Black Republicans forging new paths

GINA SMITH, The State

- Marvin Rogers is trying to scale a political hill that few others would attempt to climb.

Rogers is a black Republican, running to fill an open York County House seat held by black Democrats for more than 30 years.

Some view Rogers as the ultimate party pooper for attempting his feat during a historic run for president by a black Democrat.

But if Rogers, 32, pulls it off, he’ll make some history of his own. Rogers would be one of the first black Republicans in the S.C. House in about 100 years.

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SC black voter registration doubles pace of whites

Black people in South Carolina registered to vote at nearly twice the rate of whites over the past 10 months, according to state Election Commission data that could bode well for Democratic Sen. Barack Obama in a solidly Republican state.

Democrats said the numbers were encouraging for Barack Obama. State party Chairwoman Carol Fowler said Democrats registered 160,000 new voters since the January primaries that saw her party’s turnout eclipse that of the GOP.

“Certainly there is a ton of appeal for African Americans,” Fowler said. “We’re hearing a lot of anecdotal stories about older African Americans who never bothered to register.”

Republicans said they also have worked to increase voter rolls and noted people can vote for candidates from any party, no matter which one gets them to sign up.

“We’ve certainly been working very hard to register new voters,” said state GOP spokesman Rob Godfrey.

Historically, nine in 10 black voters cast ballots for Democrats, though President Bush picked up 15 percent of the state’s black vote in 2004.

State data shows the total number of blacks registered to vote in the state rose to nearly 680,000 — still about one-third of the total number of whites registered.

Overall, blacks make up 27 percent of the voting rolls; Hispanic and other non-white groups account for 2 percent, according to state data.

Democrats said they were buoyed by the increase in the number of young black voters registering: a 23-percent increase for women ages 18-24 and a 31-percent increase for men.

“That is a notoriously difficult group to get out to vote,” said Furman University political scientist Danielle Vinson. She said Obama has only an “outside shot” at winning South Carolina for the Democrats.

“If they get everybody to the polls they can make it close,” she said.

Jimmy Carter was the last Democrat to carry a presidential election in South Carolina and then at a time when the state and the South were just building major Republican organizations.

And even the new voters aren’t expected to change that bottom line in a solidly Republican state where the GOP holds eight of nine statewide offices, two U.S. Senate seats, four of six U.S. House seats and lopsided control of the Statehouse.

“It’s unlikely Barack Obama will carry South Carolina,” College of Charleston political scientist Bill Moore said, although he could narrow the margin substantially the margin of loss even without the big media buys he’s using in North Carolina.

“I think it has the potential to be the closest presidential race in South Carolina since 1980,” Moore added. That’s based largely on Obama’s organizational abilty. “The Obama campaign has just done a phenomenal job in putting together an organization that touches base with people.”

Overall, voter registration shot up heading into the Nov. 4 election. Between Jan. 1 and Oct. 1, the last date by which detailed demographic data is available, 230,668 people were added to the state’s voter list.

Election Commission spokesman Chris Whitmire said at least 16,000 others were added to the rolls between Oct. 1 and Oct. 4, when registration closed. The state won’t have another batch of demographic data available until the week before the election.

“We could have upward of 300,000 compared with 200,000 in 2004,” Whitmire said of new registrants.

JIM DAVENPORT, AP

SC trooper’s lawyer: Video shows innocence

A South Carolina state trooper who bragged about a crash that sent a fleeing suspect flying over the hood of his cruiser is to go on trial this week in a case drawing scrutiny from leaders of the state’s African-American community.

Lance Cpl. Steve Garren is accused of using unreasonable force and depriving Marvin Grant of his civil rights in the crash, which was captured on the patrol car’s dashboard video camera. Garren is white; Grant is black. A conviction in the case scheduled to begin Tuesday in a federal court in Greenville could bring the now-suspended officer 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Afterward the incident, Garren, 39, tells another trooper, “Yeah, I hit him. I was trying to hit him.”

It’s first of at least two civil rights abuse trials to come from a spate of police videos that appeared to show aggressive action by South Carolina troopers. The videos and how supervisors treated the officers on them brought the ousters of the heads of the Highway Patrol and Department of Public Safety earlier this year.

A second trial is also expected for a trooper accused of repeatedly kicking a truck driver in the head after a highway chase.

The head of the state NAACP said he considers the incidents similar.

“I think they are both equally premeditated,” said Lonnie Randolph, chairman of the state chapter of the National Associated for the Advancement of Colored People. “Whether you’ve got somebody with steel-toed shoes who weighs 225 pounds kicking you in the face or a person with a car weighing 2,000 pounds hitting you, I’d put the same level of criticism on both.”

Garren’s attorney predicted last week his client will be vindicated because of the video that shows the chase on a narrow, dark back road in Greenwood County in June 2007 after Grant bailed out of a car. Lawyer John O’Leary said Garren didn’t have time to get out of the way as Grant cut in front of the cruiser. He also noted no state charges were ever brought.

“There’s no way he could have intended to hit the guy based on that time frame,” O’Leary said. “The truth of the matter is this crime requires that it be willful. And, you know, we just believe it wasn’t. It was an accident.”

The lawyer said he’ll have an expert testify about how officers react to stressful situations in an attempt to explain the comments Garren made after the crash.

“I think that’s the only reason we’re in court. If you didn’t have that comment, we wouldn’t be there. That’s really the crux of it,” O’Leary said.

Federal prosecutors declined to comment. The 38-year-old Grant, who was sentenced in May to up to a year in jail for not paying child support, could not be reached for comment.

But state Rep. Leon Howard, the chairman of the Legislative Black Caucus, which helped bring the videos to the governor’s attention, said Garren’s bragging shows the mind-set of the trooper.

“It’s ingrained in him to think they’ve got the kind of authority to do the things they do. He acts like he’s just hit a squirrel,” said Howard, D-Columbia. “It’s ridiculous that he would even say that he’s innocent.”

JIM DAVENPORT (AP)

Senator says saggy pants should be outlawed in SC

AP

- A prominent black state senator says saggy pants are a civil rights setback.

Sen. Robert Ford told The (Charleston) Post and Courier for Saturday’s papers the style should be outlawed in South Carolina.

The Charleston Democrat says youth who show their underwear as they walk are emulating prisoners who can’t wear belts, and that’s destructive behavior.

Other black leaders criticized the Charleston Democrat as making unfair and inaccurate comments, since the style isn’t limited to young blacks.

Ford’s statements come after three Charleston City Council members announced they would consider a citywide ban on saggy pants.

Judge banned from bench after racial comment

Associated Press

- A South Carolina judge who admitted calling crack cocaine addiction “black man’s disease” has been banned from the bench, the state’s Supreme Court said in an order Monday.

Former Beaufort County Magistrate George Peter Lamb, who is white, agreed to the punishment and resigned before the order was issued. The court’s order included no other details about the comment.

The justices’ ruling outlined problems with Lamb that included behavior toward female employees that the high court said could have been considered inappropriate and the judge incorrectly telling a defendant at a bond hearing the penalty he could face if convicted.

Lamb’s lawyer referred questions to the former judge, who did not immediately respond to telephone messages left on his cell phone and at his home.

Lamb is a lawyer who served on Beaufort County Council until 2006, when Republican Gov. Mark Sanford appointed him a part-time magistrate.

Lamb was publicly reprimanded by the state Supreme Court, which said it was the harshest punishment it could issue since he had resigned as judge. Lamb agreed to not seek any judicial position in the state without first getting written permission from the state’s high court, effectively banning him from the bench.

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