The History
The Man
“[A]s white men we are not sorry for it, and we do not propose to apologize for anything we have done in connection with it. We took the government away from them in 1876. We did take it. If no other Senator has come here previous to this time who would acknowledge it, more is the pity.”
The above was part of a campaign speech Tillman gave in 1890 regarding his role in the Hamburg Massacre of 1876.
“History has no record of Negro rule. The situation is grave, and calls for wisdom and all manner of statesmanship. If we had our say, the Negro could never vote. I believe that God made the white man out of better clay than that which the Negro was made from... We don't need another race to help us at this time. In some of the states, the Negro holds the vote of control... In Chicago, the Republicans needed the Negro vote to elect their whole ticket, so a nigger was nominated for judge and elected” -1906 Speech
More Resources:
Wiki Tillman
The Trouble with Tillman by Will Moredock
Historically Complex: The Podcast with Dr. Lydia Mattice Brandt (episode 4 covers the Confederate Soldier Monument and the Tillman Statue)
A Video About the Tillman Monument with Dr. Lyia Mattice Brandt
The Monument
So, why on May 1, 1940 did the South Carolina Legislature erect a monument to Benjamin Tillman?
“Southern trees bear a strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black body swinging in the Southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
Pastoral scene of the gallant South,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolia sweet and fresh,
And the sudden smell of burning flesh!
Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
For the sun to rot, for a tree to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter crop.”
In 1939 Billie Holiday first sang “Strange Fruit” at the Café Society Nightclub in NYC.
Throughout the South the Civil Rights Movement was fought with violence, lynching, and through the deliberate teaching of a false history. This “lost cause” narrative erected statues like Tillman’s as a symbol of White power. The message was clear; the Jim Crow south was not going to die easily.
It’s time. We are not looking to erase history; we are looking to expose history. Benjamin Tillman’s legacy of voter suppression, violence, terror and racism is not a legacy that should be honored on our Statehouse grounds. South Carolina needs to do better…