South Carolina governor: Confederate flag comes down Friday

Haley signs bill removing Confederate flag from statehouse grounds

Leslie Minerd, of Columbia, S.C., holds a sign as she celebrates outside the South Carolina Statehouse, Thursday in Columbia, S.C. More than 50 years after South Carolina raised a Confederate flag at its Statehouse to protest the civil rights movement, the rebel banner will be removed Friday in a state where such a reversal seemed unthinkable a month ago. - photo by Associated Press

APTOPIX Confederate F Ledb 1 — Leslie Minerd, of Columbia, S.C., holds a sign as she celebrates outside the South Carolina Statehouse, Thursday in Columbia, S.C. More than 50 years after South Carolina raised a Confederate flag at its Statehouse to protest the civil rights movement, the rebel banner will be removed Friday in a state where such a reversal seemed unthinkable a month ago. - photo by Associated Press

COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley signed a bill into law Thursday that will bring down the Confederate flag outside the Statehouse, a move that seemed unthinkable only a month ago in this Deep South state that was the first to secede from the Union. The law requires the battle flag to be gone within 24 hours; her staff said it would be removed during a ceremony at 10 a.m. Friday and relegated to the state's Confederate Relic Room.

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