(We dare defend our rights)
, anthem = "
Alabama
(We dare defend our rights)
, anthem = "Alabama (state song), Alabama"
, image_map = Alabama in United States.svg
, seat = Montgomery, Alabama, Montgomery
, LargestCity = Huntsville, Alabama, Huntsville
, LargestCounty = Baldwin County, Al ...
"
, image_map = Alabama in United States.svg
, seat =
Montgomery
, LargestCity =
Huntsville
Huntsville is a city in Madison County, Limestone County, and Morgan County, Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Madison County. Located in the Appalachian region of northern Alabama, Huntsville is the most populous city in th ...
, LargestCounty =
Baldwin County
, LargestMetro =
Greater Birmingham
, area_total_km2 = 135,765
, area_total_sq_mi = 52,419
, area_land_km2 = 131,426
, area_land_sq_mi = 50,744
, area_water_km2 = 4,338
, area_water_sq_mi = 1,675
, area_water_percent = 3.2
, area_rank = 30th
, length_km = 531
, length_mi = 330
, width_km = 305
, width_mi = 190
, Latitude = 30°11' N to 35° N
, Longitude = 84°53' W to 88°28' W
, elevation_m = 150
, elevation_ft = 500
, elevation_max_m = 735.5
, elevation_max_ft = 2,413
, elevation_max_point =
Mount Cheaha
Cheaha Mountain , often called Mount Cheaha, is the highest natural point in the U.S. state of Alabama. It is located a few miles northwest of the town of Delta in Cheaha State Park, which offers a lodge, a restaurant, and other amenities.
Descr ...
, elevation_min_m = 0
, elevation_min_ft = 0
, elevation_min_point =
Gulf of Mexico
The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an oceanic basin, ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of ...
[
, OfficialLang = ]English
English usually refers to:
* English language
* English people
English may also refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England
** English national ide ...
, Languages =
* English 95.1%
* Spanish 3.1%
, population_demonyms = Alabamian, Alabaman
, population_as_of = 2021
, population_rank = 24th
, 2010Pop = 5,039,877
, MedianHouseholdIncome = $
, 2010DensityUS = 99.1
, 2010Density = 38.4
, population_density_rank = 27th
, IncomeRank = 46th
, Former = Alabama Territory
, AdmittanceDate = December 14, 1819
, AdmittanceOrder = 22nd
, Governor = Kay Ivey
Kay Ellen Ivey (born October 15, 1944) is an American politician serving as the 54th and incumbent governor of Alabama since 2017. Originally a conservative Southern Democrat, Ivey became a member of the Republican Party in 2002. She was the 38t ...
( R)
, Lieutenant Governor = Will Ainsworth
Will Ainsworth (born March 22, 1981) is an American politician serving who is the 31st lieutenant governor of Alabama, since 2019. He formerly was a representative of the 27th district of the Alabama House of Representatives, a position he was el ...
(R)
, Legislature = Alabama Legislature
The Alabama Legislature is the legislative branch of the state government of Alabama. It is a bicameral body composed of the House of Representatives and Senate. It is one of the few state legislatures in which members of both chambers serv ...
, Upperhouse = Senate
A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
, Lowerhouse = House of Representatives
House of Representatives is the name of legislative bodies in many countries and sub-national entitles. In many countries, the House of Representatives is the lower house of a bicameral legislature, with the corresponding upper house often c ...
, Judiciary = Supreme Court of Alabama
The Supreme Court of Alabama is the highest court in the state of Alabama. The court consists of a chief justice and eight associate justices. Each justice is elected in partisan elections for staggered six-year terms. The Supreme Court is house ...
, Senators = Richard Shelby
Richard Craig Shelby (born May 6, 1934) is an American lawyer and politician serving as the senior United States senator from Alabama. First elected to the U.S. Senate in 1986 as a Democrat who later switched to the Republican Party in 1994, h ...
(R)Tommy Tuberville
Thomas Hawley Tuberville ( ; born September 18, 1954) is an American retired college football coach and politician serving as the junior United States senator from Alabama since 2021. Before entering politics, Tuberville was the head football co ...
(R)
, Representative = 6 Republicans1 Democrat
, timezone1 = Central
Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object.
Central may also refer to:
Directions and generalised locations
* Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known as ...
, utc_offset1 = −06:00
, timezone1_DST = CDT
, utc_offset1_DST = −05:00
, timezone1_location = entire state (legally)
, timezone2 = Eastern
Eastern may refer to:
Transportation
*China Eastern Airlines, a current Chinese airline based in Shanghai
*Eastern Air, former name of Zambia Skyways
*Eastern Air Lines, a defunct American airline that operated from 1926 to 1991
*Eastern Air Li ...
, utc_offset2 = −05:00
, timezone2_DST = EDT
, utc_offset2_DST = −04:00
, timezone2_location = Phenix City
Phenix City is a city in Lee and Russell counties in the U.S. state of Alabama, and the county seat of Russell County. As of the 2020 Census, the population of the city was 38,817.
Phenix City lies immediately west across the Chattahoochee ...
area (unofficially)
, iso_code = US-AL
, postal_code = AL
, TradAbbreviation = Ala.
, website = alabama.gov
, Capital =
, Representatives =
, population_demonym = Alabamian, Alabaman
Alabama () is a state
State may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Literature
* ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State
* ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States
* ''Our S ...
in the Southeastern
The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each se ...
region of the United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
, bordered by Tennessee
Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...
to the north; Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States
Georgia may also refer to:
Places
Historical states and entities
* Related to the ...
to the east; Florida
Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...
and the Gulf of Mexico
The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an oceanic basin, ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of ...
to the south; and Mississippi
Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...
to the west. Alabama is the 30th largest by area and the 24th-most populous of the U.S. states
In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...
