For the political and social activists who gathered at UA’s Bryant Conference Center Thursday, there is a bigger political issue facing the state than bingo and health care.
Alabama Citizens for Constitutional Reform, a nonprofit organization devoted to creating a new constitution for Alabama, brought reform-minded Alabamians to Tuscaloosa for its fourth annual Bailey Thomson Awards Luncheon.
The luncheon also honored ACCR’s tenth anniversary.
“This is the largest, most sustained, indigenous civic reform movement in our state,” said David Mathews, a former UA president and CEO of the nonprofit Kettering Foundation.
Mathews praised ACCR’s efforts to promote constitutional reform as a bipartisan issue.
“What you’ve created is a political network that spans the entire state, despite all of the state’s divisions,” he said. “Alabama is good at a lot of things, but none any better than dividing up.”
In 1995 and 2002, Auburn University produced issue books on the government of Alabama.
“In these 15 years, you’ve been able to introduce a new element into Alabama politics,” Mathews said. “[The issue books] provided a context for talking about the constitution.”
The ACCR began in 2000 with a rally at the site of the old state capitol building in Tuscaloosa ten years ago. The organization has grown dramatically in its first decade, conducting a mock constitutional convention in 2009. The focus is not on political expediency, it’s on real, honest reform, Mathews said.
“The rhetoric of politics is always ‘do this and everything’s going to be perfect,’” Mathews said. “Anything we do to improve the state of Alabama is going to cost us something that’s dear to us.”
Mark Berte, ACCR’s grassroots education director, and Hill Carmichael of Greater Birmingham Ministries received the organization’s first-ever Spirit Awards.
Berte produced the documentary “It’s a Thick Book,” and has traveled the state raising awareness for constitutional reform.
Carmichael, whose great-grandfather was one of the 155 men who wrote the 1901 Constitution, founded the Constitution Convention Coalition to campaign for a constitutional convention.
“Everything here today speaks of good news,” he said. “It speaks of bad news for the 1901 Constitution, and it speaks of good news for the people of Alabama.”
Filmmaker Melanie Jeffcoat was awarded the Citizen Educator of the Year Award for her film, “Open Secret.” The film is a re-enactment of the 1901 Constitutional Convention based on the convention’s actual transcripts.
Having grown up in Los Angeles and Las Vegas, Jeffcoat was not aware of the controversies surrounding the constitution when she moved to Birmingham.
“When I moved to Alabama nine years ago and I cast my ballot for the first time,” she said, “I wondered why I was asked to vote on an issue that didn’t matter to me in a county I’d never heard of.”
The Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham was recognized as ACCR’s Partner of the Year. The Community Foundation has supported ACCR with more than $120,000 in grants, said Foundation president Kate Nielsen.
Edgar Gentle, a Birmingham lawyer who filed a lawsuit in 2009 challenging the validity of the 1901 constitution, was awarded the Bailey Thomson Award.
Gentle’s lawsuit alleged the constitution only passed because of massive voter fraud.
“Before the 1901 constitution, there were 100,000 black voters,” Gentle said. “After the 1901 constitution, there were 3500.”
Gentle said constitutional reform is vital for Alabama right now, as the state is at a turning point.
“Alabama is really in political turmoil right now,” he said. “Both parties are really surprised by their candidates for governor, for example.”
A forum on constitutional reform featuring former Gov. Albert Brewer, Lt. Gov. Jim Folsom, Jr., and gubernatorial candidate Dr. Robert Bentley was originally slated to take place before the luncheon, but was cancelled.
