When David Wilkins made up his mind to run for speaker of the House, he took a walk that had an indelible impact on South Carolina’s political course.

Ten years ago this December, Wilkins strode down the hall of the Blatt Building on the State House grounds to tell Speaker Bob Sheheen, D-Kershaw, that he was going to challenge him for the top job in the House.

Wilkins’ Republican Party had just picked up eight House seats in that month’s election, bringing them within two votes of their first House majority in 116 years.

Down a few votes, with no guarantee of success, Wilkins put his political future on the line.

“I thought I was going to get beat, but I knew I had to do it,” says Wilkins, now 57.

Wilkins won, by building a coalition of Republicans and Democrats looking for a change. He has been winning ever since, succeeding in directing state policy and building power — both his and that of the Republican Party.

But now, when Wilkins should be at his political peak — with the Republicans in charge of the House, Senate and governor’s office — the man credited as much as any with building that GOP dominance is finding the path not as smooth as he had hoped.

MILESTONE

Barring an unprecedented political upset, Wilkins will be re-elected to his 13th term in the House in early November and then will be re-elected speaker of the S.C. House of Representatives later that month.

Hitting the 10-year mark as speaker is a milestone that only two other men in South Carolina history have managed.

In his decade of holding the gavel and wearing the speaker’s purple robe, Wilkins has led the House and, some say, South Carolina, through fierce fights in a state with a long history of fierce fights.

Along the way, Wilkins has won the adoration of his supporters, the respect of most opponents, and has positioned himself to join the array of legendary S.C. figures.

Ten years as speaker might not seem like such a long stretch in a state famous for Strom Thurmond’s 48 years and Fritz Hollings’ 38 years in the U.S. Senate. Wilkins’ decade in charge of the House is still less than a third of the 31-year tenure of legendary House Speaker Sol Blatt.

But Wilkins’ tenure is remarkable not only for its length, but also for the crises he has led the state through: the excruciating fight to lower the Confederate flag and the banning of video poker.

FLAG FIGHT

The Confederate flag had been a controversial issue for decades. Supporters say that the flag represents heritage and honor; critics say that it is a racist banner meant to intimidate.

Wilkins was, at first, a reluctant flag warrior. He had supported keeping it atop the State House in 1996 when then-Gov. David Beasley made an ultimately failed attempt to lower it.

By 1999, Beasley had lost re-election, Republicans were reeling and Wilkins was the state’s top-ranking Republican.

It was an odd time for him to take on the flag, an issue that drew most of its support from Republican ranks. But through a “slow evolution,” Wilkins says, he came to realize that the flag was hurting the state.

The NAACP was threatening an economic boycott over the flag; the business community was nervous about the boycott’s effects on economic development.

With the Republicans hosting a high-profile presidential primary in 2000, the national media glommed onto the flag as a hot story. The state’s reputation took a national beating. Network TV crews set up at the State House, the flag on the dome in their backdrops.

“The more we hesitated to do something about it, the more we allowed people outside our state to define who we were,” he says.

“It became, in my mind, a necessity to deal with it in an honorable fashion, a dignified fashion.”

In what colleagues say is typical Wilkins fashion, he started slowly, talking with individual legislators, then two or three at a time. Eventually, word spread.

At the time, the Confederate flag was not only atop the dome, it also was displayed in a position of honor in the House and Senate chambers.

In the House, the speaker has the right to move or remove pictures, flags and decorations in the chamber. Wilkins says he considered unilaterally moving the flag from the chamber.

He approached some black leaders to offer to take the flag out of the House if they could convince the NAACP to end the boycott.

Wilkins remembers traveling alone late one night to a black funeral home for a secret meeting to discuss that possibility.

“I didn’t tell anybody that I was going,” Wilkins says.

Ultimately, that effort failed, but Wilkins kept working.

The response around the state was often harsh.

Wilkins introduced then-Gov. George W. Bush of Texas at a campaign rally in West Columbia as pro-flag protesters outside carried signs that read, “Dump Wilkins.”

“I remember Bush saying, ‘Nice signs!’” Wilkins says.

Flag supporters targeted Wilkins as a “turncoat.” They vowed to defeat him. He and his wife, Susan, were threatened. His law office was picketed.

Wilkins supported a compromise that would remove the flag from both chambers, take the flag off the dome and place it at the Confederate Soldier Monument on the State House grounds.

Then came the pivotal moment. The bill came to the floor of the House. Emotions were high. Flag supporters in the House tried everything to block the bill. They proposed more than 100 amendments. They tried procedural motions to kill the bill.

When the amendments were dispatched, Wilkins took to the floor of the House to address anxious and tired members.

From the floor, he urged his colleagues to support the bill.

“No matter how long we serve together, we’ll probably never face another moment like we face right now,” Wilkins said.

“But I’m simply not going to be bullied anymore. Not by anyone. The time is here. It’s time for us to take a stand.”

USC historian Walter Edgar, who watched the debate live, says Wilkins “remained calm and poised. He let opponents have their say but clearly was in control of the chamber.

“When the vote was taken,” Edgar says, “the legislation passed and South Carolina was able to put behind it a divisive period in its history.”

Edgar says Wilkins displayed “stalwart courage, legislative acumen and superb leadership.”

Before that moment, Wilkins’ future was in doubt. Critics questioned his ability to hold the Republican caucus together, so split was it on this issue. Democrats printed invitations to celebrate their seemingly inevitable recapturing of the House.

“People forget that in 1999, we were three or four votes from losing the majority,” says House Majority Leader Rick Quinn, R-Richland. Today, the Republicans enjoy a 75-49 margin. “I credit him with bringing everybody together and getting an agenda that everybody could invest in.”

Wilkins’ power and respect only grew from that moment on.