. With a total of of inland waterway
A body of water, such as a river, canal or lake, is navigable if it is deep, wide and calm enough for a water vessel (e.g. boats) to pass safely. Such a navigable water is called a ''waterway'', and is preferably with few obstructions against dir ...
s, Alabama has among the most of any state.
Alabama is nicknamed the ''Yellowhammer
The yellowhammer (''Emberiza citrinella'') is a passerine bird in the bunting family that is native to Eurasia and has been introduced to New Zealand and Australia. Most European birds remain in the breeding range year-round, but the eastern ...
State'', after the state bird. Alabama is also known as the "Heart of Dixie
Dixie, also known as Dixieland or Dixie's Land, is a nickname for all or part of the Southern United States. While there is no official definition of this region (and the included areas shift over the years), or the extent of the area it cover ...
" and the "Cotton State". The state tree
This is a list of U.S. state, federal district, and territory trees, including official trees of the following of the states, of the federal district, and of the territories.
Table
See also
* List of U.S. state, district, and territorial insign ...
is the longleaf pine
The longleaf pine (''Pinus palustris'') is a pine species native to the Southeastern United States, found along the coastal plain from East Texas to southern Virginia, extending into northern and central Florida. In this area it is also known as ...
, and the state flower
This is a list of U.S. state, federal district, and territory flowers.
See also
*List of U.S. state trees
* Lists of U.S. state insignia
References
External linksList of state flowers
{{USStateLists
*
U.S. state flowers
Flowers
...
is the camellia
''Camellia'' (pronounced or ) is a genus of flowering plants in the family Theaceae. They are found in eastern and southern Asia, from the Himalayas east to Japan and Indonesia. There are more than 220 described species, with some controversy ...
. Alabama's capital is Montgomery, and its largest city by population and area is Huntsville
Huntsville is a city in Madison County, Limestone County, and Morgan County, Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Madison County. Located in the Appalachian region of northern Alabama, Huntsville is the most populous city in th ...
. Its oldest city is Mobile
Mobile may refer to:
Places
* Mobile, Alabama, a U.S. port city
* Mobile County, Alabama
* Mobile, Arizona, a small town near Phoenix, U.S.
* Mobile, Newfoundland and Labrador
Arts, entertainment, and media Music Groups and labels
* Mobile ( ...
, founded by French colonists in 1702 as the capital of French Louisiana
The term French Louisiana refers to two distinct regions:
* first, to Louisiana (New France), colonial French Louisiana, comprising the massive, middle section of North America claimed by Early Modern France, France during the 17th and 18th centu ...
. Greater Birmingham is Alabama's largest metropolitan area and its economic center.
Originally home to many native tribes, present-day Alabama was a Spanish territory beginning in the sixteenth century until the French acquired it in the early eighteenth century. The British won the territory in 1763 until losing it in the American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
. Spain held Mobile as part of Spanish West Florida
Spanish West Florida (Spanish: ''Florida Occidental'') was a province of the Spanish Empire from 1783 until 1821, when both it and East Florida were ceded to the United States.
The region of West Florida initially had the same borders as the ers ...
until 1813. In December 1819, Alabama was recognized as a state. During the antebellum period, Alabama was a major producer of cotton, and widely used African American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...
slave
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
labor. In 1861, the state seceded from the United States to become part of the Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America (CSA), commonly referred to as the Confederate States or the Confederacy was an unrecognized breakaway republic in the Southern United States that existed from February 8, 1861, to May 9, 1865. The Confeder ...
, with Montgomery acting as its first capital, and rejoined the Union in 1868. Following the American Civil War
The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...
, Alabama would suffer decades of economic hardship, in part due to agriculture
Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to ...
and a few cash crops
A cash crop or profit crop is an agricultural crop which is grown to sell for profit. It is typically purchased by parties separate from a farm. The term is used to differentiate marketed crops from staple crop (or "subsistence crop") in subsist ...
being the main driver of the states economy. Similar to other former slave states, Alabamian legislators employed Jim Crow laws
The Jim Crow laws were state and local laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States. Other areas of the United States were affected by formal and informal policies of segregation as well, but many states outside the Sout ...
which disenfranchised and discriminated against African Americans and also Alabama's French Creole population from the late 19th century up until the 1960s.
In the early 20th century, despite the growth of major industries and urban centers, white
White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White on ...
rural interests dominated the state legislature through the mid-20th century. During this time, urban interests and African Americans were markedly under-represented. High-profile events such as the Selma to Montgomery march
The Selma to Montgomery marches were three protest marches, held in 1965, along the 54-mile (87 km) highway from Selma, Alabama, to the state capital of Montgomery. The marches were organized by nonviolent activists to demonstrate the ...
made the state a major focal point of the civil rights movement
The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...
in the 1950s and 1960s. During and after World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, Alabama grew as the state's economy diversified with new industries. NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research.
NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...
's Marshall Space Flight Center
The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC), located in Redstone Arsenal, Alabama (Huntsville postal address), is the U.S. government's civilian rocketry and spacecraft propulsion research center. As the largest NASA center, MSFC's first ...
in Huntsville
Huntsville is a city in Madison County, Limestone County, and Morgan County, Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Madison County. Located in the Appalachian region of northern Alabama, Huntsville is the most populous city in th ...
would help Alabama's economic growth in the mid-to-late 20th century, by developing an aerospace
Aerospace is a term used to collectively refer to the atmosphere and outer space. Aerospace activity is very diverse, with a multitude of commercial, industrial and military applications. Aerospace engineering consists of aeronautics and astrona ...
industry. Alabama's economy in the 21st century is based on automotive, finance, tourism, manufacturing, aerospace, mineral extraction, healthcare, education, retail, and technology.
