here today. all the darkness of the world can t put out the light of one man. those families were like the combustion of love that transformed hearts not just in south carolina. i had friends from all over the world, hindus native americans, people in texas calling and saying, wow. you lift up love and people are drawn to it. real love. governor beasley, a man before his time. as they say, the last living casualty of the civil war. so appropriate. governor good to see you. so much more ahead on this historic day in columbia, south carolina. fire it up! am i the only one with a meeting? i ve got two. yeah we ve gotta go. i gotta say it man this is a nice set-up. too soon.
national perspective on it. but things have now changed, and i was i was struck by the history of how this is transpiring. the flag wasn t up there for 100 years after the civil war. 91962. then it went to the state capitol to mark the 100th anniversary of the civil war or the beginning of the civil rights movement as others would say. for 100 years it sat in a museum or somewhere, and it wasn t an issue. suddenly, it became this hugely important thing to people who want to talk about heritage in that context. and a lot of other people are pointing out and i think it s significant to say when you look over there, you see the flag but there s even a larger memorial a confederate soldier memorial there and it s one of the largest memorials on the grounds here as you walk around there are a lot of memorials. not controversial. not controversial at all, at least not yet. that s the concern of many people that the monument is next and then the names of the
years since the end of slavery and the conclusion of the civil war. but as the tragic events in charleston, south carolina, revealed, we still have a long way to go. and at the very same moment when people of south carolina and democrats, republicans, whites blacks, extraordinary leadership from the governor are preparing to take down the confederate battle flag, it s shocking and appalling that house republicans were attempting to legislatively lift it up. so we came together as democrats to stop that effort yesterday, that would have allowed federal funds to be used for the display of the confederate battle flag on national park service land including federal cemeteries. house speaker john boehner, as you know said the amendment was simply an attempt to codify a directive that was given from the obama white house. what about that was true what
prevented my having the opportunity to stand here if it had prevailed. let s go to capitol hill now. i want to bring in new york democratic congressman hakeem jeffries who gave an emotional and powerful speech about this issue on the floor thursday. congressman, a lot of raw emotion from you on this particular issue. i want to take a listen and play for our viewers and listeners just a snippet of what you had to say. here it is. had this confederate battle flag prevailed in war 150 years ago, i would not be standing here today as a member of the united states congress. i would be here as a slave. congressman jeffries what were you hoping to accomplish with that speech? well we ve come a long way in america over the last 150
streets, robert e. lee boulevard, calhoun, throughout the country, so many venues. it s difficult to drive two blocks in the city of columbia without driving on a thoroughfare that is named after someone who lost the war. they fought valiantly, and people gave their lives. it s significant, but yeah. ron allen for us. we ll come back to ron throughout the morning. thank you, as always. always appreciate your reporting. the debate leading to this historic moment has been intense, to say the least. with raw emotions rising to the surface on both sides. something seen clearly in the south carolina state house this week. this particular flag that flies out there goes back to my childhood days. i grew up with that flag yes, to the national media, as a heritage. it was the stories told me by my