Strom Thurmond's long-rumored love child stepped out from the shadows this week and ended 78 years of silence.

It was as if William Faulkner had teamed with Flannery O'Connor to pen the grand-daddy of all-time Southern gothic tales -- one of the nation's foremost segregationist politicians had secretly fathered a daughter with a black 16-year-old maid who worked in his parents' home near Edgefield.

In a front page Washington Post story Sunday, Essie Mae Washington-Williams, 78, stated she's the daughter of former U.S. Sen. Strom Thurmond, who died in June at age 100.

To prove her claim, she offered to submit to DNA tests, as well as provide letters and receipts of money that she and the senator had exchanged.

By Monday it was no longer necessary.

Thurmond family members publicly acknowledged what many had suspected privately for over a half-century.

"We have no reason to believe Ms. Williams was not telling the truth," Strom Thurmond Jr. told The State newspaper. "Everyone has a right to know their heritage."

Amen.

A press conference by Williams is being held today in Columbia.

Through her attorneys, Williams says she's not interested in contesting Thurmond's will, in which she's not named.

She's acknowledged that Thurmond has assisted her financially from when she was a teenager until recent years. After having four children, her husband died in 1964 and she has struggled financially. Her attorneys say the cumulative amount of money that Thurmond gave over the years was "substantial" but less than a million dollars.

Williams and Thurmond met dozens of times in South Carolina and in Washington. When he was governor, Thurmond paid for her to attend S.C. State College and even came to Orangeburg in his official car to visit her. When she moved to Los Angeles, he would arrange to visit her -- and grandchildren -- when he was in California.

Rumors surfaced over the years in several publications, but Thurmond and Williams would both say they were merely family friends from the same hometown.

In the end, does it matter what took place 78 years ago between a 22-year-old Clemson graduate and 16-year-old Carrie Butler, both of whom are now dead?

Yes, it does.

Because of who Thurmond became, the offices he was elected to, and what he said and what he did when he held those offices.

No matter how high you may hold the senator in esteem for other actions in serving his country and no matter how distasteful you may find talking about this episode now that he's in the grave.

The facts are, even ol' Strom can't escape history.

Thurmond was one of the nation's most strident segregationists. You can try to explain it away as the political times or "states' rights" or put any kind of spin on it you want, but that's an undeniable fact.

Thurmond fought against civil rights for all black Americans -- including his eldest daughter and her mother.

Yes, Thurmond later changed his ways and embraced integration and he eventually did a lot of good for a lot of people, both black and white. You can't go far in South Carolina and not run into someone he didn't personally help. He employed four members of my immediate family, including myself one summer.

But for nearly eight decades, he never did the one thing he could have done, should have done, while he was still on this earth for Essie Mae Washington-Williams

Publicly, proudly, proclaimed her as his child.

In the 1950s it would have ended his political career, but 10 years ago he would have been applauded for truly having crossed over and accepting responsibility for his and the nation's racist past.

In this father-daughter relationship, Strom was the one who wasn't legitimate.

Dan Huntley