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"Censuring Jake Knotts: What It Is Really All About"
The Executive Committee of the Lexington County Republican Party met Thursday night, June 10th in order to consider calls by many of the committeemen for a resolution censuring SC State Senator Jake Knotts for his recent profanity-laced attacks on President Obama and Representative Nikki Haley who is running for Governor. The term "rag head" was applied to both Haley and Obama by Knotts while he was participating in a recent political talk show being broadcast from a bar on the internet.
The crude, very insulting comments--that Knotts claims were spoken in jest--made local, state, national, and even international news placing Lexington County's Republican Party in what most at the meeting considered to be an embarrassing situation.
According to several members, including Chairman Richard Bolen, keeping quiet and hoping the situation would go away was not an option. Many executive committeemen felt that they were left with no choice but to strongly censure Knotts, condemn his statements, and call for him to resign from office.
A quorum was present. There were over thirty executive committeemen present and over a hundred others were there as well. Not long after discussions began, there was an attempt to table the motion by Third Vice Chairman Douglas Ford. It was explained that there really needed to be extenuating circumstances well beyond our control before the motion could be tabled and that otherwise it would be considered an attempt to delay the process.
Strangely enough, it was not long after that when someone came in and loudly announced that a water main outside had been broken and there was no water available in the building putting the restrooms out of commission. This announcement was met with quite a bit of laughter and business continued despite multiple attempts to bog down the process by Robert Schaffer and others who were obviously intending to obstruct the business of the meeting.
When we were on the verge of voting on the resolution after about an hour and a half, the speaker system went out prompting yet another attempt to table the motion. I overheard someone say that we'd better hurry up before they cut off the power, too. I'm fairly sure he was joking. Chairman Rich Bolen managed to speak up and we continued business despite the protests.
The resolution finally passed on a recorded vote of 27 to 6. The resolution condemned Knotts' comments against Rep. Haley and President Obama, officially censured him, and, in addition, called for him to resign his office. No one realistically expects Knotts to resign but we had to be very clear in our expression of disapproval of his bad behavior. The only reason a call for ejecting him from the party was removed from the resolution was due to our wanting to avoid a very lengthy debate over an action not clearly provided for in the rules.
Knotts claims in response that Lexington County Republicans did not censure Governor Mark Sanford but he's wrong. We did censure him--through the state organization in which Lexington County was well represented. At the state executive committee meeting considering action against Sanford last year, County Chairman Rich Bolen, even attempted to put in a call for Sanford to resign but the motion failed.
In that case, the state organization took quick action which, if they'd done the same in this case, perhaps would have removed the necessity for our doing it at the county level. In this case dealing with Knotts, however, we did not see that and we felt an additional responsibility to take very quick and local action due to the fact that Knotts is an elected official representing the people of Lexington County rather than a governor representing the entire state.
In the press release issued later by Knotts, he actually takes yet another rude swipe at Nikki Haley as well as blaming "grandstanding by [his] political opponents" for the censure. He could not be more wrong.
I was one of the first to email Rich Bolen following up his official statement on Knotts' comments and called for a special meeting to consider this matter and cc'd others who also contacted him on the matter. As far as we are concerned this censure was based on a matter of principle and was in direct response to something that we really wish had never happened, i.e. Sen. Jake Knotts made a fool of himself and it reflected very badly on us in Lexington County as well as the whole state.
Some have responded to our action stating the obvious in that Knotts has freedom of speech but then, I must remind them, so do we--both individually and as a group. We used that inalienable right last night and I think we as a county and a state are far better off for the expression of it.
Knotts took advantage of his position when he made such rude and profane statements against his political opponents on a public forum that he would never have reasonably been expected to be a part of if not for his holding an elected office. If he abuses his position in such a manner, we have a moral obligation to strongly condemn that abuse. That is the other side of free speech that makes it truly free: we have the right to disagree with anyone we please.
The censure resolution by the county party also needs to be looked at in context: mature adults do not punish or express disapproval out of hatred for others. They do it because they really care about what is going on and feel responsible for saying or doing something to help correct the situation--no matter how painful it may or may not be to do. That is all we have done.
Longtime LCRP member and Knotts defender Mrs. Mickey Lindler was talking of our "eating our own"--language similar to that of Democrats when they see us take such actions. Well, I like Mickey but I really doubt she took such an attitude when disciplining her children--and that's essentially what we have done.
She also seemed to have less confidence than we do in Jake's and other candidates' abilities to behave well in the future since she thought that the precedent we set that evening would result in our having to meet "all the time" to discipline elected officials over such matters. Well, if she's right and that many of our elected officials from Lexington County are that foul-mouthed and crude when participating in broadcasts and other public forums, I say,"BRING IT ON!"
We're setting the bar higher now. What Knotts did was to, more than anything, abuse US here in Lexington County and the rest of South Carolina. Unfortunately for Knotts, we are a larger, younger, more active county party now. There will be no more "going along to get along." We're simply not going to take the abuse from public servants anymore.
Those who may accuse us of being self-righteous need to tell us what they would have done in such a situation. To be quiet on the matter would have implied acquiescence and consent. We were not, under any circumstances, going to do that.
This whole process far surpasses the mere act of condemning Knotts' behavior, however. This censure action was really about regular folks taking responsibility for their party and their community. Those few of the old guard who attempted to defend Knotts were mostly confident, experienced speakers who have repeatedly sought and many times gained leadership positions in the party.
Those who stood up to speak in support of the resolution were not quite so smooth. They were mostly everyday regular people like your neighbors and friends who are not used to speaking in public--especially under such intense scrutiny in front of large crowds and television cameras. Their voices quavered at times but they got up there despite this and made their voices heard.
The passion of the prevailing side was very evident. One young woman, a mother of two and expecting a third, was visibly upset but spoke her piece anyway pointing out what a bad example Knotts set for her children and the community as a whole.
Maybe I'm just being unreasonably idealistic in my outlook but THAT is what I want to see in our community. THAT is true courage and participation in the process. THAT kind of courage from regular working folks gives me more hope than all the empty promises and jokes some robotic candidate may deliver from the lectern.
I saw true patriotism in action last night. It is very addicting. I want to see more.
wtc
6-11-10
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