Alabama Getaway: The Political Imaginary and the Heart of Dixie

INTRODUCTION

1 Introduction It is the place, promised, that has not yet been. —minnie bruce pratt, “No Place” All he had when he left one bitterly cold morning was enough cash for gas and oil and occasional snacks, a thermos full of coffee, sandwiches Mama had made and wrapped, a road map, a bill of lading, several army blankets, and a kerosene heater on the floorboard. He would be back, he told us, when he got back. And off he went. —paul hemphill, Leaving Birmingham What makes Alabama Alabama? As for its political imaginary— the public shape of power, representation, and possibility that is the subject of Alabama Getaway— how is the state perceived? Is Alabama seen as encased in social amber like an ancient insect, stuck in repetitive loops of uneven development, rife with ol’ boy prejudices and debilitating habits of judgment, dishing out foreclosed futures to its young? Or does its political imaginary lag and belie the state’s active presence in the circulating currents of global capital, manufacturing, biomedical research, military R&D, cultural tourism, and human rights? A turn through modern Alabama history evokes tumultuous memories for an aging generation while introducing the young, via archives of vivid images and sounds, to scenes of rage and murderous white reaction against the African American struggles of the 1950s and 1960s. Tuskegee, Montgomery, Selma, Anniston, Birmingham drew international attention. Notoriety descended upon white political leaders and bloodied the state’s public face. During these years of upheaval, Alabama stridently proclaimed itself the “Heart of Dixie,” a phrase I use throughout Alabama Getaway to designate a retrograde political imaginary, mapped by a constellation of pernicious habits, that remains tenacious, dynamic, at odds with efforts to 2 • introduction extend social justice, and subject to wincing reconfirmation with any morning ’s headlines. During the closing decades of the twentieth century, the Heart of Dixie held official Alabama in thrall, reasserting states’ rights interposition, parading religious self-righteousness and intolerance, defeating efforts at desperately needed tax and constitutional reform, refusing to adequately and equitably fund public education, fouling air and water, and enforcing a punitive regime of criminal justice. The campaign slogan for the successful reelection in 1990 of Primitive Baptist, Republican, preacher-governor Guy Hunt—“Alabama is doing just fine”—became the motto for a state of neglect.1 Against this ingrown retrenchment, black Alabamians pressed a sustained movement for social justice and democratic inclusion—as measured by the impact of civil rights and voting rights legislation, by the number and cumulative effect of black elected and appointed officials in local and state government , and by the displacement of the racist terrortory of violence and intimidation that once haunted everyday life in Alabama and throughout the Deep South.2 Many Alabamians, white and black, have wearied of the state’s reputation as Alabamastan, a proving ground for theocrats, creationists, abortion clinic terrorists , the pistol-packing and trigger-happy, and the punitive hearted.3 Many, but how many? Perhaps the pulse of a new generation will yet beat out of time with the Heart of Dixie, but a 2009 Gallup Poll of political ideology found Alabama the most conservative U.S. state.4 “The old images of Alabama are fading,” touts the Mobile Press Register. “Alabama is a global player.” State officials and business leaders crow over their recruitment of German, Japanese, and Korean auto and steel factories, thanks to hundreds of millions of dollars in Alabama incentives. Investments of other millions by the Retirement Systems of Alabama have reinvigorated the downtowns of Mobile and Montgomery with world-class hotels and office buildings. “The state once known for racial intolerance and rural poverty is gaining recognition as a leader for globalization and free trade.”5 As one of its narrative threads, Alabama Getaway takes notice of the eager imagineering (the strategic marshaling of hype and publicity) of the state as a “global player.” Newly enticed manufacturing outposts soak up Alabama giveaways, but the state’s median income stagnates or loses ground.6 The introduction • 3 hourly wages are good for those who can get them, but industry decisionmaking takes place elsewhere. In Alabama, as Wanda Rushing has observed about capitalist globalization in Memphis, “each new wave of development strategies tends to reproduce old patterns of inequality, generating wealth and power for a few and maintaining the structure of poverty and inequality for many.”7 In the state’s Black Belt region, neither the...