“The fact that he has been able to hold together a coalition over 10 years and still be unchallenged in his leadership is pretty significant,” says former Gov. Jim Hodges, a Democrat.

FRUSTRATIONS

That is what makes these past two years so frustrating for Wilkins.

When Gov. Mark Sanford was elected in 2002, it marked another turning point for the state — Republicans controlled the House, Senate and governor’s office for the first time since Reconstruction.

The Democratic Party was in disarray. Republicans had a firm grip on the state. Wilkins, and most Republicans, expected this new Republican machine to cruise.

But that optimism quickly faded during the 2003 legislative session, when the House, Senate and governor failed to find a rhythm together.

It was just Sanford’s learning curve, everyone seemed to agree.

But the 2004 session was possibly worse. Wilkins, Sanford and Senate Majority Leader Hugh Leatherman, R-Florence, openly disagreed with each other.

The situation hit a new low when Sanford appeared outside the House chambers carrying two live pigs. Sanford called House leaders pork barrel-spenders uninterested in the kind of true change he was pushing.

Wilkins was incensed and blasted Sanford in the media. Their relationship has been cool, at best, ever since.

Working with Sanford, Wilkins says, has been “disappointing” and “more difficult than I thought it would be.”

Wilkins felt betrayed by the pig stunt. The House had passed nearly every Sanford legislative priority and included $53 million in tax relief in the state budget.

“But we get tagged as being big spenders,” Wilkins says.

Sanford says it was nothing personal, adding that he warned Wilkins.

Before the House voted to override 105 of 106 gubernatorial budget vetoes, Sanford says he met with Wilkins and urged him not to do it. Sanford viewed his vetoes as an attempt to kill unnecessary state spending.

“I said, ‘If you do this, you’re making a mistake,’” Sanford says. “’You’re leaving me with no avenue but to find some more visible way to illustrate this.’”

“I do not recall him making any threat for any kind of public demonstration,” Wilkins says. “I do recall him saying that next year he would not be restrained.”

What Wilkins also remembers is the House being “the one body that has worked for” Sanford.

“Many of us were bewildered by the pigs showing up on our door step,” Wilkins says.

But Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell, R-Charleston, says Wilkins made a mistake in rushing the vetoes.

“It created a perception that they were just going to roll over those vetoes and do it very quickly,” McConnell says. “And I say this with all due respect, but I think it was a mistake to handle the vetoes that way.”

Despite the pig incident, Sanford praises Wilkins as a man of principle who keeps his word.

“He’s a person who can deliver,” Sanford says.

SPEAKER’S INFLUENCE

Wilkins has been delivering for 10 years. Being speaker gives him a definite advantage in that sense; the office carries power.

“I fully realize that being the speaker gives you some real inherent influence,” Wilkins says. “I also think it’s what you make of it while you’re there.”

The House, he says, is set up for the speaker to be a strong leader, “and if he’s not, it’s his fault.”

But how that power is used, and the kind of person that uses it, determines a speaker’s success, says Dwight Drake, a lobbyist who has worked at the State House in some capacity since John West was governor in 1971.

“There’s a fundamental sense of fairness with David,” says Drake, a Democrat. “You’ll hear the Democratic (House) members complain that they’re run over by the Republican majority, but it’s because the Republicans have more votes.

“I don’t hear them complain that the speaker runs over them.”

That is true, says Rep. Leon Howard, D-Richland.

Wilkins “has made a tremendous effort to reach out across party lines and work with both sides of the aisle,” Howard says, adding that he and Wilkins “disagree on a whole lot.”

Howard came to the House the same year Wilkins became speaker. With a new majority, Howard says, “a lot of the young Republicans were like kids with loaded guns,” looking to fight early and often.

“But Wilkins has done a good job in kind of calming them down,” Howard says.

That is one of the struggles of the position, Wilkins says, balancing the roles of speaker of the entire House and de facto leader of the House Republican caucus.

“The speaker’s job is to lead the House,” Wilkins says. “That’s the first job.”

At the same time, Wilkins is a proud Republican.

“There are times when I have very strongly pushed the Republican agenda, and I’m proud of that,” Wilkins says.

Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter, D-Orangeburg, says Wilkins often has pushed too hard.

“When he really wants something, and wants it badly,” she says, “I have seen him hunker down and send word out to his troops, and it happens.”

At other times, Wilkins has claimed he can’t control the Republicans, she says, when “it’s a controversial issue or is politically sticky, and he doesn’t want to get involved.”

Cobb-Hunter would like Wilkins to use his power to build diversity in boards and commissions, as well as the judiciary.

When the lone black member of the MUSC board was challenged in 2002 by a white man with no experience, the white man won the vote in the Legislature because he was a Republican, Cobb-Hunter says. Wilkins could have stepped in and kept the sliver of diversity on the board, she says.

“I’d like to see him do more in straying away a bit from the party line and doing more things because it’s the right thing to do,” she says. “I’d like to see him use a little more of his political capital.”

‘I OUGHT TO LEAD’

Wilkins’ political capital may be more needed in dealing with his greatest challenge of the future: working with Sanford.

Both men are hopeful their relationship will improve.

Sanford says the two have promised to share a beer at the beach — at Wilkins’ place at Pawleys Island, or at Sanford’s place at Sullivan’s Island — before the summer is over.

Wilkins hopes they can make that work, for the future of the state. But he will not take that, or anything else, for granted.

“As soon as I do, I will lose it,” Wilkins says.

Instead, he says he will do what he has always done — work hard, try to be fair and serve the House in a manner in which it deserves.

“I ought to lead,” Wilkins says. “If I don’t lead, I’m doing a disservice to the House, to the members. That’s my job and they expect me to do it.”

Reach Gould Sheinin at (803) 771-8658 or asheinin@thestate.com