The state's geography is diverse, with the north dominated by the mountainous Tennessee Valley
The Tennessee Valley is the drainage basin of the Tennessee River and is largely within the U.S. state of Tennessee. It stretches from southwest Kentucky to north Alabama and from northeast Mississippi to the mountains of Virginia and North Car ...
and the south by Mobile Bay
Mobile Bay ( ) is a shallow inlet of the Gulf of Mexico, lying within the state of Alabama in the United States. Its mouth is formed by the Fort Morgan Peninsula on the eastern side and Dauphin Island, a barrier island on the western side. The ...
, a historically significant port. Politically, as part of the Deep South
The Deep South or the Lower South is a cultural and geographic subregion in the Southern United States. The term was first used to describe the states most dependent on plantations and slavery prior to the American Civil War. Following the war ...
, Alabama is predominantly a conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
state, and is known for its Southern culture
The culture of the Southern United States, Southern culture, or Southern heritage, is a subculture of the United States. The combination of its unique history and the fact that many Southerners maintain—and even nurture—an identity separate f ...
. Within Alabama, American football
American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...
, particularly at the college
A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offering ...
level at schools such as the University of Alabama
The University of Alabama (informally known as Alabama, UA, or Bama) is a Public university, public research university in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Established in 1820 and opened to students in 1831, the University of Alabama is the oldest and la ...
, Auburn University
Auburn University (AU or Auburn) is a public land-grant research university in Auburn, Alabama. With more than 24,600 undergraduate students and a total enrollment of more than 30,000 with 1,330 faculty members, Auburn is the second largest uni ...
, Alabama A&M University
Alabama Agricultural and Mechanical University (Alabama A&M) is a public historically black land-grant university in Normal, Huntsville, Alabama. Founded in 1875, it took its present name in 1969. AAMU is a member-school of the Thurgood Marsha ...
, Alabama State University
Alabama State University (ASU) is a public historically black university in Montgomery, Alabama. Founded in 1867, ASU is a member-school of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund.
History
Alabama State University was founded in 1867 as the Lin ...
, Troy University
Troy University is a public university in Troy, Alabama. It was founded in 1887 as Troy State Normal School within the Alabama State University System, and is now the flagship university of the Troy University System. Troy University is accredi ...
, the University of South Alabama
The University of South Alabama (USA) is a public research university in Mobile, Alabama. It was created by the Alabama Legislature in May, 1963, and replaced existing extension programs operated in Mobile by the University of Alabama. The first ...
, and Jacksonville State University
Jacksonville State University (JSU) is a public university in Jacksonville, Alabama. Founded in 1883, Jacksonville State offers programs of study in six academic schools leading to bachelor's degree, bachelor's, master's degree, master's, educati ...
, plays a major part of the state's culture.
Etymology
The European-American naming of the Alabama River
The Alabama River, in the U.S. state of Alabama, is formed by the Tallapoosa and Coosa rivers, which unite about north of Montgomery, near the town of Wetumpka.
The river flows west to Selma, then southwest until, about from Mobile, it un ...
and state was derived from the Alabama people
The Alabama or Alibamu ( akz, Albaamaha) are a Southeastern culture people of Native Americans, originally from Alabama. They were members of the Muscogee Creek Confederacy, a loose trade and military organization of autonomous towns; their home ...
, a Muskogean-speaking tribe whose members lived just below the confluence
In geography, a confluence (also: ''conflux'') occurs where two or more flowing bodies of water join to form a single channel. A confluence can occur in several configurations: at the point where a tributary joins a larger river (main stem); o ...
of the Coosa and Tallapoosa rivers on the upper reaches of the river. In the Alabama language
Alabama (also known as Alibamu) is a Native American language, spoken by the Alabama-Coushatta tribe of Texas. It was once spoken by the Alabama-Quassarte Tribal Town of Oklahoma, but there are no more Alabama speakers in Oklahoma. It is a Mus ...
, the word for a person of Alabama lineage is (or variously or in different dialects; the plural form is ). The word's spelling varies significantly among historical sources. The first usage appears in three accounts of the Hernando de Soto
Hernando de Soto (; ; 1500 – 21 May, 1542) was a Spanish explorer and '' conquistador'' who was involved in expeditions in Nicaragua and the Yucatan Peninsula. He played an important role in Francisco Pizarro's conquest of the Inca Empire ...
expedition of 1540: Garcilaso de la Vega used , while the Knight of Elvas and Rodrigo Ranjel wrote ''Alibamu'' and ''Limamu'', respectively, in transliteration
Transliteration is a type of conversion of a text from one writing system, script to another that involves swapping Letter (alphabet), letters (thus ''wikt:trans-#Prefix, trans-'' + ''wikt:littera#Latin, liter-'') in predictable ways, such as ...
s of the term. As early as 1702, the French called the tribe the , with French maps identifying the river as . Other spellings of the name have included ''Alibamu'', ''Alabamo'', ''Albama'', ''Alebamon'', ''Alibama'', ''Alibamou'', ''Alabamu'', ''Allibamou''. and possibly ''Alabahmu''. The use of state names derived from Native American languages
Over a thousand indigenous languages are spoken by the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. These languages cannot all be demonstrated to be related to each other and are classified into a hundred or so language families (including a large numbe ...
is common in the U.S.; an estimated 27 states have names of Native American origin.
Sources disagree on the word's meaning. Some scholars suggest the word comes from the Choctaw (meaning 'plants' or 'weeds') and (meaning 'to cut', 'to trim', or 'to gather'). The meaning may have been 'clearers of the thicket' or 'herb gatherers', referring to clearing land for cultivation or collecting medicinal plants. The state has numerous place names of Native American origin. However, there are no correspondingly similar words in the Alabama language.
