Carolina South Carolina at a Glance State Profile - Gov. Hodges (D) - Sen. Thurmond (R) - Sen. Hollings (D) Presidential Politics Congressional Districting - 01 - Sanford (R) - 02 - Spence (R) - 03 - Graham (R) - 04 - DeMint (R) - 05 - Spratt Jr. (D) - 06 - Clyburn (D) Almanac 2000 Home States & Districts Elected Officials For district profiles and additional information on the elected officials of South Carolina, please use the pull-down menu above.

Looking out across the harbor to Fort Sumter are the glorious mansions of the Battery, gazing on the same view that the hot-blooded young swells of Charleston saw in April 1861 when they fired the shots that began the Civil War. Today there are few more beautiful urban scenes in America than the pastel ''single houses'' of Charleston, built flush with the sidewalk, turning their shoulders to the streets, with open piazzas inside their gateways facing south to catch the breeze, lovingly restored and maintained. Charleston, founded in 1670, was blessed with one of the finest harbors on the Atlantic, at the point where, Charlestonians say, the Ashley and Cooper rivers meet to form the Atlantic Ocean. It was one of the South's two leading cities through the Civil War. Across its docks went cargoes of rice, indigo and cotton--all cultivated by black slaves, enriching the white planters and merchants who dominated the state's economic and political life. In the years following the Civil War, Charleston became an economic backwater, enabling the old buildings to survive; now the prosperity of recent years has financed their restoration.

This old society, descended from Barbados planters and French Huguenots, Sephardic Jews and English gentry second sons, was once a leading force in American political life. The hotheads in the gallery disrupted the 1860 Democratic National Convention here so boisterously that it was adjourned and reconvened in Baltimore, while Southern Democrats split off and nominated their own candidate, enabling Abraham Lincoln to win with 38% of the popular vote. South Carolina's blacks also have a lively history. There were free blacks here before the Civil War (some even owned slaves themselves), and Charleston's historic black culture was memorialized in George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess. The local accent, which seems to outsiders to have a touch of New Jersey and which can be incomprehensible when rapidly spoken, is best appreciated in the speech of Charlestonian Senator Ernest Hollings.

Some 25 years ago, the Charleston area depended heavily on its Navy and Air Force bases, which accounted for 20% of regional payrolls. In the years since, Charleston has lost most of the bases, but far from languishing it has built a vibrant private economy with lots of small companies. Joe Riley Jr., mayor since 1976, has cut crime along with Reuben Greenberg, the only black Jewish police chief in the United States (or perhaps anywhere), and has sponsored new parks and commercial projects that respect and amplify Charleston's historic heritage, and have made it a major tourist destination. Also prime tourist destinations are the South Carolina beaches from the high rises of the Grand Strand around Myrtle Beach through the eponymous hammocks of Pawleys Island south to Hilton Head with its tasteful condos. Low Country South Carolina, once a backwater dependent on the military, is now one of the most gracefully growing parts of the United States.

The 1st Congressional District includes most of the Charleston area and much of the Low Country. Its lines were drawn to maximize the black population of the next-door 6th; but, given the plantation heritage here, it is still 20% black. It includes the old houses of the Battery of Charleston and the beachfront and affluent suburbs strung out on high ground in all directions. It proceeds north past Pawleys Island to the Grand Strand; it runs south to Kiawah Island, but stops short of Hilton Head. About two-thirds of the voters are in metropolitan Charleston. Politically, it is solidly Republican, the more so as more newcomers move to the Charleston area and the Grand Strand.

The congressman from the 1st District is Mark Sanford, a Republican who was a surprise winner in 1994. Sanford grew up on a family farm in Beaufort County, went to Furman and the University of Virginia business school, then worked in real estate finance and investment in New York City and Charleston. When 1st District incumbent Arthur Ravenel ran for governor in 1994, Sanford, with no political experience, decided at 34 to run for Congress. Sanford gave his own campaign $100,000 and ran as an outsider. He called for term limits and cutting the deficit; he said citizen-legislators needed to replace career politicians; he pledged to serve only three terms, to take no PAC money, to vote for no tax increases and to refuse any salary increase until the budget was balanced. In the first primary he trailed former Pentagon official and state Republican chairman Van Hipp 31%-19%. In the runoff Sanford held conference calls each week with Bob Inglis, elected in the 4th District in 1992, and 3d District nominee Lindsey Graham. He emphasized his outsider status and won 52%-48%, and won the general with 66%.

