Precolonial period There is evidence of human activities in the area dating to about 50,000 years ago. At the time Europeans arrived, marking the end
Pre-Columbian era around 1500, there were many separate
Native American polities including the powerful
Cofitachequi populated by a variety of nations including the largest the
Cherokee and the
Catawba, with a total population being up to 20,000 around 1600. Up the rivers of the eastern coastal plain lived about a dozen tribes of
Siouan background. Along the
Savannah River were the
Apalachee,
Yuchi, and the
Yamasee. Further west were the Cherokee, and along the
Catawba River, the Catawba. These tribes were village-dwellers, relying on agriculture as their primary food source. About a dozen or more separate small tribes summered on the coast harvesting oysters and fish, and cultivating corn, peas and beans. Travelling inland as much as mostly by canoe, they wintered on the coastal plain, hunting deer and gathering nuts and fruit. The names of these tribes survive in place names like
Edisto Island,
Kiawah Island, and the
Ashepoo River.
Anthony Ashley Cooper, one of the Lord Proprietors, planned the
Grand Model for the Province of Carolina and wrote the
Fundamental Constitutions of Carolina, which laid the basis for the future colony. His
utopia was inspired by
John Locke, an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers and commonly known as the "Father of Liberalism". The Carolina slave trade, which included both trading and direct raids by colonists, was the largest among the British colonies in North America. Another cash crop was the
indigo plant, a plant source of blue dye, developed by
Eliza Lucas. Meanwhile,
Upstate South Carolina, west of the Fall Line, was settled by small farmers and traders, who due to resource competition fought a number of wars with confederated Native American tribes westward. Colonists overthrew the proprietors' rule, seeking more direct representation. In 1712, the former
Province of Carolina split into North and South Carolina. In 1719, South Carolina was officially made a
royal colony. South Carolina prospered from the fertility of the lowcountry and the harbors, such as at
Charleston. It allowed religious toleration, encouraging settlement, and trade in deerskin, lumber, and beef thrived. Rice cultivation was developed on a large scale on the back of slave labor. By the second half of the 1700s, South Carolina was one of the richest of the
Thirteen Colonies. electing
John Rutledge as the state's first president. In February 1778, South Carolina became the first state to ratify the
Articles of Confederation, the initial governing document of the United States, and in May 1788, South Carolina ratified the
United States Constitution, becoming the eighth state to enter the union. During the
American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), about a third of combat action took place in South Carolina, more than any other state.
Antebellum built 1839–41, is an example of
Greek Revival architecture America's first census in 1790 put the state's population at nearly 250,000. By the 1800 census, the population had increased 38 per cent to nearly 340,000 of which 146,000 were slaves. At that time South Carolina had the largest population of Jews in the sixteen states of the United States, mostly based in Savannah and Charleston, the latter being the country's fifth largest city. In the Antebellum period (before the Civil War) the state's economy and population grew. Cotton became an important crop after the invention of the
cotton gin. While nominally democratic, from 1790 until 1865, wealthy male landowners were in control of South Carolina. For example, a man was not eligible to sit in the State House of Representatives unless he possessed an estate of 500 acres of land and 10 Negroes, or at least 150 pounds sterling.
Columbia, the new state capital was founded in the center of the state, and the State Legislature first met there in 1790. The town grew after it was connected to Charleston by the
Santee Canal in 1800, one of the first canals in the United States. As dissatisfaction of the planters ruling class with the federal government grew, in the 1820s
John C. Calhoun became a leading proponent of
states' rights,
limited government,
nullification of the U.S. Constitution, and
free trade. In 1832, the
Ordinance of Nullification declared federal tariff laws unconstitutional and not to be enforced in the state, leading to the
Nullification Crisis. The federal
Force Bill was enacted to use whatever military force necessary to enforce federal law in the state, bringing South Carolina back into line. An 1831 House Report from the Committee on Military Affairs noted that In the
United States presidential election of 1860, voting was sharply divided, with the South voting for the
Southern Democrats and the North for
Abraham Lincoln's
Republican Party. Lincoln was anti-slavery, did not acknowledge the right to
secession, and would not yield federal property in Southern states. Southern secessionists believed Lincoln's election meant long-term doom for their slavery-based agrarian economy and social system. Lincoln was elected president on November 6, 1860. The state House of Representatives three days later passed the "Resolution to Call the Election of Abraham Lincoln as U.S. President a Hostile Act", and within weeks South Carolina became the first state to
secede. Although the state was not a major battleground, the war ruined the state's economy. More than 60,000 soldiers from South Carolina served in the war, with the state losing an estimated 18,000 troops. Though no regiments of
Southern Unionists were formed in South Carolina due to a smaller unionist presence, the
Upstate region of the state would be a haven for Confederate Army deserters and resisters, as they used the Upstate topography and traditional community relations to resist service in the Confederate ranks. At the end of the war in early 1865, the troops of General
William Tecumseh Sherman marched across the state devastating plantations and most of Columbia. South Carolina would be readmitted to the Union on July 9, 1868.
