S.C. legislative session ends, but lawmakers’ work lingers
COLUMBIA, S.C. (WRDW/WAGT) - South Carolina’s legislative session is officially over at the State House.
But work isn’t done – including on a bill that would restrict what can and cannot be taught in South Carolina classrooms.
State law required the South Carolina General Assembly end its legislative session here by 5 p.m. Thursday.
But the work doesn’t entirely end for the year at that point.
A bill called the “Transparency and Integrity in Education Act” – ed in both the House and the Senate last year, but in different versions.
It has sat inactive for nearly a year, waiting for negotiators to take it up to determine what’ll be in the final version of the bill they send to the governor.
They finally met this week.
“A lot of work has taken place on both sides to try to get us this far,” said Senate Education Chairman Greg Hembree, R-Horry.
The two chambers agree about most of the legislation.
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Among its provisions – it would ban teaching concepts including one race, sex, ethnicity, color, or national origin is inherently superior to another – and that people are responsible for other actions committed in the past by of their same race or sex.
“We don’t need overt politics and ideological indoctrination on students, especially when we’re undermining a parent’s worldview and beliefs. We don’t need that in our schools,” said Rep. Adam Morgan, R-Greenville.
The bill states it does not ban the fact-based discussion or instruction of controversial aspects of history or current events or about the historical oppression of a particular group of people based on race, ethnicity, religion, sex, etc.
“Opinion is not the place to go in a classroom. … If they take that to heart and they really teach facts, then this law will never affect anything they do,” said Rep. Shannon Erickson, R-Buaefort, House Education and Public Works chair.
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But Democrats uniformly opposed the bill – and reiterated they’re concerned this could lead to censorship in the classroom – and a chilling effect on teachers.
“History is sometimes a matter of who’s telling the story,” said Sen. Darrell Jackson, D-Richland.
There are still a few disagreements that need to be settled – among them, deciding who can bring about a lawsuit if they disagree with a ruling about appropriate materials and curricula and when they could do that.
The conference committee hasn’t quite wrapped up its negotiations yet.
So despite Thursday being the last day of the regular legislative session, lawmakers will continue their work next month in a special session.
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