MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) - Fifty years after the U.S. Supreme Court decision outlawing school segregation, an Alabama law mandating racially separate classrooms is still on the books.
Gov. Bob Riley and others concerned about the state's image are urging voters to approve a constitutional amendment on Nov. 2 to strike the long-unenforceable language from the state constitution. They say such laws are a painful reminder of the South's divisive past, and make Alabama look bad when it comes to drawing in new businesses.
But the amendment ballot has opponents, including former Chief Justice Roy Moore, who is suspicious of possible hidden agenda: a huge tax increase.
"This is the most deceptive piece of legislation I have ever seen and it is simply a fraud on the people of Alabama," said Moore, best known for his refusal to remove his Ten Commandments monument from the state judicial building.
The panel recommended cleaning out the now-unenforceable Jim Crow language: a requirement for separate schools "for white and colored children," and poll taxes, designed to keep blacks from voting. The segregated schools language became unenforceable in 1954, when the Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education decision unanimously ruled that "separate but equal" schools were unconstitutional.
The 24th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution outlawed poll taxes in federal elections in 1964, and a U.S. Supreme Court decision two years later did the same for state and federal elections.
http://www.wjla.com/news/stories/1004/179945.html
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