[Bama_Alumna]

Bama_Alumna, this is a quote from one of the feedbacks...what does it mean?
Just because you had enough friends to pick you for 31 doesn't mean you can get cocky now.

The XXXI (31) is a very exclusive honorary reserved for the "top" 31 women on campus.


To answer a few other questions...

oftentimes involvement in SGA at Bama is a prerequisite for involvement in political/public life later on

Both of our most recent gubernatorial candidates were once SGA presidents at Alabama. Many other prominent politicians from and in the state of Alabama including Senator Richard Shelby (head of homeland security) were in machine-affiliated fraternities.

someone in the feedback said that the threats, etc. got so bad one year that the school actually banned SGA

There was no SGA at Alabama from 1993-1998 (IIRC) due to an alleged incident involving our current governor's daughter who, although she was a member of a machine-affiliated sorority was not permitted to run for SGA president. She mounted a campaign anyway and some not-so-nice things happened to her. Like I said, this is all "alleged" and no one except the girl in question knows what really happened.

Can you imagine a school like Bama banning the Homecoming Queen?

UA won't cancel Homecoming due to the alumni $$ that comes in as a result of it. Homecoming is a B I G deal. And the alumni want to see the Homecoming queen & all the surrounding celebration. Tradition is an important thing.

it seems like they're putting themselves at risk for a lot of trouble

The Machine won't get "in trouble" because 1) it is very secretive, 2) there are too many powerful people who were/are involved with it, 3) there is no real way to prove it exists.

This is intriguing...how did she win?

The girl in the article (Emily A) who won the senate seat did so without machine backing. But a Senate seat is not really that difficult to win. It's not like an executive office. There may have been only a few people running against her, and she did have a lot of publicity.