Different views on Thurmond

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defined him elsewhere, Thurmond's

remembered more often at home

for changing with the times.

In his death, in many parts of this country, Strom Thurmond is being remembered for his harsh segregationist views of a bygone era — views that regrettably both reflected and encouraged the prevailing sentiments in his native South Carolina during about two-thirds of Thurmond's life.

Outside of South Carolina, much attention is focused on Thurmond's forceful stand for segregation and the enthusiastic role he played in fighting changes that were not only inevitable but also right. Some of the attention devoted to Thurmond's past is fair, for he was not a Southerner who merely acquiesced to a rigid system of racism built into law and custom. He was its champion at a time when embracing racial prejudice in South Carolina took neither courage nor vision, and when doing the opposite would have ended a political career and ruined one's fortune.

But Thurmond is much more than the caricature presented by headlines such as the one that greeted Friday morning readers of nytimes.com, the online site of The New York Times — "Strom Thurmond, Foe of Integration, Dies at 100."

It would have been greatly preferred that Thurmond had renounced the injustice and wickedness of the racism that gripped the South for generations. An unequivocal public apology may have released other Southerners to follow with their own and promoted the reconciliation that has been so elusive.

But when it was undeniably clear, except to those with the hardest hearts and the most unrealistic longings, that change would come to the South, Thurmond changed. In doing so, he made it easier for others in his home state to change, too.

Thurmond hired black staff members before it was virtually a requirement for a Southern politician. In fact, he made history by being the first member of the Southern congressional delegation to hire a black aide. He worked to get blacks appointed to other important positions, he helped bring federal dollars to towns with black mayors and he treated black constituents with respect and attended to their needs. In return, he won a significant share of the black vote — 22 percent in his last re-election race, which was far more than any South Carolina Republican candidate has received in modern times.

In coming days, Thurmond appropriately will be remembered as an American war hero, a beloved state politician, an entertaining character and a friend to many South Carolinians who needed a favor in Washington. His segregationist past should be remembered, too, but so should his dramatic change that helped his home state change, slowly but surely.