S.C. Confederate flag not lowered after Charleston massacre
After nine people were fatally shot in a historic black church in Charleston, flags at the top of the South Carolina State Capitol were flown at half-staff to honor the victims. However, while the American flag and state flag were lowered, a nearby Confederate flag flew at normal height.
The discrepancy has to do with state law. South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley can order state flags to be flown at half staff but according to the Washington Post, it is the State's General Assembly that dictates the manner in which the Confederate flag is flown.
On Friday, NAACP President and CEO Rev. Cornell William Brooks called the slayings an act of "racial terrorism" and said the Confederate flag flying on the South Carolina Capitol grounds needs to come down.
The Confederate flag was moved from the State Capitol in 2000 but state law stipulates that it be flown at a nearby war memorial and be illuminated at night.
"This flag must be flown on a flagpole located at a point on the south side of the Confederate Soldier Monument, centered on the monument, ten feet from the base of the monument at a height of thirty feet," according to the law. "The flagpole on which the flag is flown and the area adjacent to the monument and flagpole must be illuminated at night and an appropriate decorative iron fence must be erected around the flagpole."
The issue has touched a nerve, particularly because the man accused of the massacre -- 21-year-old Dylann Roof -- was pictured with a license plate bearing the Confederate flag.
Many view the Confederate flag, the symbol of the pro-slavery South during the Civil War, as a racially charged emblem of repression and the issue has even reached the Supreme Court. The court on Thursday upheld Texas' refusal to issue a license plate bearing the Confederate Flag, rejecting a free-speech challenge.
There are also calls to remove the Confederate flag from the South Carolina State Capitol.
"You know 15 years ago, the General Assembly at the time, they had a conversation. The Republicans and Democrats and everybody came together on a consensus to bring the Confederate flag down off of the dome, and they put it on the monument out in front. ... I think the state will start talking about that again," South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley told "CBS This Morning" on Friday.
But when asked her opinion on the matter, Haley said: "My job is to heal the people of this state."