S.C. Governor candidate Sheheen has deep roots in Camden

Editor's note: Political reporter Robert Behre recently spent some time with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Vincent Sheheen. A similar report on Republican candidate Nikki Haley will be published in the coming weeks.

CAMDEN -- Vincent Sheheen's advisers urged him to move his gubernatorial campaign headquarters to Columbia, but he insisted on staying here.

After all, the Kershaw County seat is where his great-grandfather Abraham put down roots 115 years ago.

This is where some of Abraham's offspring opened businesses and earned enough trust and goodwill to get elected mayor, chairman of Kershaw County Council, state representative, state senator and executive director of the South Carolina Commission on Higher Education.

Here, Sheheen can hop in his pickup truck, drop his children at school and arrive at his law office within 10 minutes. He can keep tabs on his extended family and the five chickens in his backyard.

And if Sheheen can expand to the rest of the state what he has done here -- successfully running as a Democrat in staunchly Republican territory -- then he stands a chance to win the state's top job this fall.

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Vincent Sheheen

A Camden native, state Sen. Vincent Sheheen is the Democratic candidate for governor of South Carolina.

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"Kershaw County is a microcosm of the state, and it's given me a good view in a small way of a lot of things that are happening in South Carolina," Sheheen says as a passerby calls him by name and waves. "It's also typical of a small town in that people know each other, obviously."

Tractor parking

One the state's oldest cities, Camden sprang up in colonial times at the fall line of the Wateree River. It witnessed one of the patriots' worst drubbings in the Revolutionary War, later saw a renaissance when northerners were lured to its grand hotels, and nurtured a reputation as the Steeplechase Capital of the World.

Sheheen says Kershaw County's mix of rich and poor, black and white, and newcomers and old-timers mirrors South Carolina's demographics, while its small towns are grappling with similar problems found in other corners of the state.

The DuPont plant outside Camden changed hands, dramatically reducing its number of employees. A growing number of residents are commuting the 30 or so miles to Columbia, which helps them find jobs but means they're often doing more shopping there than in town.

Camden also is the kind of town where people still parallel park their tractor on a town street.

William Leonhard of Cassatt, a tiny town just northeast of Camden, left his John Deere between the discount tobacco shop and a sandwich shop considered Camden's oldest restaurant.

Leonhard emerges later with beef jerky and cigarettes to go along with the suitcase of beer sitting near his tractor seat.

He says he supports Sheheen, not just because the family has hired him to clear its land but also because Sheheen's late uncle Michael helped him after a 1983 motorcycle accident left him disabled.

"If you need help, they'd give the shirt off their back for you," Leonhard says. "They helped me out until I could get back on my feet."

Family matters

In 1895, Abraham Sheheen, a Lebanese native who immigrated to Virginia, went south, selling dry goods along the way to finance his journey.

"It's the American story. They were looking for a place where they could prosper economically," Vincent Sheheen says.

Abraham opened a grocery store, and as the family expanded its members also opened a feed and seed store and a printing business.

The family's political legacy began in the 1960s when Abraham's son Austin, Vincent Sheheen's grandfather, was elected mayor.

Sheheen was close to his grandfather and recalls a story he heard about how the former mayor ensured that school integration went as peacefully as possible.

"He didn't want the kids to be scared, so they had the policemen dress up like firemen and go in like they were checking the fire alarms during the day," he says.

Sheheen's father Fred used to own a printing company just across from Rusty Davis' guitar store.

Sheheen pops into Davis' shop to say hello, and Davis explains how Fred Sheheen wrote a nice newspaper column about Davis' guitar playing four decades ago. "It made some of my friends jealous," Davis says. "I've known the Sheheen family a long time."

Fred Sheheen formerly headed the South Carolina Commission on Higher Education. His mother was an elementary school teacher in Kershaw County public schools and later served as an elementary school principal.

Vincent Sheheen says he hasn't sought much advice or help from his family members in this race. He didn't even campaign much with his uncle, former Rep. Bob Sheheen, when he ran for his old Statehouse seat.

"I had to earn it on my own. I had to prove it own my own," Sheheen says, "and I think the people here would have held it against me if I didn't."

Cautionary note

Harold Griffin says he has known the Sheheen family since he moved to Camden in 1977. The owner of Harold's Wheel Alignment Tire & Brake Service says he is impressed with how Vincent listens.

"I'm a card-carrying Republican, and I can show you the card," Griffin says, explaining he will vote for Sheheen because he sees Republican Nikki Haley as four more years of Mark Sanford. "We don't need four more years," he says.

Griffin says he voted in the GOP primary June 8, mainly to vote against a Republican sheriff's candidate in a race that seems to rival the gubernatorial race here in interest.

The numbers here are a cautionary tale for Sheheen. Even in his home county, he collected only 5,000 votes in the primary, plenty to trounce his Democratic rivals but only 247 more votes than Haley received here in the GOP primary.

Republican voters in Kershaw outnumbered Democrats almost 2-1 on June 8.

But those statistics don't discourage Margene Clinton of Camden, who says she feels Sheheen has been groomed for the job. "We don't call him senator anymore. We just call him governor," she says.

When Sheheen was a student at Clemson University, one of his political science professors, Dave Woodard, told him he had a bright political future -- if he became a Republican.

Sheheen says he was told that by others too, when he first ran for a Statehouse seat in 2000.

"I'm a very loyal person, so I don't change hats lightly," he says, adding that he enjoys being a Democrat because that party doesn't ask its members to toe the party line.

"Many of the Republicans in Columbia had gone into more of an anti-government approach, which isn't consistent with what I believe," he says. "I do believe there's a role for government to play."

Willie Corbett, a retired truck driver, says he knew Sheheen's uncle Bob, who was Speaker of the House when Democrats last had control in Columbia. He knows Vincent too.

"If you've got a problem, he's never too busy to give you conversation. I like that," Corbett says.

Asked about the Nov. 2 general election, Corbett says Sheheen will carry Kershaw County. "Whether he'll carry the rest of the state, I don't know."

As governor, Sheheen says he would focus on recruiting businesses and attracting jobs, as well as improving education.

He wants to reform South Carolina's tax system, which he says contains loopholes that have shifted the tax burden onto the middle class. Doing so, he says, also would make the state more competitive and bring in much-needed jobs. Some of those new jobs could come from growing the health-care economy, he says.

Sheheen also wants to restructure state government and the budgeting process, and improve accountability in Columbia.

He has other plans, including those that address environmental issues.

First, though, he has to defeat Haley, a contest that will be determined in part on how he does in the money race.

The most recent campaign financial reports, released just after the party primaries, showed Sheheen had raised $1.7 million and spent $1.7 million on his bid, while Haley had brought in $1.4 million and spent $1.2 million.

While running for office might have some parallels to the steeplechase races this town still revels in each spring and fall, Sheheen hesitates while comparing the two.

"Steeplechase is interesting. Jump the hurdles, you win the trophy and you have a big party. The difference is after you win that race, the work is over. In the governor's race, you know after you win, the work is just beginning.

"The much more important part is after the race."

Reach Robert Behre at 937-5771 or at rbehre@postandcourier.com.