Gov. Mark Sanford gave his fourth "State of the State" address Wednesday night to a joint session of the state House and Senate, saying, "The state of our state is that we are a state in transition."

He talked about the changes in the world that have affected our state, like textile jobs moving to other countries and the fact that 30 percent of all the new jobs created here in the 1990s are no longer here.

He called for a restructuring of state government and reforming the workers compensation system.

He also repeated his earlier calls for a limit on the growth of government spending, asking lawmakers to let voters decide this fall whether to cap increases in state spending to the rate of inflation plus population growth.

"I will live by what the people of South Carolina decide," he told lawmakers. "This is a great way to avoid a lot of fighting and fussing come budget time."

He also talked about the need for property tax relief, but cautioned lawmakers to make sure they didn't pass a tax shift that would put more of a burden on businesses.

"We believe that any swap of sales tax for property tax ought to be revenue neutral, or, for that matter, a tax cut. If in the name of reducing property taxes we in fact raise the tax load on South Carolinians, then I'll be forced to veto the bill," he said.

The governor also called for a cap on college tuition increases, and called for school choice for all parents, "Not just wealthy folks who can afford the right neighborhood that has a good school."

Democratic Senate leader John Land of Manning gave the official Democratic response and was highly critical. "He gave us no leadership," he said.

"He gave us no particulars. He gave us no road map. He talked about property tax cuts, but he didn't tell us in what way. He said you might look at the sales tax exemptions. Which one governor? Help us! Give us your list. He doesn't want to do that because he's running for office and he doesn't want to anger anybody," he said.

Even some members of the governor's own party thought the speech was too vague.

Sen. Luke Rankin, R-Myrtle Beach, said, "Well, I was looking for specifics. You know the property tax relief and the whole concept of tax reform. He mentioned exemptions, but which ones is he talking about?" 

But Spartanburg Sen. Jim Ritchie says, "I think the job of a governor is to lay out broad outlines of the direction we should go, and then set forth those parameters where he believes the legislature should move. And then, within that, it's our prerogative to decide how we spend the money and what programs we fund."

Senate Majority Leader Harvey Peeler, R-Gaffney, said he was particularly impressed with how the governor reached out to so many different people in his speech and predicted warmer relations between the governor and lawmakers.

"Tonight's speech showed me that our governor has matured while in office," he said.

One example might be what the governor ended his speech with.

"About 30 percent of our citizens are African-American, and yet only 10 percent of the judges in our state are African-American. Rightly or wrongly, there is a perception in some parts of our state that at times there are different standards of justice, or, at other times, feelings that our government is not committed to diversity," he said.

He said he didn't believe those perceptions were true, but called on lawmakers to make real efforts this year to increase the number of African-American judges.

Rep. Leon Howard, D-Columbia, has been working toward that for eight years as a member of the Legislative Black Caucus.

He praised Gov. Sanford for hiring more minorities in his administration than even most Democratic governors. But he said the governor seemed timid in making his statement, like he was afraid he might offend members of his own party.

"It seemed that he was afraid to just take a bold step. But that's a little bit better than most of the governors have done in the past in terms of minority judges and increasing the number of African-American judges," Rep. Howard said.