Social
Justice Advocates Plan April 5 Demonstration near Daniel Island Office of Nancy
Mace
April 4- Due to the decision of the Court, we'll move to our plan B for Daniel Island on Sat. April 5. It will be a small, rapid turnover demonstration smack in the middle of downtown Daniel Island. We're calling it "Speed Dating for Social Justice W/O Nancy Mace."
March 28- The City of Charleston has refused to grant a permit for this time and location. Lowcountry Up is Good, Inc. filed an action in US District Federal Court on March 28 to obtain a Court Order authorizing the demonstration. Please return here for updates and revisions based on what happens in court. Your presence at the hearing will help show the court that this demonstration and the issues it raises are important to the Citizens of the Lowcountry. Full details on the Lawsuit being filed.
March 27- We're looking for experience in making and deploying some puppets for a political puppet theater as part of this demonstration. We're also seeking musicians to play for some of the time we'll be by the road. We hope to have a sing along as well. Please bring us your suggestions so this can be more than a shake sings and chant demonstration.
The fight to save the Lowcountry's future as a component of a diverse, social democracy will be the motivation for a major social justice demonstration action being
planned for Saturday, April 5 near the Daniel Island office of US
Representative Nancy Mace. The demonstration will include delegations from a coalition
of human rights and economic justice organizations from the 1st
Congressional District and Lowcountry including those committed to healthcare,
reproductive rights, civil rights, the living wage, education, affordable
housing and transit.
The demonstration will prove local opposition to the recent decision by the US Congress to surrender it's Constitutional authority to control and protect the public purse to Trump/Musk which Rep. Mace chose to endorse with our vote.
Justification for Ace Mace Social Justice Action
Charleston is rated the best place in the US to vacation, but low wages and a rising cost of living drive citizens to desperation. Working residents spend hours snarled in traffic, missing time with their children who struggle alone to learn through homework what their schools seem incapable of teaching. Mace ignores her constituents and these issues while pursing the Republican nomination for Governor or SC and seeking profile on right wing media through sexuality connected culture war issues. On the only weekend of the year when every Charleston area hotel room is full, we will point out the lack of focus leaders like Rep. Mace have on issues like reliable transit, affordable housing, a living wage, education, healthcare and human rights.
As progressive South Carolinian's we accept the reality of living in a red state, however, that does not mean it is acceptable for a US Representative to dodge contact with the people she represents while they stagger under collapsing federal safety net programs, a rapidly rising cost of living and the loss of the cultural and environmental opportunities which once made living in the SC Low country more attractive than it is now. Our position as working citizens here is unsustainable, even for conservative Republicans.
Our Congresswoman should be holding town halls, connecting with the people she represents and working towards a better future for all our children, red and blue. While we cannot hope to find common cause with MAGA Trumpublicans, it is the duty of our Congresswoman to hear and represent us all. In areas where our interests coincide such as cost of living, traffic and housing, it continues to be her duty to act in the Congress in the best interest of our entire district. 
Image, right, William Hamilton, outside the Office of US Representative Nancy Mace on Daniel Island after an advocacy visit to her staff on Feb. 26, 2025.
This demonstration is scheduled to commemorate the 158th anniversary of a demonstration in downtown Charleston where African Americans and their supporters confronted a city guard (the police department of that era) composed of former Confederate soldiers at the four corners of law. This confrontation was a part of the two month long successful struggle to desegregate Charleston’s then new, horse drawn streetcars. During the demonstration (also called a riot by some observers) the US Army of Occupation turned out a company of Black Federal soldiers to protect the African Americans and preserve order. No one was killed during the tense confrontation, which took place in the first weeks of Federally enforced reconstruction. Mary Bowers, the Rosa Parks of Charleston would go on to help lead the struggle, demanding the right to ride on Meeting street two weeks later and ultimately winning it for all Charlestonians in early May.
You can read a detailed account of this and other related events in spring of 1867 in Voices of Black South Carolina by Damon L. Fordham, pp. 29-33, History Press, 2009.
Demonstrations and social justice actions executed in Charleston and the Lowcountry this Spring will be linked to events in that historic struggle to win the right to ride which will continue to Memorial weekend, when it is hoped the long fought for Beach Reach CARTA Shuttle will survive budget cuts to return transit to the Atlantic.
The Organizers, Best Friends of Lowcountry Transit, Inc. and Lowcountry Up is Good, PAC, Inc. plan to seek a permit for the demonstration from the City of Charleston Police Department. No violence or destruction of property is planned as part of this peaceful demonstration. Participants will be required to sign up online prior to participating. An overflow standby area will be established and the demonstration will be three hours long, conducted in two 90 minute shifts. An after event is being planned.
Education advocates will be asked to wear red; healthcare & reproductive rights advocates blue; Transit advocates green; housing advocates brown; labor advocates yellow (reflective vests) and gender identity advocates pridewear.
This demonstration is scheduled to take place during the finals of the Credit One Charleston Open, the largest women’s only tennis tournament in North America. It will be conducted on public property in accordance with the rights and privledges reserved to citizens under the First and Fourtneenth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States and with the supervision and help of a team of Experience, SC Licensed Attorneys trained in Civil Rights and Social Justice Advocacy issues, led by William J. Hamilton, III, Lowcountry Attorney, activist and writer.
For more information contact
William
J. Hamilton, III
Ex. Dir.
Best Friends of Lowocuntry Transit, Inc. & Lowcountry Up is Good, PAC, Inc.
wjhamilton29464@gmail.com
(843) 870-5299
Bluesky at https://bsky.app/profile/wjhamilton29464.bsky.social
Monitor #chsresist for details
