Statehouse grounds,” Republican state Rep. Doug Brannon, told The Associated Press. “It’s not just a symbol of hate. It’s actually a symbol of pride in one’s hatred.”
Brannon said he plans to introduce a bill to take down the flag as early as he can.
Others, like state Sen. Lee Bright, who has a Confederate flying hanging in his office, was quoted equating efforts to remove it from the north lawn of the Statehouse with a “Stalinist purge.” Bright's office declined to elaborate on the comments when reached by FoxNews.com.
The process of taking the flag down took its first baby step on Tuesday afternoon when the South Carolina House voted 103-10 to allow a special session to discuss it. The Senate must also agree to meet, though Haley has said she would use her authority as governor to force a special legislative session.
Once a special session is called, there will be some procedural hurdles that will draw out the process. The bill would have to clear the judiciary committees and then come back to both floors for debate.
“If I had to set a deadline, I’d say about August first, hopefully before September,” state Rep. Todd Rutherford told WLTX-TV in a recent interview.
The Post and Courier newspaper, which is based in Charleston, has a working tally of the number of South Carolina legislators who say they’ll support taking the flag down, who say they’ll vote against it, and who have not responded.
By early Tuesday afternoon, 50 members of the state House said they would vote to remove the flag. Eight have said no, nine were undecided, nine refused to answer and 46 have not responded.
In the state Senate, 19 lawmakers said they’d vote in favor of taking down the flag. One said no, four were undecided, three refused to answer and 18 have not responded.
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