WASHINGTON/POLITICS
The Times, Gainesville, Georgia | gainesvilletimes.com
Friday, November 23, 2018 5A
Comey resists closed-door
interview on FBI actions
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - For
mer FBI chief James Comey
said Thursday he
will resist a sub
poena to appear
before a congres
sional committee
Dec. 3 unless that
happens publicly
because House
Republicans will dis
tort anything he says
behind closed doors.
“I’m still happy to sit in
the light and answer all
questions,” he tweeted.
The House Judiciary
Committee chairman, Rep.
Bob Goodlatte of Virginia,
subpoenaed Comey as part
of an investigation into FBI
decisions made during the
2016 election, when
Democrat Hillary
Clinton was cleared
in a probe into her
email use and agents
opened an investi
gation into Donald
Trump’s campaign
and Russia.
Some Republi
cans have argued
that Justice officials were
conspiring against Trump’s
election when Comey ran
the bureau and they have
interviewed multiple cur
rent and former Justice offi
cials behind closed doors in
an effort to prove their point.
Democrats say Republicans
are trying to discredit spe
cial counsel Robert Muel
ler’s Russia investigation
before they lose control of
the House in January.
Comey, who was fired by
Trump, tweeted of House
Republicans: “I’ve seen
enough of their selective
leaking and distortion. Let’s
have a hearing and invite
everyone to see.”
His lawyer, David Kel
ley, said in a statement that
Comey “will resist in court
this abuse of process.”
Comey
South Carolina mayor counters
white supremacist monument
LINDSEY HODGES I Associated Press
The Meriwether monument in Calhoun Park is shown in
North Augusta, S.C.
BY JEFFREY COLLINS
Associated Press
COLUMBIA - A South
Carolina mayor knows that
state law won’t allow him to
take down a monument to a
white supremacist killed dur
ing a Reconstructionist era
riot. Instead, Mayor Bob Pet
tit is fighting to put up memo
rials for the eight black men
also killed.
Mayor Bob Pettit of North
Augusta has lived in the city
since 1991. But he never paid
much attention to the obelisk
of Thomas Meriwether or
the history behind it. Meri
wether was killed during the
Hamburg Massacre of 1876,
launched by white suprema
cists seeking to seize local
political control from blacks
and carpetbaggers.
Meriwether was hailed at
the time as a hero of white
independence, and his death
prompted South Carolina
lawmakers to dedicate a
monument to him in 1914. It
holds the following inscrip
tion: “In life he exemplified
the highest ideal of Anglo-
Saxon civilization. By his
death he assured to the chil
dren of his beloved land the
supremacy of that ideal.”
There was no mention
of the eight black men who
were killed, and the incident
lay dormant until a constitu
ent came to a city council
meeting in the wake of white
supremacist violence that
led to the death of a woman
in Charlottesville, Virginia
in September 2017.
“I challenged them,”
community activist Ken
Makin said. “I said, ‘You can
denounce racist violence
and remove that statue.’ “
Pettit took up the chal
lenge. He established a com
mittee that met for more
than a year to research and
study the area’s history. The
result was a 352-page report
that leaves no doubt about
the racist motives behind
the memorial.
“Certainly it (the memo
rial) is not appropriate in
today’s North Augusta,” Pet
tit said. “Doing nothing is
totally unacceptable.”
Removing the statue
would need a two-thirds vote
from South Carolina’s con
servative, Republican-dom
inated General Assembly
under a state law called the
Heritage Act, passed in 2000
when the Confederate flag
was removed off the capitol
dome. The law bans remov
ing historical monuments.
So Pettit thinks he has a
workaround. He wants North
Augusta to partner with pri
vate groups and put up a
memorial to the eight black
men killed on the same site
— in a park along one of the
city’s busiest streets.
The mayor said the new
memorial must be compa
rable to the existing one
and complete the story of
how Red Shirts like the
ones involved in the Ham
burg Massacre went around
South Carolina in 1876 intim
idating voters to try to boot
blacks from power. They
won in an election so close
that for months, the state
had dueling governors and
House Speakers until Wade
Hampton and the white
supremacists muscled oth
ers out of the government.
The attack also made a
hero of “Pitchfork” Ben Till
man, who led the white mob.
Tillman would ride the noto
riety from driving blacks out
of power to the South Caro
lina governor’s office and
later the U.S. Senate.
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