South Carolina Senate votes to remove Confederate flag

Update:

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The South Carolina Senate has voted to remove the Confederate flag from a pole on Statehouse grounds.

The 37-3 vote Monday allows the state to remove the flag and the flagpole where it flies as soon as it passes the House and is signed by Gov. Nikki Haley.

The bill must pass a two-thirds vote, which is likely to be held Tuesday.

Monday's vote comes less than a week after the 15th anniversary of South Carolina taking the flag off the Capitol dome where it flew since the early 1960s and moving it to beside a monument honoring Confederate soldiers.

Lawmakers had largely ignored the flag until the killing of nine black people during a Bible study at a historic African-American church on June 17.

Earlier:

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The depth of support in the South Carolina Legislature to bring down the Confederate flag will face its first test this week as lawmakers return to Columbia to come up with a specific plan.

The General Assembly returns Monday to discuss Gov. Nikki Haley's budget vetoes and what to do with the rebel flag that has flown over some part of the Statehouse for more than 50 years.

Several bills have been filed, but details like when to bring down the flag that currently flies on a pole by a monument to Confederate soldiers in front of the state Capitol, whether to put another flag in its place and what kind of ceremony should mark the removal aren't specified.

Haley, business leaders, the Legislative Black Caucus and civil-rights leaders are against flying any flag that flew over the Confederacy on the pole.

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