The South Carolina state house is a microcosm of the US’s contradictions. Outside there are memorials to the Confederate war dead and African American history. Below a statue of Strom Thurmond, a longtime US senator and racial segregationist, are the names of his five children including Essie Mae, whose mother, a Black maid, was 15 when Thurmond impregnated her.
Thurmond died at the age of 100 in 2003; his successor, Lindsey Graham, a lifelong bachelor who never had children, died last Saturday at 71. His sudden exit leaves a void not just in Washington but the state that molded Graham, elected him to the Senate four times and wrestled with his shape-shifting journey from Ronald Reagan Republican to Donald Trump sycophant.
