COLUMBIA, S.C. A day after an unemployed veteran charged with a felony shocked South Carolina's Democratic establishment by winning the U.S. Senate primary, party officials were still scratching their heads: What happened?
Alvin Greene, 32, didn't raise any money. He didn't have a website. And his opponent was a relatively better-known former legislator, Vic Rawl, who was already preparing for the general election.
Greene was considered such a long shot that his opponent and media didn't even bother to check his background. If they had, they would have discovered he faces a felony obscenity charge after an alleged encounter with a college student last fall.
After The Associated Press reported Greene's charge Wednesday, the leader of the state Democratic party said she asked Greene to withdraw from the race.
"I did not do this lightly, as I believe strongly that the Democratic voters of this state have the right to select our nominee," Fowler said. "But this new information about Mr. Greene ... would certainly have affected the decisions of many of those voters."
South Carolina state law prohibits convicted felons from serving in state office. Felons can serve in federal office, although the U.S. House or Senate could vote to expel any member deemed unfit to serve.
Rawl said he didn't know about Greene's arrest until reading media reports about it.
"It's an absolute surprise," Rawl said. "I can't really make any comments, because I don't know what's going on."
But Greene said that he will not step aside.
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Lets see;
William Jefferson (D-La.) 2007
James Traficant, (D-Ohio) 2001
Mel Reynolds (D-Ill.) 1995
Walter R. Tucker III (D-Calif.) 1995
Dan Rostenkowski (D-Ill.) 1994
Carroll Hubbard (D-Ky) 1994
Larry Smith (D-Fla) 1993
Albert Bustamante (D-Texas) 1993
Nick Mavroules (D-Mass.) 1992
Floyd H. Flake (D-N.Y.) 1991
Robert Garcia (D-N.Y.) 11-21-88
John W. Jenrette Jr. (D-S.C.) 7/15/80
Raymond R. Lederer (D-S.C.) 5/18/80
Claude Leach (D-La.) 7/20/79
The list is to long to continue.
Suspected;
Chris Dodd
Barney Frank
Charles Rangel
Timothy GeithnerWilliam Jefferson Clinton
Hillary Clinton
and again-to many to list.
It serves always to distract the public councils and feeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions.
It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution in those entrusted with its administration to confine themselves with in their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one department to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all departments in one and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism.
If in the opinion of the people the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed."
…George Washington’s Farewell Address…
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