Georgia Report - News Detail Page > Perdue signs repeal of 'Jim Crow' laws

Georgia Report - News Detail Page: "Perdue signs repeal of 'Jim Crow' laws
by Tom Crawford on 4/28/2005

Calling them a “stain on the state of Georgia,” Gov. Sonny Perdue signed four bills Thursday that repeal racially discriminatory laws adopted by white legislators in the 1950s and 1960s in an attempt to stop the integration of schools and public facilities.

“We all know these were intended as a roadblock to full citizen participation in government,” Perdue said during a signing ceremony in his office. “It was the right thing to do to take them off the books . . . it’s part of the process of racial reconciliation in Georgia.”

Most of these “Jim Crow” laws had long since been negated by court rulings, but two legislators have tried for several sessions to expunge them from the state code as well: Rep. Tyrone Brooks, a black Democrat from Atlanta, and Rep. Mike Coan, a white Republican from Lawrenceville.

Coan was unable to attend the bill signing ceremony Thursday morning, but Brooks and Rep. Billy Mitchell (D-Stone Mountain) looked on as Perdue signed the bills.

“This stain has been removed to some extent and this is a step in the right direction,” Brooks said. “It does help move us towards the racial reconciliation we are all seeking. It sends the right message to Georgians.”

The bills include:

* HB 25 repeals a law that authorized the governor to close a college if there was any threat of violence.
* HB 26 repeals a law that authorized the governor to suspend compulsory attendance laws in grades K-12.
* HB 27 repeals a law that allowed the General Assembly to provide tax-funded grants for students to attend private schools.
* HB 372 repeals a law that allowed local school systems to lease buildings to private schools.

Perdue signed legislation last week, HB 244, that is strongly opposed by African-American legislators because it will require voters to show photo identification at the polls, a requirement that critics say will suppress the turnout of black voters.

"It is ironic and significant that the governor signed the infamous HB 244, the most discriminatory voting law in the 21st Century, before he repealed the unenforceable Jim Crow laws,” said Senate Minority Leader Robert Brown (D-Macon), an African-American lawmaker.

“Governor Perdue is preaching reconciliation and peddling the politics of secrecy, exclusion, and division,” Brown said. “He says one thing and does another, but the people of Georgia are not fooled. Ordinary Georgians can see right through the governor’s empty rhetoric.”