Confederate flag removed from South Carolina Statehouse

COLUMBIA, S.C. - After decades of debate and mounting pressure from an NAACP boycott, South Carolina finally removed the Confederate flag from atop its Statehouse on Saturday in a somber ceremony that paid tribute to its Civil War roots.

The flag, seen as a reminder of slavery for some and a tribute to Southern heritage for others, flew atop the Statehouse dome for 38 years.

But protests over the flag continued even as it was being lowered: Civil War re-enactors raised another Confederate flag on Statehouse grounds, in front of a Confederate soldier's monument.

The new location was part of the compromise reached by the Legislature in May.

Hundreds of anti-Confederate flag demonstrators held bright yellow signs reading ''Shame'' and blew whistles as the flag was hoisted atop the flagpole.

''We're blowing the whistle on racism,'' Brett Bursey, director of the South Carolina Progressive Network, said.

The crowd on hand for the ceremony swelled to 3,000 at one point, authorities said. Many were flag supporters, including state Sen. Bill Branton.

He called the compromise ''the biggest mistake we've ever made in this General Assembly.'' He vowed to lead efforts to put the flag back on the dome.

Flag supporters gathered in the street in front of the Capitol, chanting, ''off the dome and in your face,'' as some of the hundreds of police officers kept the two factions from throwing more than words. One person was arrested for assault.

South Carolina was the last state to fly the Confederate flag from its Capitol dome. Raised over the Statehouse in 1962, many thought the flag was a symbol of Southern heritage. Others said it is a defiant sign against blacks and the civil rights movement.

On Saturday, two Citadel cadets - one white, one black - removed the flag. The cadets from the Citadel - part of the long gray line that fired on Fort Sumter to start of the Civil War - lowered the flag and turned it over to Gov. Jim Hodges. The governor then bowed slightly and handed it into history at the South Carolina State Museum.

As the flag came down, 12 Confederate war re-enactors marched to the steady thump of a drum to a fenced area guarded by dozens of police. As the flag rose on a 30-foot bronze poll, some in the crowd cheered.

Flag opponents, notably the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, say that flag is too visible at the pole, behind a 38-foot tall Confederate Soldier Monument at the most visible approach to the Statehouse at the foot of Columbia's North Main Street.

The NAACP's tourism boycott against the state is credited with creating the public pressure that led lawmakers to agree to remove the flag in May. On Saturday, the NAACP and 750 of its supporters silently marched past the Statehouse before the flag ceremonies. State NAACP President James Gallman said the flag's new position is a ''moral lynching.''

Gallman said the NAACP will continue its boycott. The group plans to continue protests and emphasize what the flag means to black people. Kevin Gray, who runs the Harriet Tubman Freedom House Project in Columbia, said he would have pickets outside Hodges home, the Statehouse and businesses that supported the compromise.

''We're planning a six-month battle,'' he said.

The flag from the dome will go in display Monday at the State Museum along with the Confederate flag removed from state Senate chambers Friday and a similar flag lowered in the House Saturday morning.

Hodges, the only top official taking part in Saturday's flag relocation ceremony, said most South Carolinians support the compromise that plants the flag at the most visible spot on the Capitol grounds.

Hodges did not speak during the ceremony. On Friday, he said the flag's lowering was ''a significant step for our state.''