An 1842 article in the ''Jacksonville Republican'' proposed it meant 'Here We Rest'. This notion was popularized in the 1850s through the writings of Alexander Beaufort Meek
Alexander Beaufort Meek (July 17, 1814 (Columbia, South Carolina) – November 1, 1865 (Columbus, Mississippi) was an American politician, lawyer, judge, and chess player. He also was a writer of historical and literary essays, and poetry. He serv ...
. Experts in the Muskogean languages have not found any evidence to support such a translation.
History
Pre-European settlement
Indigenous peoples
Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...
of varying cultures lived in the area for thousands of years before the advent of European colonization. Trade with the northeastern tribes by the Ohio River
The Ohio River is a long river in the United States. It is located at the boundary of the Midwestern and Southern United States, flowing southwesterly from western Pennsylvania to its mouth on the Mississippi River at the southern tip of Illino ...
began during the Burial Mound Period (1000BCE700CE) and continued until European contact.
The agrarian Mississippian culture
The Mississippian culture was a Native Americans in the United States, Native American civilization that flourished in what is now the Midwestern United States, Midwestern, Eastern United States, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from appr ...
covered most of the state from 1000 to 1600 CE, with one of its major centers built at what is now the Moundville Archaeological Site
Moundville Archaeological Site, also known as the Moundville Archaeological Park, is a Mississippian culture archaeological site on the Black Warrior River in Hale County, near the modern city of Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Extensive archaeological inv ...
in Moundville, Alabama
Moundville is a town in Hale and Tuscaloosa counties in the U.S. state of Alabama. It was incorporated on December 22, 1908. From its incorporation until the 1970 census, it was wholly within Hale County. At the 2010 census the population was 2 ...
. This is the second-largest complex of the classic Middle Mississippian era, after Cahokia
The Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site ( 11 MS 2) is the site of a pre-Columbian Native American city (which existed 1050–1350 CE) directly across the Mississippi River from modern St. Louis, Missouri. This historic park lies in south-w ...
in present-day Illinois
Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...
, which was the center of the culture. Analysis of artifacts from archaeological
Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...
excavations at Moundville were the basis of scholars' formulating the characteristics of the Southeastern Ceremonial Complex
The Southeastern Ceremonial Complex (formerly the Southern Cult), aka S.E.C.C., is the name given to the regional stylistic similarity of artifacts, iconography, ceremonies, and mythology of the Mississippian culture. It coincided with their ado ...
(SECC). Contrary to popular belief, the SECC appears to have no direct links to Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica is a historical region and cultural area in southern North America and most of Central America. It extends from approximately central Mexico through Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and northern Costa Rica. W ...
n culture but developed independently. The Ceremonial Complex represents a major component of the religion of the Mississippian peoples; it is one of the primary means by which their religion is understood.
Among the historical tribes of Native American people living in present-day Alabama at the time of European contact were the Cherokee
The Cherokee (; chr, ᎠᏂᏴᏫᏯᎢ, translit=Aniyvwiyaʔi or Anigiduwagi, or chr, ᏣᎳᎩ, links=no, translit=Tsalagi) are one of the indigenous peoples of the Southeastern Woodlands of the United States. Prior to the 18th century, t ...
, an Iroquoian language
The Iroquoian languages are a language family of indigenous peoples of North America. They are known for their general lack of labial consonants. The Iroquoian languages are polysynthetic and head-marking.
As of 2020, all surviving Iroquoian ...
people; and the Muskogean-speaking Alabama (''Alibamu''), Chickasaw
The Chickasaw ( ) are an indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands. Their traditional territory was in the Southeastern United States of Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee as well in southwestern Kentucky. Their language is classified as ...
, Choctaw
The Choctaw (in the Choctaw language, Chahta) are a Native American people originally based in the Southeastern Woodlands, in what is now Alabama and Mississippi. Their Choctaw language is a Western Muskogean language. Today, Choctaw people are ...
, Creek, and Koasati
The Coushatta ( cku, Koasati, Kowassaati or Kowassa:ti) are a Muskogean-speaking Native American people now living primarily in the U.S. states of Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas.
When first encountered by Europeans, they lived in the territor ...
. While part of the same large language family, the Muskogee tribes developed distinct cultures and languages.
European settlement
The Spanish were the first Europeans to reach Alabama during their exploration of North America in the 16th century. The expedition of Hernando de Soto passed through Mabila
Mabila (also spelled Mavila, Mavilla, Maubila, or Mauvilla, as influenced by Spanish or French transliterations) was a small fortress town known to the paramount chief Tuskaloosa in 1540, in a region of present-day central Alabama. The exact loca ...
and other parts of the state in 1540. More than 160 years later, the French founded the region's first European settlement at Old Mobile in 1702. The city was moved to the current site of Mobile in 1711. This area was claimed by the French from 1702 to 1763 as part of La Louisiane
Louisiana (french: La Louisiane; ''La Louisiane Française'') or French Louisiana was an administrative district of New France. Under French control from 1682 to 1769 and 1801 (nominally) to 1803, the area was named in honor of King Louis XIV, ...
.[
After the French lost to the British in the ]Seven Years' War
The Seven Years' War (1756–1763) was a global conflict that involved most of the European Great Powers, and was fought primarily in Europe, the Americas, and Asia-Pacific. Other concurrent conflicts include the French and Indian War (1754 ...
