On September 3, 2015, after having met with the victims’ families and the survivors, state prosecutors announced that they would be seeking the death penalty in the Roof case. During a news conference, Scarlett A. Wilson, who is in charge of the prosecution, stated that she had filed legal notice that the death penalty would be sought. During the press conference, she stressed that not all the family members of the victims were in favor of her seeking the death penalty. Ms. Wilson understood the need for forgiveness and healing.  Yet, she made it clear that the defendant had committed a horrible crime and that justice demanded an appropriate punishment.

The Obama Administration quickly denounced the shooting, as it should have, and declared that it was opening a federal investigation. On July 11, 2015, Attorney General Lynch announced at a packed news conference that Roof had been charged in a  federal indictment with 33 counts of criminal activity,  including hate charges. The debate over the legal fate of Dylann Roof is now confined to courtrooms.

Have we as Americans learned anything from the shooting that will help us become more tolerate of our growing diversity? I do not think that we have.

Dylann Roof did not act on behalf of White Supremacists; the exact opposite is the case. In his manifesto that appeared online at the website of The Last Rhodesian, Roof resigns himself to acting alone because there are no other Whites ready and willing to take the cause of racial hatred.

Roof holds some repugnant views, nonetheless, I think valuable lessons can be learned from a complete reading of his manifesto. I have not read or listened to any in-depth discussion over the substance of his expressed views. It seems like America is still too afraid to discuss race relations in raw terms of how people really feel. We avoid discussing the perceptions that we have of each other. The difficult conversations over race, if they even get started, often end with accusations of racism, either historical or contemporary.

The sad part is that I am not surprised or offended by many of the statements (conclusions) contained in the Roof’s Manifesto; I have heard them before and recently while conversing with my fellow New Yorkers. It is amazing how easily people will express themselves if they can do so without recriminations.

Dylann Roof’s shooting spree at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church has so far failed to stimulate any real discussion over why America can no longer deal with its diversity. Good people died that day while praying for all of our souls; their lives should matter.  Amazingly, the victims’ families have called for forgiveness and healing. In response to the shootings and in disregard to the victims’ families wishes, community activists, and their liberal allies reignited the debate over the Confederate battle flag (The Flag) that was flying  the state grounds in Columbia.

The Confederate Battle Debate

Senor political reporter at CNN, Nia-Malika Henderson, wrote a compelling essay about the debate over the Confederate Flag days after the shooting. According to the author, “debates over the display of the flag were as familiar as grits and tea.” She questioned whether the flag’s current place on state grounds would withstand the outrage generated by Roof’s actions. His appearance in pictures embracing the Flag served as a rallying point for removal advocates.

The essay argued that renewed the debate over the Flag might have been driven more by simple politics than arguments about equality under the law and universal civil rights. In this aspect, she was correct. Republican Presidential candidates wanted no part of the Flag debate. Yet, Democrats on the national level tried to elevate the local debate over the flag to an election year issue. Ms. Henderson believed that Gov. Nikki Haley could probably ride out the emotional storm over the shootings and leave the Flag in place.

It appears that State Representative Norman A. “Doug” Brannon understood the local politics of South Carolina better than CNN reporter Henderson. After the massacre at the Church, South Carolina State Republicans were very concerned that the local voter would be caught up in the emotions of the moment. A majority of Whites wanted the Flag to stay exactly where it was. Not to anyone’s surprise, a majority of Blacks wanted to the Flag removed from the state grounds. Brannon and many of his colleagues understood that the 2000 accord to remove the Flag from atop of the State House was now in jeopardy. Though another move of the Flag would need the approval of a “super majority,” State Republicans were savvy enough to understand that they could lose control of the state legislature if they did not act affirmatively to resolve the Flag issue.

I am not a big fan of Clichés though one seems proper here. In order to understand the emotions over the Flag’s presence on South Carolina’s state grounds, “one had to be there.”