CRESCENT People: Congressman Jeff Duncan – Introducing One of South Carolina’s Congressional “Fab Four” to a New Constituency.

South Carolina’s congressional delegation got four new faces last year. They’ve become famous on Capital Hill for working together as a unit – consulting each other as they work to make decisions and listen to other points of view. Media outlets have gone so far as to refer to them as “The Fab Four” or “The Four Horsemen” (not for the apocalypse but for the wrestling group in the 1980s famous for doing things “their way” and who will be inducted in to the WWE Wrestling Hall of Fame this year).

CRESCENT had an opportunity to talk with former state House member and South Carolina’s 3rd District Congressman Jeff Duncan. He’s a political veteran who has seen his share of battles, but at the same time, he’s as deeply committed to his principles today as he was when he first ran for office. His devotion to his family and his faith keep him grounded, and with the geographical boundaries of the state’s congressional districts changing, he’s introducing himself to a new constituency. They’re lucky to have him.

Part of the 4th District is now going to be yours, and there are a lot of folks in the other parts of the state who don’t know who you are, that really should.  So who is Jeff?  Where did Jeff come from and why is Jeff here now?

Well, I’m just a very proud South Carolinian who understands the state from a historical standpoint and wants to serve his state in the nation’s capital and serve his state in a lot of different capacities.  I have as a state representative and I have in my local community, now I’m serving in Congress.

I was born in South Carolina.  My father was in the textile business and we moved around a lot.  We move around in North Carolina, part of Virginia and back to South Carolina with the textile business.  I went to two different high schools.  I moved about twelve times while I was growing up, so I have a lot of childhood friends, and I think that’s helped me go into different situations very easily because, when you go from one school to the next, as a seventh grader or eighth grader or ninth grader, you learn to adjust to new situations and make friends rapidly and assess the situation rapidly.

I went to two different high schools, and we moved back to South Carolina between my junior year and my senior year, which is very traumatic for a rising senior who was an athlete, football, I wouldn’t say a football star, but a good football player who had the kind of best friends you develop in your ninth, tenth, eleventh grade years of life that I was moving away from. And to move from an area right above Charlotte, NC to Ware Shoals, SC was its own challenge.  But that’s what happened.

So I moved into Ware Shoals which was a 1A school, very small, 75 members in my senior class and wondering why in the world my father uprooted me and moved me to such a small town.  What was going to happen on the football field?  What was going to happen…you know, I had no friends.  Moved in June, school started in September or late August.  Not a lot of time to develop those friendships.  So anyway, long story short is, God knew what he was doing in my life because I met my wife there and we moved to Laurens after we were married.

We dated through college.  I came to Clemson University and played football at Clemson for a couple of years as a walk-on.  I made the team.  I was a guy that helped get the defense ready for the opposing offense.  I was a scout team guy most of the time but had great experiences with guys like…William Perry and playing football with him.  Or Michael Dean or David Treadwell who went on to play for Denver or Dale Hatcher, the only guy other than Ray Guy who has actually hit the scoreboard in the Superdome during a game.  There have only been two punters, but I know Dale and tried to catch his punts.  He could kick very, very high and a long way.  So that experience was great.

And we moved to Laurens when I got out of college and went to work in the banking industry, ended up in Laurens, a small bank, family-owned bank that’s been gobbled up through mergers.  Moved to Laurens in 1989 and pretty much been there ever since.  Got active in the community with the Chamber and with the different things that bankers get involved in but, also, I wanted to get involved in my community because I believed in Laurens County.  I liked what I saw there so as I got involved in the county and got to know more people, in the end of 2001, beginning of 2002, I decided to run for the State House for a vacant seat.

The gentleman was retiring who had been there ten years and a lot of folks came up and said, “We want you to represent us in Columbia.  We want you to run for the State House.”  I’d never really given it much thought even though I studied Political Science at Clemson and had a strong interest in politics, my interest was more, when I was at Clemson, more foreign affairs politics and Middle East politics or the Soviet Union, trying to understand that sort of thing.  So, state level politics never was something I was that interested in.  But when folks started encouraging me to run, we started looking at it, praying about it and decided that that was the time.

So when I ran for office, I won fairly easily, 70-30, and served for eight years in the South Carolina legislature moving up in the ranks to committee chairmanship for my last two years and developing a reputation.  In Columbia, they didn’t need to look up at the voting board to see how Jeff Duncan was voting.  They knew instinctively, he was voting conservatively, especially on spending issues.  And social issues, as well.  I was a very conservative person, had that reputation.  They didn’t have to guess. They knew.  That’s the kind of reputation I want as a Congressman, as well, and I think we’ve done a very good job establishing that the first year in office.  As has our whole South Carolina delegation on the Republican side.

They know we’re going to come down on the side of conservatism.  They know we’re going to be very fiscally conservative. They know, on the social issues, most of the Republicans will be…what’s hanging over the country right now are the fiscal matters, the spending, the debt, the deficits, the borrowing, the bailouts, the takeovers.   Everything you’ve seen Washington get involved in in the last three or four years.  We’re up there trying to reverse that trend.  We’re trying to cut spending, rein in deficits and end deficits so we can build surpluses to begin paying back our debt, ending the government takeover of private businesses, ending the government’s involvement in areas that government has no business being involved in.

People that know me, both in Washington and in the state, know that I carry a United States Constitution with me in my pocket as a foundation of my philosophy that government has a role.  Our founders envisioned a central government to handle a certain number of things, very enumerated or spelled out in the Constitution.  Government’s well beyond those original platform…those seventeen enumerated powers in the Constitution.  Trying to rein government and get back closer to those seventeen enumerated powers.  I don’t know that we’ll ever get back to that, but I think I can do my part. We can do our part as conservatives to rein in that size and scope of government.  To try to get close to what our founders envisions.  I think if we’re able to do that, the country will be very successful once again.

I think limited government, free markets and more individual freedoms or individual liberties are the most important things we can strive for.  My son asked me, over the weekend, he’s doing a project, he said, “Dad, what’s the American dream?”  I had to think about that because I know what the American dream is.  I’m living it.  I started my own business. Ran it for sixteen years.  I ran for public office to serve my community.  And I ran for a national office as a United States Congressman to serve my nation.  While also serving my community and my state, I’m serving my nation.  So I’m living the dream, but how do you articulate that?  And it comes down to basically – freedom.

The man should be free to pursue his own stake in life and succeed or fail or his own without the government propping up but without the government getting in the way.  Taking personal responsibility for their actions and inactions, and hopefully, leading to a lifestyle of prosperity for him and his family.  I think that’s what folks around the world when they see America, they see that land of opportunity to do just that.  To pursue what they want to pursue.  To succeed and have a better lifestyle than what they’ve got or what their fathers and mothers have had.

We’ve got to support that as government.  I think that’s government’s role is to support that and allow more freedom and more opportunity.  That’s the American dream.  So I had to articulate and really think about that for him.  And it was interesting. Congressman Gowdy was asked the same question by my son.  He sent an email to all of them…all the freshman members, and Trey responded very similarly.  And I read his quote afterwards.  More about personal freedom, the ability to pursue prosperity and happiness and it all comes down to liberty.

Stay Tuned for Part 2.