February/March 2012 Representative Jim Clyburn Representative Tim Scott 6th District 1st District A Tale of Two Congressmen U.S. Reps. Jim Clyburn and Tim Scott McKinley Washington Serving the Sea Islands for Four Decades Phylicia Rashad on the Strength of Family aTale Conof twogressmen REPRESENTATIVES JIM CLYBURN & TIM SCOTT HEY ARE AS except the color of their skin – they insisting that the nation’s chief different as a slow both are African-Americans – and the executive deserves another four years Southern drawl and a fact that they serve the people of South in office and the opportunity to nasal New York Carolina as members of the U.S. House continue the policies he has twang, as diverse as a of Representatives. established since moving into the sunny summer day in Jim Clyburn is 71 years old, and, White House in 2009. Summerville and a mid-winter dusting though he was a teacher early in his “He has demonstrated a capacity to Tof snow in Spartanburg and as dissimilar professional career, he has been lead this country,” Clyburn explained. as homemade involved in government and politics in “When he took over we were BY BRIAN SHERMAN Charleston grits one way or another for the past four hemorrhaging 700,000 jobs a month. and the kind you mix with water and decades. He has represented South We lost 2.1 million jobs in the three heat up in the microwave. Carolina’s 6th District since 1993 and months prior to him being sworn in. They are not, however, as different as as assistant Democratic leader is The first thing he had to do was stop black and white. currently the third-ranking Democrat the hemorrhaging. It took time to put James Enos Clyburn and Timothy in the House. He is a staunch the tourniquet on. He has done a Eugene Scott have little in common supporter of President Barack Obama, tremendous job, and his policies will 18 Living Roots | February/March 2012 FEATURE families: Paul Thurmond and Carroll Harbor shipping channel, making Campbell. Scott gives the president a Charleston more competitive with other failing grade for his first term in office. ports, including nearby Savannah. In his efforts to see that his party “To have that port jeopardized is a regains control of the executive branch real serious problem. I got the money of government, he has held town hall through the House twice to deepen the meetings in his district for most of the harbor. Both times it failed in the Republican candidates for president. Senate,” Clyburn explained. “I don’t “Our unemployment situation is a understand people who hold onto a result of a model that simply doesn’t philosophy that is detrimental to the work in the 21st century,” Scott state. The same non-earmark commented. “We are being driven by a philosophy was held by senators from larger, more centralized government. In Georgia, but when it came to the a global economy, that fails. Savannah port, they decided they were Unfortunately, that has been the going to find the $600 million to approach of this administration.” deepen the harbor.” According to Clyburn, without an earmark, federal funding for work on PUTTING PEOPLE BACK TO WORK Charleston’s shipping lanes won’t be available until 2024. He blamed Scott and Clyburn obviously have a conservative U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint of difference of opinion on the president’s South Carolina, a Republican, for the performance. They do agree, however, demise of his earmark for the harbor. that the most important issue during “We need to stop making the defeat the 2012 election cycle is putting of the president the number one people back to work. They don’t agree priority,” Clyburn said. “You’ve got on how to accomplish that people in the Republican Party whose monumental feat. According to Scott, a priority is to make sure Obama is a three-pronged approach would cut the one-term president. My number one nation’s unemployment rate in half: priority is getting people back to work. Congressmen reducing regulations on businesses, You have people who believe that in make the economy well again.” allowing businesses to return profits order to drown the captain you have to Tim Scott, 46, is one of 60 or so earned outside the borders of the sink the whole ship.” conservatives swept into office by the United States without double taxation, “Tea Party Revolution,” when the and lowering the corporate tax rate. THE PARTY OF LINCOLN Republicans wrested control of the U.S. Scott said this plan would help provide House in 2010. He and U.S. Rep. jobs for 7 million Americans. Clyburn, who served on the staff of Allen West of Florida are the first black Clyburn prefers to depend on Gov. John West and as South Carolina’s members of their party to serve in earmarks – funds included in legislation human affairs commissioner before Congress since J.C. Watts of Oklahoma for a specific purpose, usually for a winning his current congressional seat, retired in 2002. Scott, who represents project in a specific legislator’s state or actually started life as a Republican, South Carolina’s 1st District, sat on the district – to kick-start the economy though he sees little similarity between Charleston County Council for 13 into high gear. Scott and many other the party of Lincoln and today’s party years and was a state representative for Republicans see eliminating earmarks of Romney, Gingrich, Santorum and two years before besting eight other as a way to make a dent in the ever- Palin. He remembers wearing “I Like Republicans and then Democrat Ben growing national debt. Ike” buttons in 1952 and 1956, Frasier in the general election. Among In Clyburn’s opinion, that attitude is supporting the candidacy of those he vanquished in the primary stifling South Carolina’s economy Republican President Dwight David were members of two of South because an earmark is the only way to Eisenhower, and working to elect Carolina’s most prominent political obtain funding to deepen the Charleston Richard Nixon as president on the February/March 2012 | Living Roots 19 FEATURE FEATURE South Carolina State campus during remembered. “The plea went Americans turned to the Democratic the 1960 campaign. He also was deeply unaddressed. That was when I began to Party. According to Clyburn, they involved in the civil rights have stuck with the Democrats movement, organizing sit-ins and because even in the 21st century, helping to establish the Student many Republican policies are seen Non-Violent Coordinating as anti-black. Committee at a meeting at Shaw “There are exceptions, but, for University in Raleigh. the most part, Republicans are Following a civil rights against Social Security, Medicare demonstration at a lunch counter in and universal access to health care. Orangeburg in March 1960, he and Most blacks believe that health care around 300 of his colleagues were is a fundamental right. It’s no carted off to jail, which turned out to accident that African-Americans die be a fortunate stroke of luck for the younger and get less health care. If future congressman. He explained the president didn’t do anything that the students who were not else, putting health care on the arrested – because there was no place agenda was monumental, and every to put all of them – returned to the black person knows that.” South Carolina State campus, raided the dining hall and brought dinner BLIND LOYALTY to their incarcerated friends. His 6th District Rep. Jim Clyburn future wife, Emily, was among them. Scott, on the other hand, is not “She came up to me with a see a Republican strategy that was, if not convinced that African-Americans hamburger in her hand, broke it in anti-student and anti-black, certainly should blindly follow the Democratic two, and we each ate half,” he said. struck me as being so. That was my Party. He grew up in a broken home in They now have three daughters North Charleston and made such and three grandchildren. poor grades in his freshman year at During this tumultuous time in Stall High School that he had to his life, Clyburn began to see what take summer school classes to he considered to be the dark side of advance to the 10th grade. He the Republican Party. He said survived and eventually thrived Nixon’s running mate, Henry through the influence of his mother, Cabot Lodge, made some positive football and a mentor who taught comments about the progress him about free enterprise system. South Carolina State students were “I have a very strong mom, and making and what the Nixon she kept me pumped with administration would do for optimism,” Scott said. “She taught African-Americans. Instead of me that if you shoot for the moon agreeing with his colleague, Nixon and miss, you’ll still end up among repudiated his statements and the stars.” “took him to the woodshed,” He added that the lessons he according to Clyburn. learned growing up about Later that year, when the Rev. individual responsibility and “being Martin Luther King Jr. was jailed in 1st District Rep. Tim Scott right is far more important than Albany, Ga., the civil rights leader’s being popular” took him in the wife got an empathetic call from break with the Republican Party.” direction of the Republican Party. Nixon’s opponent, John F. Kennedy. He added that in 1964, when the “There’s no doubt that those lessons Clyburn tried unsuccessfully to get Republican candidate for president, led me to be a conservative,” Scott Nixon to do the same.