The Confederate Flag vs Sen. Pinckney's empty chair
The confederate flag is facing a vote. Governor Haley made a call for this vote* in her press conference on the 22nd, piling onto the call from the Mayor of Charleston and several other members of the SC senate. There was a chance that a vote could come as early as Tuesday but it will happen.
Calls for the flags removal are not new, but I cannot remember a time when it was, in part, in response to the murder and mourning of a member of the governing body.
As the men and women of the South Carolina senate enter the room to hold this vote, they have a raw reminder of their grief, manifested by cloth and an empty chair. Their well-practiced and hard learned grooming of how to deal with the Confederate Flag as an elected southern official might be harder to hold onto as they do call the role. It might be harder to be complacent about the well documented history of hate crimes being carried out under the symbol of the Confederate Flag as they look upon the black cloth & empty seat representing their friend who fell victim to such hate.
If it were anywhere else, it would be fair to suggest that the pressures of the outside world wouldn’t hurt, but this is SC.
My bets are on the personal.
That this vote will be decidedly local.
My bet is that Sen. Pinckney's chair might just be enough for members to put down the rhetoric and stand united with their fallen brother.
Now, for how long? Well, that is the next question.
*as the law is currently written, the removal of the Confederate Flag requires 2/3 majority vote from both houses.
