Strom Thurmond, yes, that one from the observatory, is widely considered a hero in the state of South Carolina for his 47 years served as a senator, including a term in which he was elected at 100 years old, making him the oldest ever U.S. senator.
Some generously call him a patriot, but he can only be a patriot if Robert E. Lee is as well.
It’s a story from history that people idealize on the level of a patriotic stand. One senator from South Carolina took a stand for his people in the form of a Senate-record 24-hour and 18-minute filibuster.
The problem? The bill the infamous senator was trying to stop was the Civil Rights Act of 1957. Before this, Thurmond was a member of the Dixiecrats, a group of Southern Democrats who used the filibuster to prevent anti-lynching legislation.
Thurmond did not shy away from his opinions on segregation.
“There’s not enough troops in the army to force the southern people to break down segregation and admit the n***** race into our theaters, into our swimming pools, into our homes and into our churches,” Thurmond once said.
His opinions earned him a presidential nomination from the Dixiecrat party in 1948.
Originally, Thurmond and many southerners were Democrats as representatives of the “Solid South,” Southern states that powerfully influenced the election due to their voting trends: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia.
The trend followed the Reconstruction Era, after Abraham Lincoln, a Republican, freed the slaves. This launched the Solid South trend until the mid-20th century, when, in Thurmond’s eyes, something even worse happened.
For Thurmond and other Southern senators, the only thing that could’ve been worse than a president telling them African Americans were free was when democrat Lyndon B. Johnson got the Senate to pass the Civil Rights Acts of 1964, stating that African Americans were equals, causing Thurmond to switch his political affiliation that very same year.
Since that fateful day, South Carolina has gone blue only one time.
I’m not arguing that I don’t want the U.S. to recognize its history; I do. But the problem arises from the fact that African American students are meant to study in a building named after someone who would not have let them in there.
Someone who argued against them having basic human rights. Someone who opposed federal anti-lynching bills.
Now, he did widely condemn lynchings, but in general, his behavior towards protecting states’ rights bluntly contradicted Clemson’s core values of integrity, respect and diversity.
Names on buildings are intended to idealize a figure. If Clemson or anyone wants to honor the longest-serving South Carolina senator for the duty he did for his state outside of an academic building, that should be okay.
But, for African Americans on campus, having to study in a building commemorating someone who fought to exclude you from it violates the very principles Clemson claims to uphold.
