South Carolina Drama Good Enough for Hollywood

Only in South Carolina. Only here could a squabble about a leadership job lead to high drama that sounds like a made-up story line for Hollywood. All it needs is gratuitous sex and violence to be a blockbuster.
What’s sparked Palmetto State legislative histrionics is the uncomfortable, unsettling battle over whom will be the state’s next lieutenant governor, a job no one seems to want.
It got so bad in the first week of June that the guy who was next in line resigned so he wouldn’t have to take the job and lose his position as a longtime state senator. And now, it looks like the only guy who might want it is (shudder) a Democrat in a legislature overwhelmed by Republicans.
So here’s what’s been happening. Earlier this year, the College of Charleston picked Lt. Gov. Glenn McConnell to be its next president, a job set to start July 1. With the session set to recess on June 19, most people thought McConnell would resign then to be ready to step into his new role on July 1.
But a controversial bill that would promote the college to the ranks of being a research university, which would mean it could get all sorts of new research grants and expand what it does, got bogged down in politics. McConnell worried he might be put in a position to have to oversee a vote on the bill, which could be seen as a conflict of interest. So he telegraphed a desire to step down before the Senate voted on the bill.
Disarray ensued. If McConnell resigned early, the next in line to be the lieutenant governor would be the Senate president pro tempore, considered a mostly ceremonial leadership position that allows a leading senator to run the Senate when the lieutenant governor isn’t overseeing the chamber. Remember, this new lieutenant governor would only serve in the job for a few months because a new one will be elected in November. And to get this part-time, short-term job, the new lieutenant governor has to resign the Senate position because one can’t serve in two roles at one time (which essentially is why McConnell has to step down to head the college).
Back to the story. State Sen. John Courson, R-Columbia, was serving as president pro tem as the session drew to a close, but didn’t want to be lieutenant governor. So after much dramatic squabbling, he resigned the leadership role and went back to being a regular senator. For the record, there apparently is precedence for the state to have no lieutenant governor. So you’d think everything would be hunky-dory.
But throw in this twist: Back in 2011, legislators didn’t want Gov. Nikki Haley to be able to call them back into session to deal with a restructuring bill. So they inserted special language in a bill that governs what happens when the legislature goes home for the year. The language, which still is in this bill, overrides how they can be forced to return to the General Assembly. Instead of the governor being able to call them back for any reason — from reviewing a tax decision to appropriating extra money to deal with a calamity — the only leaders who can call them back to Columbia are the leaders of their chambers — the speaker of the House and, you guessed it, the president pro tem.
So the way things stand now, if there is no president pro tem, not only would there be no one to become lieutenant governor. But there also wouldn’t be anyone to call senators back into session to deal with an unexpected crisis. How’s that for a big ol’ mess with a capital M?
On Thursday came word that Democratic Sen. Yancey McGill of Kingstree was considering offering for president pro tem, which would allow him to rise to become lieutenant governor when McConnell steps down.
That would fix the problem. But it kind of begs the question that many have been asking since all of the nonsense started anyway: Why do we really even need a lieutenant governor?
Andy Brack is editor and publisher of Statehouse Report. He can be reached at brack@statehousereport.com.