Is It Time for a Rewrite?
The
Andalusia Star-News, October 16, 2004
207 Dunson Street, Andalusia, Alabama 36420
(334) 222-2402
http://www.andalusiastarnews.com/articles/2004/10/16/opinion/891opin.txt
By Kim Henderson
The “current” version was written in 1901.
It’s not so current by 2004 standards.
What’s known as Alabama’s highest code of law—the
state’s constitution—to this day carries a plethora of strong racial and
sexist language.
Section 102, which read, “The legislature shall never
pass any law to authorize or legalize any marriage between any white person
and a Negro, or descendant of a Negro,” was stricken down by an amendment
(60 to 40 percent) as late as 2000.
Section 182 is still on the books. It lays out very
specific—some of which are archaic—stipulations as to who cannot vote in
this state.
That section reads: The following persons shall be
disqualified both from registering, and from voting, namely: “All idiots and
insane persons; those who shall by reason of conviction of crime be
disqualified from voting at the time of the ratification of this Constitution;
those who shall be convicted of treason, murder, arson, embezzlement,
malfeasance in office, larceny, receiving stolen property, obtaining property
or money under false pretenses, perjury, subornation of perjury, robbery,
assault with intent to rob, burglary, forgery, bribery, assault and battery on
the wife, bigamy, living in adultery, sodomy, incest, rape, miscegenation
(interracial marriage or union), crime against nature, or any crime punishable
by imprisonment in the penitentiary, or of any infamous crime or crime
involving moral turpitude; also, any person who shall be convicted as a
vagrant or tramp, or of selling or offering to sell his vote or the vote of
another, or of buying or offering to buy the vote of another, or of making or
offering to make a false return in any election by the people or in any
primary election to procure the nomination or election of any person to any
office, or of suborning any witness or registrar to secure the registration of
any person as an elector.”
It sounds like you have to be a saint to vote.
Section 86 is entitled, “Suppression of Dueling.” The
text states: “The legislature shall pass such penal laws as it may deem
expedient to suppress the evil practice of dueling.”
Alabama politics do get heated at times, but I just
can’t picture Governor Riley having to step in and break up a John
Wayne-style brawl outside of the state capitol.
The following language, under Alabama’s Section 177,
belied the rights of women to vote. Entitled, “Age and citizenship
qualifications of electors,” the section states: “Every male citizen of
this state who is a citizen of the United States, and every male resident of
foreign birth, who, before the ratification of this Constitution, shall have
legally declared his intention to become a citizen of the United States,
twenty-one years old or upwards, not laboring under any of the disabilities
named in this article, and possessing the qualifications required by it, shall
be an elector, and shall be entitled to vote at any election by the people;
provided, that all foreigners who have legally declared their intention to
become citizens of the United States, shall, if they fail to become citizens
thereof at the time they are entitled to become such, cease to have the right
to vote until they become such citizens.”
The preceding are a few examples of the long outdated
laws remaining in Alabama’s constitution.
With 287 sections and a whopping 742 amendments,
Alabama’s constitution is the largest state constitution in the United
States.
Framers of the exhaustive Alabama law text met for 52
days before the document was completed.
According to the organization, Alabama Citizens for
Constitutional Reform (ACCR), the legislature spends nearly 50 percent of its
time debating local issues, and over 70 percent of the state’s
constitutional amendments apply to a single city or county.
Along with Amendment 2, seven other amendments will be
presented to voters next month, from issues relating to Trussville and
Crenshaw County to the shrimping industry.
Maybe, just maybe, it’s time to rewrite the entire
document and leave local issues to local voters.
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