Monday letters: Haley should open probe of Orangeburg Massacre

From her backroom relationships with corporations and negotiating business deals that undermine state businesses to criticizing her own party and her leadership in bringing down the Confederate flag, Gov. Nikki Haley has been a controversial and courageous governor.

If the governor wants to crown her historic governorship, she can commit to another courageous and bold act: Open an official investigation into the Orangeburg Massacre.

This tragic event occurred Feb. 8, 1968, on the campus of the then-S.C. State College. Three students were killed and 27 others wounded on the third night of growing tension over the refusal of the town’s only bowling alley to allow black patrons. Nine highway patrolmen had been issued deadly buckshot and giving authority to fire into a crowd of students if they felt their lives were being threatened.

The officers were acquitted of imposing summary justice, and then-Gov. Robert McNair blamed “black power” influences for this tragic event. Cleveland Sellers, a civil rights activist, was the only person jailed. Twenty-five years later, he received a full pardon. He now serves as president of Voorhees College in Denmark.

If three students were killed and 27 wounded at the University of South Carolina or Clemson University in 1968, do you think there would not have been a full investigation and someone held accountable?

Truth and reconciliation could lead to a brighter day in South Carolina, and Gov. Haley could lead

This story was originally published February 8, 2016 at 7:52 AM with the headline "Monday letters: Haley should open probe of Orangeburg Massacre."