COLOMBIA, SC (AP) – A South Carolina Senate committee opted for symmetry instead of a more natural look when making a recommendation on Wednesday to standardize the iconic heart of palm tree and the growing state flag.
But the Family and Veterans Services Committee recognized that the discussion is far from over. More bills are likely to emerge as amendments under the bill goes to the Senate floor. Senators acknowledged that their phones are ringing and that their email inboxes are overloaded with the problem.
“This is what we are going to send. If someone wants to investigate further and attack and amend and have a flag upside down, they can do it, ”said committee chairwoman Katrina Shealy, a Lexington Republican.
Without a standard design, the flags that fly over the State House and stay in the governor’s office and elsewhere around the state may not quite match: the palm trees may have different shapes and the background in some may be a darker shade indigo than in others.
The style varies between flag makers for indoor or outdoor use, with the state generally choosing who offers the lowest price at any given time.
In 2018, lawmakers created a committee of historians who carefully studied the state flags that South Carolina has used over the past 250 years. They created a historically accurate design that was severely criticized because the heart of palm tree looked sick to some and to others, as if it had barely survived a hurricane.
The committee returned to the drawing board and used more contemporary designs from the 20th century.
The Senate committee on Wednesday chose a project with a symmetrical tree instead of another with a more natural but resilient appearance. South Carolina Department of Archives and History director Eric Emerson said he had the most support from historians.
Emerson reminded the senators in a rather amusing way that the committee had recommended “the first project that everyone hated”.
But Shealy said the committee needed to choose something to avoid chaos later.
“We are going to give them an option on the floor. God knows we don’t have to give them too many options with 46 people, ”said Shealy, referring to the number of legislators in the Senate.
In the past few decades, South Carolina’s heart of palm and half moon tree has become one of the country’s best-known designs for a state flag. It appears everywhere, including in slippers whose soles come out of the tree and grow in the sand; necklaces and ties worn by state leaders; isolated mailbox and beer can flags.
The palm heart and crescent that appear on the flag have symbolic value dating back to the Battle of Sullivan’s Island in 1776, in which Colonel William Moultrie’s 2nd South Carolina Regiment defeated the British near Charleston, then known as Charlestown.
The half moon was used by Moultrie’s soldiers, who wore indigo uniforms because the culture that can be used to make bluish dye grew abundantly 250 years ago. The palm tree pays homage to the material the soldiers used to hastily build a fort. British cannonballs bounced off the spongy bark of the trees and the invaders were unable to reach the coast.
Senator Thomas McElveen said he would propose an alternative idea in the Senate floor: a design based on elements of the banner that was briefly used as an official flag in the 1930s. Problems with production and what may have been jealousy of the then secretary of the Historical Commission AS Salley Jr. in relation to flag designer Ellen Heyward Jervey, prompted lawmakers to revoke their official status.
“The fight will be on the tree and the appearance,” said McElveen, a Democrat from Sumter.
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