Gun Politics and Affront to Memory of Emanuel Nine

Paul Hyde/South Carolina Daily Gazette

Earlier this month, South Carolina voters watched a parade of disturbing campaign images that have become increasingly familiar in modern politics.

Among the most striking were social media posts featuring candidates posing with military-style rifles, firing weapons at shooting ranges or otherwise presenting themselves as warriors in the nation’s ongoing cultural battles.

Several of the candidates who most enthusiastically embraced those images — including former gubernatorial candidate U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace and U.S. Senate candidate Mark Lynch — have now lost their primary contests.

Their campaigns are over.

For many South Carolinians, such displays represent independence, constitutional liberty and support for the Second Amendment. For others, particularly victims of gun violence, they communicate something quite different.

They raise a troubling question: Why does South Carolina politics so often celebrate firearms while saying so little about the victims of gun violence?

That question feels especially important this week.

On June 17, South Carolina marks 11 years since a white supremacist walked into a Bible study at Mother Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston and murdered nine Black worshippers who had welcomed him into their sanctuary as a brother in Christ.

We should say their names again, especially now, when the anniversary no longer carries the attention of a round-number milestone: the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, Cynthia Hurd, Susie Jackson, Ethel Lance, the Rev. DePayne Middleton-Doctor, Tywanza Sanders, the Rev. Daniel Simmons Sr., Sharonda Coleman-Singleton and Myra Thompson.

Eleven years ago, the nation recoiled at the horror.

South Carolinians reflected on faith, race, forgiveness and violence.

And some unexpectedly hopeful images remain indelible. We watched, awestruck, as devastated family members extended grace to a killer who had shown none.

We remember a president who journeyed to Charleston and grieved with us, leading South Carolina in a unison singing of “Amazing Grace.”

We remember that then-Gov. Nikki Haley and state lawmakers found the courage to remove the Confederate battle flag at long last from the Statehouse grounds.

Yet as public memory fades, political habits remain remarkably unchanged.

It’s remarkable how little state leaders talk about victims of crime while courting gun owners. Sadly, crime victims are a growing group of South Carolinians. It’s also a highly motivated one.

As we remember the Emanuel Nine this week, it’s important to remember that this massacre was not an unavoidable tragedy.

Closing the ‘Charleston loophole’

The shooter obtained his firearm through what became known as the “Charleston loophole” — a gap in federal law allowing gun sales to proceed if a background check is not completed within three business days.

Because of recordkeeping failures and time limits, a prohibited buyer slipped through.

More than 90% of federal background checks are completed in minutes. A background check that takes longer than three days often is a red flag that something is seriously wrong.

Background checks delayed more than three days are four times more likely to result in a denial determination, according to the gun-violence prevention organization Everytown.

In the wake of the Mother Emanuel massacre on June 17, 2015, other states acted to protect their citizens by closing or limiting the Charleston loophole. Most extended the required wait for a background check to be completed before a gun is sold.

Public safety, after all, is a state leader’s first and most important responsibility.

But here in South Carolina, 11 years after Charleston gave the loophole its name, state lawmakers have still not fixed the problem.

The Charleston massacre requires state leaders to confront uncomfortable lessons. One of those lessons is painfully obvious: rights and responsibilities are not opposites.

Politicians can defend the Second Amendment while still speaking honestly about gun violence.

They can celebrate lawful ownership without turning firearms into campaign props and fetishizing deadly weapons. And they can champion liberty while supporting safeguards designed to keep weapons out of dangerous hands.

South Carolina remains one of the worst states in the nation for gun deaths, ranking 12th highest in the nation per capita in 2024, or 11th in the nation if Washington, D.C. is excluded, according to the National Center for Health Statistics.

The Charleston massacre exposed a deadly weakness in our gun laws. The killer should never have been able to purchase a firearm.

Yet 11 years later, the Charleston loophole remains open — an astonishing failure of political will by state lawmakers and a painful reminder that tragedy does not always produce reform.

The best way for state lawmakers to honor the victims of Mother Emanuel would be to close the Charleston loophole.

It is long overdue. A lesson paid for in nine lives should not take more than a decade to learn.