, it became part of British West Florida
West Florida ( es, Florida Occidental) was a region on the northern coast of the Gulf of Mexico that underwent several boundary and sovereignty changes during its history. As its name suggests, it was formed out of the western part of former S ...
from 1763 to 1783. After the United States victory in the American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
, the territory was divided between the United States and Spain. The latter retained control of this western territory from 1783 until the surrender of the Spanish garrison at Mobile to U.S. forces on April 13, 1813.
Thomas Bassett, a loyalist
Loyalism, in the United Kingdom, its overseas territories and its former colonies, refers to the allegiance to the British crown or the United Kingdom. In North America, the most common usage of the term refers to loyalty to the British Cro ...
to the British monarchy
The monarchy of the United Kingdom, commonly referred to as the British monarchy, is the constitutional form of government by which a hereditary sovereign reigns as the head of state of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies (the Bailiwi ...
during the Revolutionary era, was one of the earliest white settlers in the state outside Mobile. He settled in the Tombigbee District
The Tombigbee District, also known as the Tombigbee, was one of two areas, the other being the Natchez District, that were the first in what was West Florida to be colonized by British subjects from the Thirteen Colonies and elsewhere. This later ...
during the early 1770s. The district's boundaries were roughly limited to the area within a few miles of the Tombigbee River
The Tombigbee River is a tributary of the Mobile River, approximately 200 mi (325 km) long, in the U.S. states of Mississippi and Alabama. Together with the Alabama, it merges to form the short Mobile River before the latter empties int ...
and included portions of what is today southern Clarke County Clarke County may refer to:
;Places
*One of five counties in the United States:
**Clarke County, Alabama
**Clarke County, Georgia
**Clarke County, Iowa
**Clarke County, Mississippi
**Clarke County, Virginia
Clarke County is a county in the Com ...
, northernmost Mobile County
Mobile County ( ) is located in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Alabama. It is the second most-populous county in the state after Jefferson County, Alabama, Jefferson County. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, its po ...
, and most of Washington County.
What is now the counties of Baldwin and Mobile became part of Spanish West Florida
Spanish West Florida (Spanish: ''Florida Occidental'') was a province of the Spanish Empire from 1783 until 1821, when both it and East Florida were ceded to the United States.
The region of West Florida initially had the same borders as the ers ...
in 1783, part of the independent Republic of West Florida
The Republic of West Florida ( es, República de Florida Occidental, french: République de Floride occidentale), officially the State of Florida, was a short-lived republic in the western region of Spanish West Florida for just over months du ...
in 1810, and was finally added to the Mississippi Territory
The Territory of Mississippi was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from April 7, 1798, until December 10, 1817, when the western half of the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Mississippi. T ...
in 1812. Most of what is now the northern two-thirds of Alabama was known as the Yazoo lands
The Yazoo lands were the central and western regions of the U.S. state of Georgia, when its western border stretched back to the Mississippi. The Yazoo lands were named for the Yazoo nation, that lived on the lower course of the Yazoo, in what ...
beginning during the British colonial period. It was claimed by the Province of Georgia
A province is almost always an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman ''provincia'', which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions outs ...
from 1767 onwards. Following the Revolutionary War, it remained a part of Georgia, although heavily disputed.
With the exception of the area around Mobile and the Yazoo lands, what is now the lower one-third of Alabama was made part of the Mississippi Territory when it was organized in 1798. The Yazoo lands were added to the territory in 1804, following the Yazoo land scandal
The Yazoo land scandal, Yazoo fraud, Yazoo land fraud, or Yazoo land controversy was a massive real-estate fraud perpetrated, in the mid-1790s, by Georgia governor George Mathews and the Georgia General Assembly. Georgia politicians sold large ...
. Spain kept a claim on its former Spanish West Florida territory in what would become the coastal counties until the Adams–Onís Treaty
The Adams–Onís Treaty () of 1819, also known as the Transcontinental Treaty, the Florida Purchase Treaty, or the Florida Treaty,Weeks, p.168. was a treaty between the United States and Spain in 1819 that ceded Florida to the U.S. and defined t ...
officially ceded it to the United States in 1819.
19th century
Before Mississippi's admission to statehood on December 10, 1817, the more sparsely settled eastern half of the territory was separated and named the Alabama Territory
The Territory of Alabama (sometimes Alabama Territory) was an organized incorporated territory of the United States. The Alabama Territory was carved from the Mississippi Territory on August 15, 1817 and lasted until December 14, 1819, when it w ...
. The United States Congress
The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, and an upper body, the Senate. It meets in the U.S. Capitol in Washing ...
created the Alabama Territory on March 3, 1817. St. Stephens, now abandoned, served as the territorial capital from 1817 to 1819.
Alabama was admitted as the 22nd state on December 14, 1819, with Congress selecting Huntsville as the site for the first Constitutional Convention. From July5 to August 2, 1819, delegates met to prepare the new state constitution. Huntsville served as temporary capital from 1819 to 1820, when the seat of government moved to Cahaba in Dallas County Dallas County may refer to:
Places in the USA:
* Dallas County, Alabama, founded in 1818, the first county in the United States by that name
* Dallas County, Arkansas
* Dallas County, Iowa
* Dallas County, Missouri
* Dallas County, Texas, the nin ...
.
Cahaba, now a ghost town
Ghost Town(s) or Ghosttown may refer to:
* Ghost town, a town that has been abandoned
Film and television
* Ghost Town (1936 film), ''Ghost Town'' (1936 film), an American Western film by Harry L. Fraser
* Ghost Town (1956 film), ''Ghost Town'' ...