In the House, Sanford voted for the Contract with America but has been a party maverick, with a moderate record on many issues and a willingness to buck the Republican leadership. He criticized leadership tactics in handling the votes on Newt Gingrich's ethics problems. He strongly advocated term limits and made a point of sleeping in his office and returning to his family in Charleston as often as possible. He has been one of the few members voting against measures passed with near-unanimity: the resolution against the bombing of Iraq in December 1998, a bill to preserve sites significant to the Underground Railroad in June 1998, a defense appropriation in September 1997 that included funds for Charleston harbor. He opposed pork barrel spending, including demonstration projects for Charleston's Cooper River bridges; he opposed (as did Mayor Riley) building I-73 to Charleston and said less populous Myrtle Beach would be a better terminus. His attempts to freeze spending for the National Science Foundation and to cut the sugar subsidy failed by wide margins in summer 1998.

But Sanford's willingness to challenge conventional political wisdom may turn out to make a bigger difference than all those spending bills put together. From his election in 1994 he has advocated replacing part of Social Security with individual retirement accounts; his latest bill would dedicate two-thirds of the payroll tax to them. At first he and Michigan's Nick Smith were the only members willing--even eager--to discuss these proposals. Sanford wants to give ordinary people the ability to accumulate wealth in investments. ''The biggest flaw in Social Security is it doesn't take advantage of the power of compounding interest,'' he said. Soon other members began talking about such plans, and by spring 1998, Democrats like Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Bob Kerrey were proposing their version of individual retirement accounts. The decision of Bill Clinton, apparently in aid of the Gore campaign, to squelch such reform in 1999 may have delayed reform, but it is likely to come eventually, as younger voters figure out that a payroll-tax retirement system cannot deliver promised benefits and an investment-based system can yield far more. In July 1998 Sanford said, ''There's really been a remarkable change. I really thought this would be a more slow-moving debate.''

Sanford did not have Republican opponents in 1996 or 1998; in the latter year he was re-elected over a Natural Law party candidate who sells shirts and perfumes in Isle of Palms. Sanford seems highly popular, and voters in the 1st District seem not at all displeased with his spurning of seniority, his disdain for pork barrel projects and his support of term limits, about which in early 1999 he said he was writing a book based on the journal he keeps: ''Sometimes, it's a pleasure to know that what I'm doing just might make a positive difference in someone's life. Other times, it's a rank and ugly business, where, too often, expediency overrules principle and the nation is left poorer as a result.'' But he may not be succeeded by a similarly daring reformer. He seems so determined to keep his word and not run again in 2000 that others started talking about running within weeks after the November 1998 election. One likely candidate is state Representative Henry Brown, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, who says he won't limit his terms; he is an in-law of South Carolina Christian Coalition head Roberta Combs and reliably has her support. Another candidate is state Senator Larry Grooms, who said he wouldn't limit his terms either. Tommy Hartnett, who held this seat before losing a challenge to Senator Ernest Hollings in 1992, is also a possibility. Charleston County Democratic Chairman Andy Brack said in early 1999 that he was interested in the race, and that it would take $1 million for a Democrat to win. More than that, one might think, in this district carried solidly by Bob Dole; but Democratic Governor Jim Hodges in 1998 raised plenty of money from video poker operators and scored an impressive victory.

Cook's Call:
Safe. Sanford's retirement from this seat will not change the fact that it will most assuredly remain in Republican hands. Expect a crowded Republican primary, but don't look for a competitive general election.

The People:

• Pop. 1990: 581,195
• 25.1% rural; 9.8% age 65+;
• 78.1% White, 20% Black, 1.1% Asian, 0.4% Amer. Indian, 1.2% Hispanic origin; 0.4% Other.
• Households: 59.4% married couple families; 30.3% married couple fams. w. children; 47.9% college educ.; median household income: $28,765; per capita income: $13,112; median gross rent: $362; median house value: $75,600.

1996 Presidential Vote Dole (R) 107,221 (55%) Clinton (D) 74,150 (38%) Perot (I) 11,491 (6%)

1992 Presidential Vote Bush (R) 101,830 (53%) Clinton (D) 63,318 (33%) Perot (I) 26,620 (14%)