The South Carolina Policy Council Archive

H.4433 would require all students in grades five through twelve receive annual instruction in swimming and water safety. An exception made for the swimming requirement for any schools without a…

H.4432 would mandate that school bus drivers, school crossing guards, and resource officers wear body-worn cameras. The State Department of Education (DOE) would develop guidelines governing the use of the…

H.4415 would prohibit private school buses that don’t conform to State Board of Education regulations on “painting, lettering on the front and rear of the bus, use of stop arm…

H.4407 permits private school students to participate in public school interscholastic activities under the same terms that charter school students, Governor’s school students, or home school students are permitted to…

H.4382 requires the Department of Education, Election Commission, and county voter registration boards to make sure all seventeen-year-old high school students complete a voter registration form, to be submitted by…

S.940 would require any handgun dealer or owner to immediately report the loss or theft of a handgun to a law enforcement agency. Just how this law would be enforced…

Companion bills H.4630 and S.906 would require that any interrogation conducted on a person in custody, and related to a felony or Class A misdemeanor, be recorded in its entirety by…

H.4387 would prohibit a law enforcement agency from giving its officers ticket quotas. The bill would also prohibit a law enforcement officer from being evaluated based on the number of…

Worst of the worst: ● Forcing citizens to undergo training before even buying a gun. ● Creating a new crime of failing to notify law enforcement after gun theft. ● Rolling back roll-call voting…

INCREASED FUNDING MIGHT – MIGHT – GET YOU A “MINIMALLY ADEQUATE” EDUCATION. CHOICE CAN DO FAR BETTER. A year ago the South Carolina Supreme Court issued a decision in the…

● South Carolina’s session is one of the nation’s longest ● Longer sessions mean lawmakers spending more time with lobbyists ● In South Carolina, there are about two lobbyists for every one…

EMINENT DOMAIN POWER FOR A NON-UTILITY PRIVATE COMPANY?  Update: This bill was ratified and signed by the governor with the provision that eminent domain would not apply to private, for-profit…

TAKEAWAYS: ● Federal-state agreement on cleanup costs not available to public. ● Key officials in relief effort not accountable to any statewide official. ● State-federal assistance system is a dizzying web of bureaucracies.…

SOUTH CAROLINA’S ONLY COMPREHENSIVE ASSESSMENT OF EVERY YEAR’S LEGISLATIVE SESSION Our guide to the 2015 legislative session – The Best and Worst of the General Assembly – has just been published. It’s the only…

HOW CAN WE MAKE SOUTH CAROLINA’S POLITICIANS THE LEAST POWERFUL AND MOST ACCOUNTABLE IN THE NATION? (1)  Restore judicial independence. The public deserves confidence that judges rule independently of the…

WHEN THE ARGUMENT IS ABOUT EVIDENCE, SCHOOL CHOICE WINS. EVERY TIME. Over the last thirty years or more, well-meaning reformers have tried valiantly to improve educational results within public education systems. Prominent…

Update: This bill was amended and much was taken out from the original legislation. The Council is now essentially a glorified study committee, which will “make recommendations to the General Assembly…

SOUTH CAROLINA IS A RIGHT-TO-WORK STATE. DOES THAT MEAN SOUTH CAROLINIANS ARE FREE TO WORK? NOT ENTIRELY. South Carolina’s status as a right-to-work state is often credited by government officials…

ON CARRYING FIREARMS, THE PRESUMPTION SHOULD BE ONE OF LIBERTY S.105 and companion bills S.570 and H.3716 are all attempts to enact a policy of “constitutional carry.” If passed, any of the…

● Lawsuit alleges city acted improperly in gun ban. ● Attorney General opinion agrees. ● City’s ban runs against Second Amendment, court precedent. ● Flouting constitutionality a troubling trend in state, local bills. Of…

WHY TAXES AND FEES ON PARTICULAR INDUSTRIES PROTECT  ESTABLISHED COMPANIES AND STIFLE INNOVATION  Companion bills S.862 and H.4329 would stipulate that a third party that makes an accommodation reservation and…

SOME SLOPES REALLY ARE SLIPPERY [Update: S.868 has been amended. The amendment has replaced the entire text of the bill with a provision stating that the eminent domain powers granted to telegraph…

THERE’S ONLY ONE WAY TO ACHIEVE BUDGET TRANSPARENCY, AND THAT’S TO FOLLOW THE LAW  The budget debate this session was one of the most bizarre we’ve seen yet. It wasn’t that…

SAME BAD ARGUMENT, DIFFERENT TAX It is a long held view among many elected officials that the only thing preventing exemplary achievements for students in state run schools is insufficient…

EVERY YEAR, LAWMAKERS TRY TO PASS POTENTIALLY CONTROVERSIAL CHANGES THROUGH THE STATE BUDGET. BUT NOT EVERY PROBLEM IS A FUNDING PROBLEM. Legislators returned to Columbia July 6 for a third…

THE STATE BUDGET IS A TRANSACTION BETWEEN TAXPAYERS AND GOVERNMENT. HERE’S WHAT YOU’RE BUYING. After being rushed through a secretive committee process, the fiscal year (FY) 2016 conference budget –…

● U.S. Supreme Court defines federal agency as “state” ● Millions will continue to be subject to individual, employer mandates ● Only one way remains to circumvent ObamaCare Last week…

‘IF THEY BELIEVE THEY AREN’T BEING PROPERLY COMPENSATED FOR THE WORK THEY DO, THEY SHOULD REDUCE THEIR WORKLOAD’ Watch the General Assembly long enough and you’re sure to hear the popular…

H.4330 – Parental Right to Refuse Assessments Act – would give parents the power to excuse their children from the many K-12 standardized tests administered in this state. The bill…

The Quality Hospice Programs Act, introduced in H.4327 as only a slight deviation from the Hospice Licensure Act, expresses limitations and regulations with regards to ‘multiple location’ hospice facilities. A…