, was the first permanent state capital from 1820 to 1825. The Alabama Fever
Alabama Fever was the land rush that occurred after 1817 as settlers and speculators moved in to establish land claims in the territory and U.S. State of Alabama as Native American tribes ceded territory. It came to be characterized as a movement ...
land rush was underway when the state was admitted to the Union, with settlers and land speculators pouring into the state to take advantage of fertile land suitable for cotton cultivation. Part of the frontier in the 1820s and 1830s, its constitution provided for universal suffrage for white men.
Southeastern planters and traders from the Upper South
The Upland South and Upper South are two overlapping cultural and geographic subregions in the inland part of the Southern and lower Midwestern United States. They differ from the Deep South and Atlantic coastal plain by terrain, history, econom ...
brought slaves
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
with them as the cotton plantations in Alabama
A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...
expanded. The economy of the central Black Belt (named for its dark, productive soil) was built around large cotton plantations
A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...
whose owners' wealth grew mainly from slave labor. The area also drew many poor, disenfranchised people who became subsistence farmers
Subsistence agriculture occurs when farmers grow food crops to meet the needs of themselves and their families on smallholdings. Subsistence agriculturalists target farm output for survival and for mostly local requirements, with little or no su ...
. Alabama had an estimated population of under 10,000 people in 1810, but it increased to more than 300,000 people by 1830. Most Native American tribes were completely removed from the state within a few years of the passage of the Indian Removal Act
The Indian Removal Act was signed into law on May 28, 1830, by United States President Andrew Jackson. The law, as described by Congress, provided "for an exchange of lands with the Indians residing in any of the states or territories, and for ...
by Congress in 1830.
From 1826 to 1846, Tuscaloosa
Tuscaloosa ( ) is a city in and the seat of Tuscaloosa County in west-central Alabama, United States, on the Black Warrior River where the Gulf Coastal and Piedmont plains meet. Alabama's fifth-largest city, it had an estimated population of 1 ...
served as Alabama's capital. On January 30, 1846, the Alabama legislature announced it had voted to move the capital city from Tuscaloosa to Montgomery. The first legislative session in the new capital met in December 1847. A new capitol building was erected under the direction of Stephen Decatur Button
Stephen Decatur Button (June 15, 1813, in Preston, Connecticut – January 7, 1897, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) was an American architect and a pioneer in the use of metal-frame construction for masonry buildings. He designed commercial buildin ...
of Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...
. The first structure burned down in 1849, but was rebuilt on the same site in 1851. This second capitol building in Montgomery remains to the present day. It was designed by Barachias Holt of Exeter, Maine.
Civil War and Reconstruction
By 1860, the population had increased to 964,201 people, of which nearly half, 435,080, were enslaved African Americans, and 2,690 were free people of color
In the context of the history of slavery in the Americas, free people of color (French: ''gens de couleur libres''; Spanish: ''gente de color libre'') were primarily people of mixed African, European, and Native American descent who were not ...
. On January 11, 1861, Alabama declared its secession
Secession is the withdrawal of a group from a larger entity, especially a political entity, but also from any organization, union or military alliance. Some of the most famous and significant secessions have been: the former Soviet republics le ...
from the Union
Union commonly refers to:
* Trade union, an organization of workers
* Union (set theory), in mathematics, a fundamental operation on sets
Union may also refer to:
Arts and entertainment
Music
* Union (band), an American rock group
** ''Un ...
. After remaining an independent republic for a few days, it joined the Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America (CSA), commonly referred to as the Confederate States or the Confederacy was an unrecognized breakaway republic in the Southern United States that existed from February 8, 1861, to May 9, 1865. The Confeder ...
. The Confederacy's capital was initially at Montgomery. Alabama was heavily involved in the American Civil War. Although comparatively few battles were fought in the state, Alabama contributed about 120,000 soldiers to the war effort.
A company of cavalry soldiers from Huntsville, Alabama, joined Nathan Bedford Forrest
Nathan Bedford Forrest (July 13, 1821October 29, 1877) was a prominent Confederate Army general during the American Civil War and the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan from 1867 to 1869. Before the war, Forrest amassed substantial wealt ...
's battalion in Hopkinsville, Kentucky
Hopkinsville is a home rule-class city in and the county seat of Christian County, Kentucky, United States. The population at the 2010 census was 31,577.
History
Early years
The area of present-day Hopkinsville was initially claimed in 1796 b ...
. The company wore new uniforms with yellow trim on the sleeves, collar and coattails. This led to them being greeted with "Yellowhammer", and the name later was applied to all Alabama troops in the Confederate Army.
Alabama's slaves were freed by the 13th Amendment in 1865. Alabama was under military rule from the end of the war in May 1865 until its official restoration to the Union in 1868. From 1867 to 1874, with most white citizens barred temporarily from voting and freedmen enfranchised, many African Americans emerged as political leaders in the state. Alabama was represented in Congress during this period by three African-American congressmen: Jeremiah Haralson
Jeremiah Haralson (April 1, 1846 – 1916?), was a politician from Alabama who served as a state legislator and was among the first ten African-American United States Congressmen. Born into slavery in Columbus, Georgia, Haralson became self-educ ...
, Benjamin S. Turner
Benjamin Sterling Turner (March 17, 1825 – March 21, 1894) was an American businessman and politician who served in the United States House of Representatives representing Alabama's 1st congressional district in the 42nd United States Congress ...
, and James T. Rapier
James Thomas Rapier (November 13, 1837 – May 31, 1883) was a politician from Alabama during the Reconstruction Era. He served as a United States representative from Alabama, for one term from 1873 until 1875. Born free in Alabama, he went to sc ...
.
Following the war, the state remained chiefly agricultural, with an economy tied to cotton. During Reconstruction, state legislators ratified a new state constitution in 1868 which created the state's first public school system and expanded women's rights. Legislators funded numerous public road and railroad projects, although these were plagued with allegations of fraud and misappropriation
In law, misappropriation is the unauthorized use of another's name, likeness, identity, property, discoveries, inventions, etc without that person's permission, resulting in harm to that person.
