Working together

SOMETHING HAPPENED earlier this month that shouldn’t be worth commenting on but probably is, because it has become all too rare: A Republican elected official and a Democratic elected official — both with a history of being highly partisan — stood up together at a news conference to announce something they had done together to help our state.

The officials were Attorney General Henry McMaster and 6th District U.S. Rep. James Clyburn, and the issue was fighting domestic violence — a topic that certainly deserves attention, since South Carolina leads the nation in the number of women killed by men. Their joint accomplishment was landing a $900,000 federal grant to hire prosecutors to handle criminal domestic violence cases in Chesterfield, Clarendon, Darlington, Dillon, Marion, Marlboro and Williamsburg counties.

There’s nothing extraordinary about Mr. McMaster finding creative ways to make sure batterers are prosecuted; he’s been doing that since taking office. Likewise, there’s nothing extraordinary about Mr. Clyburn (or any member of Congress) working to direct federal money to his district, or even working with state officials of any party to try to get federal assistance to tackle an important state problem — there’s a long tradition of that in South Carolina.

What’s extraordinary was that the two men chose to announce the grant together, and to credit each other for the work, rather than each trying jealously to grab all the credit himself. The grant will very likely be helpful; this spirit of cooperation certainly will be.