U. of South Carolina President Calls for Confederate Flag to Come Down

The president of the University of South Carolina at Columbia, Harris Pastides, on Monday called for the Confederate battle flag to be removed from the State House grounds, reports The State, a newspaper in Columbia, S.C. Mr. Pastides joined a growing chorus of leaders calling for the flag’s removal after nine African-Americans were shot and killed last Wednesday in a church in Charleston, S.C.

“It is because, simply, it is the right thing to do and the right time to do it,” Mr. Pastides said on Monday of removing the flag. The state’s Republican governor, Nikki R. Haley, will call for the flag to be removed from a memorial outside the State House in a news conference later Monday, The Post and Courier, a Charleston newspaper, reported.

The university’s athletic director also tweeted on Monday in support of removing the flag:

It is time to remove the flag. We are ONE !! #CharlestonStrong #Gamecocks

— Ray Tanner (@RayTannerSC) June 22, 2015

Dylann Roof, a 21-year-old white man, was arrested and charged with nine counts of murder for the shootings at Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church.