Posted on 02/03/2004 9:54:29 AM PST by stainlessbanner
COLUMBIA, S.C. -- Following Thursday night's Democratic Candidates' debate in Greenville's Peace Center, South Carolina's U.S. Sen. Fritz Hollings, when asked about the issue of the Confederate flag, replied: "Don't worry about it. It's not an issue anymore."
But it was indeed an issue, in that NBC's debate moderator Tom Brokaw raised this issue during the presidential candidates' debates.
Candidate and Ohio congressman Dennis Kucinich replied that because of the NAACP boycott of the entire state of South Carolina (due to one Confederate flag flying on the state capitol grounds at a Confederate war memorial) he was spending the nights outside South Carolina.
Candidate Al Sharpton denounced the Confederate flag as representing a movement built on slavery.
After the debate, I was able to interview Sharpton.
WND: Are you going to campaign in Mississippi?
SHARPTON: I'm going to campaign in Mississippi.
WND: And you're going to condemn their state flag?
SHARPTON: Absolutely! Unequivocally!
WND: It was voted by a huge majority including a lot of blacks.
SHARPTON: It was still wrong. You had some blacks in the Confederate army.
WND: That's right! I'm delighted you recognized that.
SHARPTON: They were wrong. Absolutely.
Sen. Lieberman held a similar view, while being surprised at the fact there were black soldiers in the Confederate army.
WND: Senator, do you agree with your fellow candidates Sharpton and Edwards that the Confederate flag should be banned from any public display, even on courthouse memorials in every town in the South?
SEN. LIEBERMAN: The Confederate flag is a symbol that is offensive to people. It's not just African-Americans -- because it represents slavery.
WND: You would ban it?
SEN. LIEBERMAN: I've said this very clearly. I'd certainly take it off the statehouse grounds. The Confederate flag is part of history. It's not part we're proud of. The only place it would belong in my opinion would be in a museum case. Otherwise, to give it any public honor is offensive and divisive. It takes us backward and not forward. And frankly it does not represent the kind of coming together that I see here in South Carolina across racial lines.
WND: How about the black Confederate soldiers? There were a lot of them.
SEN. LIEBERMAN: Well you'd have to ask somebody else about that!
So, we asked somebody else: Gen. Wesley Clark.
WND: General, do you believe it's wrong for the people of Mississippi to have in their state flag the Confederate battle flag for which they voted overwhelmingly -- including blacks.
GEN. CLARK: I'd like to see the American flag.
WND: I'm asking you about.
GEN. CLARK: I'm telling you about the American flag! That's what I like to see.
WND: But you don't want to comment on that. Are you going to go to Mississippi?
Gen. Clark declined to answer and went to another reporter.
By very notable contrast to Sharpton and his fellow presidential Confederate flag-bashers, South Carolina Democratic Congressman James Clyburn (whose endorsement of Sen. John Kerry was regarded by the front-runner as significant enough for a special news conference) had the following to say about this issue.
WND: Congressman, do you feel that I have violated the NAACP's boycott of South Carolina because I'm going to spend the night here?
REP. CLYBURN: Oh, I don't know. You'll have to ask the NAACP people. I've made it very clear what my position is on that. And my position has been stated out there for a long time. Because I believe the compromise that was reached by the black legislators and the white legislators over the current position of that flag, gives us an interim solution that we ought to live with for a while. And maybe at some point in the future revisit it. As it stands now, that was a compromise voted for by every single black legislator, save one who did not vote, but abstained from voting. Everybody else supported it, and therefore I support it.
On the other side of the South Carolina capitol building there is a new monument to African-American history -- including blacks in Union army uniforms. Around the building is a marker noting the site of South Carolina's first capitol building: "Burned by Sherman's troops" in 1865.
One of Congressman Clyburn's staff told me that in Darlington, S.C., there is a Confederate War memorial to one of that army who was black.
Would Democratic candidates Edwards, Lieberman and Sharpton all be in favor of tearing down this memorial to a brave Confederate soldier who was black?
Seems like a good way to keep less than desirable people out of the state, to me. However, this did mean that the Masters Inn out on I-21 lost out on a body to fill a single... Not that Dennis has any money left to pay anyway.
The Jewish sculptur Moses Jacob Ezekiel wanted to show the true composition of the southern army: It depicts an armed, uniformed black Confederate soldier marching in step with his white comrades and a white Confederate soldier handing his small child to a black woman for safe keeping as he goes off to war.
I believe you can see the scene on the right on this picture
Of course they would - bad-mouthing the Confederacy is a part of the liberal Yankee mantra.
The candidates weigh in puss out.
Fixed it for ya! ;-)
Why can't these morons recognize that it's up to the State?
Old Abe St. Lincoln fixed that in 1865
Good info. Didn't know that. How about the fact that during the civil war there was still legal slavery in the Union? The emancipation proclamation also didn't apply to slaves living in the North. They were freed by the 13th Amendment, eight months after the conclusion of the war.
Funny, I've never heard him complaining about the mexican flag and it's an obsolete part of "our" history as well.
Oops. I keep forgetting that THAT south is indeed rising again.
And to this day, nobody challenges it.
Kudos to Moses Jacob Ezekiel.
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