Alabama is still in the Confederacy

[Edric O]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1362581,00.html

On November 2, the citizens of Alabama grudgingly voted to take a step out of the 19th century. A referendum was held on whether to keep or remove a line in the State Constitution that guaranteed "separate schools for white and coloured children". Apparently, the state elders were happily sleeping beneath their pointy white hats when those darn tree-hugging hippies passed all that unamerican commie crap about "civil rights" back in the '60.

The referendum of November 2 was unbelievably close: The anti-segregation side won by a ridiculous 0.13%, which prompted a recount of the votes. The recount was finished yesterday, and yes, it turns out the anti-segregation side really won - but only barely.

As could have been expected, Alabama's Republican Right were busy campaigning for the aryan purity of their schools. But not because of racism - oh, no, it had nothing to do with racism at all! (cough cough) They campaigned against taking segregation out of their constitution because they think it might lead to higher taxes. After all, who cares what happens to some stupid second-class citizens as long as we get to keep our ultra-low taxes, right? Now if only we could abolish taxes altogether, and bring back slavery and the Confederacy... ah, those were the days!

But this is not the first time that Alabama's wholesome conservative values have taken a blow at the hands of those filthy evil socialist traitors. Just 4 years ago, they voted to legalize interracial marriage! Imagine that! Now whites and blacks can actually marry at will! The horror, the horror...

Warning: The above post contained a heavy dose of sarcasm and should not have been read by underage emprworms.

[Acriku]

It apparently didn't have any effect by being there, if the state were to be in accordance with federal law, so I don't see why they would vote to keep it in there. The higher taxes doesn't even make sense to me.

This brings up something that I've thought about for a while. If the leaders in the '60s had their schools segregated, but truly equal, then we'd likely still be segregated to this day. The only reason why segregation was looked down upon was because it wasn't equal segregation, it was rather unequal, so would the civil rights leaders have had as much success had the schools been truly separate but equal?

[Edric O]

It apparently didn't have any effect by being there, if the state were to be in accordance with federal law, so I don't see why they would vote to keep it in there.

Well, it's not the law itself that makes this news interesting (since it was probably not enforced) - it's the fact that so many people voted to keep it!

The higher taxes doesn't even make sense to me.

That argument doesn't make sense to me either, but as one of the local people said:

"In Alabama, if an opponent can label a policy as a tax, then 99 times out of 100 the policy fails."

[Edric O]

This brings up something that I've thought about for a while. If the leaders in the '60s had their schools segregated, but truly equal, then we'd likely still be segregated to this day. The only reason why segregation was looked down upon was because it wasn't equal segregation, it was rather unequal, so would the civil rights leaders have had as much success had the schools been truly separate but equal?

Truly equal segregation would be damn near impossible to implement in practice, and even harder to maintain for any significant period of time. You'd have to make sure that black schools are essentially identical to white schools, and somehow get the teachers to be identical too. And, of course, the mere fact that education is segregated would encourage racist and discriminative attitudes and policies, which you'd have a very hard time rooting out.

But if we assume, for the sake of the argument, a situation in which you have truly equal segregated schools, then yes, the civil rights movement would be a lot less militant, and it would make much more modest demands.

As a general rule, the greater the oppression, the greater the strength of the liberation movement.

[ordos45]

What can one say, the South still dreams of the good ole days without Yank rule.  One commentator remarked that Bush had won the Confederacy, and Kerry won the Union. 

Heck, desgregation would never have worked had Eisenhower not enforced it with the military.  It's sad that we had to give people their civil rights, and enforce those rights at the point of the bayonet.