Reconstruction 1865–1877 was the first black person to serve in the
U.S. House of Representatives. He represented
SC's 1st congressional district. In
Texas vs. White (1869), the Supreme Court ruled the ordinances of secession (including that of South Carolina) were invalid, and thus those states had never left the Union. However, South Carolina did not regain representation in Congress until that date. Until the
1868 presidential election, South Carolina's legislature, not the voters, chose the state's electors for the presidential election. South Carolina was the last state to choose its electors in this manner. During Reconstruction, South Carolina maintained a majority-black government, which lasted until approximately 1876 when Democrats and former Confederates committed voter fraud to regain power. On October 19, 1871, President
Ulysses S. Grant suspended
habeas corpus in nine South Carolina counties under the authority of the
Ku Klux Klan Act. Led by Grant's Attorney General
Amos T. Akerman, hundreds of Klansmen were arrested while 2,000 Klansmen fled the state. The 1900 census demonstrated the extent of disenfranchisement: the 782,509 African American citizens comprised more than 58% of the state's population, but they were essentially without any political representation in the
Jim Crow society. The 1895 constitution overturned local representative government, reducing the role of the counties to agents of state government, effectively ruled by the General Assembly, through the legislative delegations for each county. As each county had one state senator, that person had considerable power. The counties lacked representative government until home rule was passed in 1975. Governor
"Pitchfork Ben" Tillman, a Populist, led the effort to disenfranchise the blacks and poor whites, although he controlled Democratic state politics from the 1890s to 1910 with a base among poor white farmers. During the constitutional convention in 1895, he supported another man's proposal that the state adopt a
one-drop rule, as well as prohibit marriage between whites and anyone with any known African ancestry. Some members of the convention realized prominent white families with some African ancestry could be affected by such legislation. In terms similar to a debate in Virginia in 1853 on a similar proposal (which was dropped), George Dionysius Tillman said in opposition: If the law is made as it now stands respectable families in
Aiken,
Barnwell,
Colleton, and
Orangeburg will be denied the right to intermarry among people with whom they are now associated and identified. At least one hundred families would be affected to my knowledge. They have sent good soldiers to the Confederate Army, and are now landowners and taxpayers. Those men served creditably, and it would be unjust and disgraceful to embarrass them in this way. It is a scientific fact that there is not one full-blooded Caucasian on the floor of this convention. Every member has in him a certain mixture of... colored blood. The pure-blooded white has needed and received a certain infusion of darker blood to give him readiness and purpose. It would be a cruel injustice and the source of endless litigation, of scandal, horror, feud, and bloodshed to undertake to annul or forbid marriage for a remote, perhaps obsolete trace of Negro blood. The doors would be open to scandal, malice and greed; to statements on the witness stand that the father or grandfather or grandmother had said that A or B had Negro blood in their veins. Any man who is half a man would be ready to blow up half the world with dynamite to prevent or avenge attacks upon the honor of his mother in the legitimacy or purity of the blood of his father. The state postponed such a one-drop law for years. Virginian legislators adopted a one-drop law in 1924, forgetting that their state had many people of mixed ancestry among those who identified as white.
20th century Early in the 20th century, South Carolina developed a thriving
textile industry. The state also converted its main agricultural base from cotton, to more profitable crops. It would attract large
military bases during
World War I, through its majority Democratic congressional delegation, part of the one-party
Solid South following disenfranchisement of blacks. In the late 19th century, South Carolina would implement
Jim Crow laws which enforced
racial segregation policies until the 1960s. During the early-to-mid part of the 20th century, millions of African Americans left South Carolina and other southern states for jobs, opportunities, and relative freedom in U.S. cities outside the former Confederate states. In total from 1910 to 1970, 6.5 million blacks left the South in the
Great Migration. By 1930, South Carolina had a white majority population for the first time since 1708. South Carolina was one of several states that initially rejected the
Nineteenth Amendment (1920) giving women the right to vote. The South Carolina legislature later ratified the amendment on July 1, 1969. The struggle of the
civil rights movement took place in South Carolina, as they did in other Southern states and elsewhere within the country. South Carolina would experience a much less violent movement than other Deep South states. This tranquil transition from a
Jim Crow society occurred because the state's white and black leaders were willing to accept slow change, rather than being utterly unwilling to accept change at all. Other South Carolina political figures, like Sen.
Strom Thurmond, on the other hand, were among the nation's most radical and effective opponents of social equality and integration. During the mid-to-late 20th century, South Carolina started to see economic progress first in the textile industry and then in manufacturing. Tourism also started to form into a major industry within the state during the 20th century, especially in areas such as
Myrtle Beach and
Charleston.
21st century , 2010 As the 21st century progresses, South Carolina has attracted new business by having a 5%
corporate income tax rate, no state
property tax, no local income tax, no inventory tax, no
sales tax on manufacturing equipment, industrial power or materials for finished products; no wholesale tax, and no unitary tax on worldwide profits. South Carolina was one of the first states to stop paying for "early elective" deliveries of
babies, under either
Medicaid and private insurance. The term early elective is defined as a
labor induction or
Cesarean section between 37 and 39 weeks. The change was intended to result in healthier babies and fewer costs for the state of South Carolina. On November 20, 2014, South Carolina became the 35th state to legalize
same-sex marriages, when a federal court ordered the change. As of 2022, South Carolina had one of the lowest percentages among all states of women in state legislature, at 17.6% (only five states had a lower percentage; the national average is 30.7%; with the highest percentage being in
Nevada at 61.9%). ==Geography==