Commentary: The A.G.'s Vindictive Fine Collecting

A Greenville, Alabama Confederate Statue, still in place.

     Alabama's Attorney General is on  roll.
     He's collecting fines from cities and municipalities that are trying to correct State history.
     They're removing confederate statues and other memorials...Birmingham first and perhaps Montgomery next, if they change the names of three majority black High Schools named for confederate generals.

     A.G. Steve Marshall is requiring them to pay a $25,000 fine per statue or memento, as required under a misguided 2017 law signed into law by Governor Kay Ivey....who bragged about the law in a TV ad for her election.

     I think it's money well spent. The cities and towns removing those statues will be well served, having cleansed themselves of public displays of "Lost Cause" confederate propaganda.

     So Marshall---and Ivey too--- have to think to themselves: is that how they want to be remembered a century from now? That they fined cities? That they made it difficult for them to remove stone paraphernalia that was erected long after the war as racist calling cards?

     $25k from Birmingham. $25k from Mobile. Maybe $100k from Montgomery?
     And exactly where will those dollars go?
     If he can, could or should Marshall send those dollars to a cause that will balance his confedercause activities? That's likely a decision the legislature has to make, a super-majority Republican body, so no, not likely. In fact they might do just the opposite. Assign the dollars to build a super memorial of some sort with their names in neon.