Another use of the word refers to intentional a ...
. Organized insurgent
An insurgency is a violent, armed rebellion against authority waged by small, lightly armed bands who practice guerrilla warfare from primarily rural base areas. The key descriptive feature of insurgency is its asymmetric warfare, asymmetric na ...
, resistance groups tried to suppress the freedmen and Republicans. Besides the short-lived original Ku Klux Klan
The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and ...
, these included the Pale Faces, Knights of the White Camellia
The Knights of the White Camelia was an American political terrorist organization that operated in the Southern United States in the late 19th century. Similar to and associated with the Ku Klux Klan, it supported white supremacy and opposed fre ...
, Red Shirts, and the White League
The White League, also known as the White Man's League, was a white paramilitary terrorist organization started in the Southern United States in 1874 to intimidate freedmen into not voting and prevent Republican Party political organizing. Its f ...
.
Reconstruction in Alabama ended in 1874, when the Democrats regained control of the legislature and governor's office through an election dominated by fraud and violence. They wrote another constitution in 1875, and the legislature passed the Blaine Amendment
The Blaine Amendment was a failed amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would have prohibited direct government aid to educational institutions that have a religious affiliation. Most state constitutions already had such provisions, and thirty- ...
, prohibiting public money from being used to finance religious-affiliated schools. The same year, legislation was approved that called for racially segregated
Racial segregation is the systematic separation of people into race (human classification), racial or other Ethnicity, ethnic groups in daily life. Racial segregation can amount to the international crime of apartheid and a crimes against hum ...
schools. Railroad passenger cars were segregated in 1891.
20th century
The new 1901 Constitution of Alabama included provisions for voter registration
In electoral systems, voter registration (or enrollment) is the requirement that a person otherwise eligible to vote must register (or enroll) on an electoral roll, which is usually a prerequisite for being entitled or permitted to vote.
The ru ...
that effectively disenfranchised
Disfranchisement, also called disenfranchisement, or voter disqualification is the restriction of suffrage (the right to vote) of a person or group of people, or a practice that has the effect of preventing a person exercising the right to vote. D ...
large portions of the population, including nearly all African Americans and Native Americans, and tens of thousands of poor European Americans, through making voter registration difficult, requiring a poll tax
A poll tax, also known as head tax or capitation, is a tax levied as a fixed sum on every liable individual (typically every adult), without reference to income or resources.
Head taxes were important sources of revenue for many governments fr ...
and literacy test
A literacy test assesses a person's literacy skills: their ability to read and write have been administered by various governments, particularly to immigrants. In the United States, between the 1850s and 1960s, literacy tests were administered t ...
. The 1901 constitution required racial segregation of public schools. By 1903 only 2,980 African Americans were registered in Alabama, although at least 74,000 were literate
Literacy in its broadest sense describes "particular ways of thinking about and doing reading and writing" with the purpose of understanding or expressing thoughts or ideas in written form in some specific context of use. In other words, huma ...
. This compared to more than 181,000 African Americans eligible to vote in 1900. The numbers dropped even more in later decades. The state legislature passed additional racial segregation laws related to public facilities into the 1950s: jails were segregated in 1911; hospitals in 1915; toilets, hotels, and restaurants in 1928; and bus stop waiting rooms in 1945.
While the planter class had persuaded poor whites to vote for this legislative effort to suppress black voting, the new restrictions resulted in their disenfranchisement as well, due mostly to the imposition of a cumulative poll tax. By 1941, whites constituted a slight majority of those disenfranchised by these laws: 600,000 whites vs. 520,000 African Americans.[Glenn Feldman. ''The Disfranchisement Myth: Poor Whites and Suffrage Restriction in Alabama''. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2004, p. 136.] Nearly all Blacks had lost the ability to vote. Despite numerous legal challenges which succeeded in overturning certain provisions, the state legislature would create new ones to maintain disenfranchisement. The exclusion of blacks from the political system persisted until after passage of federal civil rights legislation in 1965 to enforce their constitutional rights as citizens.
The rural-dominated Alabama legislature consistently underfunded schools and services for the disenfranchised African Americans, but it did not relieve them of paying taxes. Partially as a response to chronic underfunding of education for African Americans in the South, the Rosenwald Fund
The Rosenwald Fund (also known as the Rosenwald Foundation, the Julius Rosenwald Fund, and the Julius Rosenwald Foundation) was established in 1917 by Julius Rosenwald and his family for "the well-being of mankind." Rosenwald became part-owner of S ...
began funding the construction of what came to be known as Rosenwald School
The Rosenwald School project built more than 5,000 schools, shops, and teacher homes in the United States primarily for the education of African-American children in the South during the early 20th century. The project was the product of the part ...
s. In Alabama these schools were designed, and the construction partially financed with Rosenwald funds, which paid one-third of the construction costs. The fund required the local community and state to raise matching funds to pay the rest. Black residents effectively taxed themselves twice, by raising additional monies to supply matching funds for such schools, which were built in many rural areas. They often donated land and labor as well.
Beginning in 1913, the first 80 Rosenwald Schools were built in Alabama for African American children. A total of 387 schools, seven teachers' houses, and several vocational buildings were completed by 1937 in the state. Several of the surviving school buildings in the state are now listed on the National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
.
Continued racial discrimination and lynching
Lynching is an extrajudicial killing by a group. It is most often used to characterize informal public executions by a mob in order to punish an alleged transgressor, punish a convicted transgressor, or intimidate people. It can also be an ex ...
s, agricultural depression, and the failure of the cotton crops due to boll weevil
The boll weevil (''Anthonomus grandis'') is a beetle that feeds on cotton buds and flowers. Thought to be native to Central Mexico, it migrated into the United States from Mexico in the late 19th century and had infested all U.S. cotton-growing ...
infestation led tens of thousands of African Americans from rural Alabama and other states to seek opportunities in northern and midwestern cities during the early decades of the 20th century as part of the Great Migration out of the South. Reflecting this emigration, the population growth rate in Alabama (see "historical populations" table below) dropped by nearly half from 1910 to 1920.
At the same time, many rural people migrated to the city of Birmingham to work in new industrial jobs. Birmingham experienced such rapid growth it was called the "Magic City". By 1920, Birmingham was the 36th-largest city in the United States. Heavy industry and mining were the basis of its economy. Its residents were under-represented for decades in the state legislature, which refused to redistrict after each decennial census according to population changes, as it was required by the state constitution. This did not change until the late 1960s following a lawsuit and court order.
Industrial development related to the demands of World War II brought a level of prosperity to the state not seen since before the civil war. Rural workers poured into the largest cities in the state for better jobs and a higher standard of living. One example of this massive influx of workers occurred in Mobile. Between 1940 and 1943, more than 89,000 people moved into the city to work for war-related industries. Cotton and other cash crop
A cash crop or profit crop is an Agriculture, agricultural crop which is grown to sell for profit. It is typically purchased by parties separate from a farm. The term is used to differentiate marketed crops from staple crop (or "subsistence crop") ...
s faded in importance as the state developed a manufacturing and service base.
Despite massive population changes in the state from 1901 to 1961, the rural-dominated legislature refused to reapportion House and Senate seats based on population, as required by the state constitution to follow the results of decennial censuses. They held on to old representation to maintain political and economic power in agricultural areas. One result was that Jefferson County, containing Birmingham's industrial and economic powerhouse, contributed more than one-third of all tax revenue to the state, but did not receive a proportional amount in services. Urban interests were consistently underrepresented in the legislature. A 1960 study noted that because of rural domination, "a minority of about 25% of the total state population is in majority control of the Alabama legislature."
In the United States Supreme Court cases of ''Baker v. Carr
''Baker v. Carr'', 369 U.S. 186 (1962), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that redistricting qualifies as a justiciable question under the Fourteenth Amendment, thus enabling federal courts to hear Fourteen ...
'' (1962) and ''Reynolds v. Sims
''Reynolds v. Sims'', 377 U.S. 533 (1964), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case in which the Court ruled that the electoral districts of state legislative chambers must be roughly equal in population. Along with ''Baker v. Carr'' (196 ...
'' (1964), the court ruled that the principle of "one man, one vote
"One man, one vote", or "one person, one vote", expresses the principle that individuals should have equal representation in voting. This slogan is used by advocates of political equality to refer to such electoral reforms as universal suffrage, ...
" needed to be the basis of both houses of state legislatures, and that their districts had to be based on population rather than geographic counties.
African Americans continued to press in the 1950s and 1960s to end disenfranchisement and segregation in the state through the civil rights movement, including legal challenges. In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in ''Brown v. Board of Education
''Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka'', 347 U.S. 483 (1954), was a landmark decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled that U.S. state laws establishing racial segregation in public schools are unconstitutional, even if the segregat ...
'' that public schools had to be desegregated
Desegregation is the process of ending the separation of two groups, usually referring to races. Desegregation is typically measured by the index of dissimilarity, allowing researchers to determine whether desegregation efforts are having impact o ...
, but Alabama was slow to comply. During the 1960s, under Governor George Wallace
George Corley Wallace Jr. (August 25, 1919 – September 13, 1998) was an American politician who served as the 45th governor of Alabama for four terms. A member of the Democratic Party, he is best remembered for his staunch segregationist and ...
, Alabama resisted compliance with federal demands for desegregation. The civil rights movement had notable events in Alabama, including the Montgomery bus boycott
The Montgomery bus boycott was a political and social protest campaign against the policy of racial segregation on the public transit system of Montgomery, Alabama. It was a foundational event in the civil rights movement in the United States ...
(1955–1956), Freedom Rides
Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode interstate buses into the segregated Southern United States in 1961 and subsequent years to challenge the non-enforcement of the United States Supreme Court decisions '' Morgan v. Virginia ...
in 1961, and 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches. These contributed to Congressional passage and enactment of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and United States labor law, labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on Race (human categorization), race, Person of color, color, religion, sex, and nationa ...
and Voting Rights Act of 1965
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. It was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson during the height of the civil rights movement ...
by the U.S. Congress.
Legal segregation ended in the states in 1964, but Jim Crow customs often continued until specifically challenged in court. According to ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'', by 2017, many of Alabama's African Americans were living in Alabama's cities such as Birmingham and Montgomery. Also, the Black Belt region across central Alabama "is home to largely poor counties that are predominantly African-American. These counties include Dallas, Lowndes, Marengo and Perry
Perry, also known as pear cider, is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented pears, traditionally the perry pear. It has been common for centuries in England, particularly in Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, and Worcestershire. It is also made ...
."
In 1972, for the first time since 1901, the legislature completed the congressional redistricting based on the decennial census. This benefited the urban areas that had developed, as well as all in the population who had been underrepresented for more than sixty years. Other changes were made to implement representative state house and senate districts.
Alabama has made some changes since the late 20th century and has used new types of voting to increase representation. In the 1980s, an omnibus redistricting case, '' Dillard v. Crenshaw County'', challenged the at-large
At large (''before a noun'': at-large) is a description for members of a governing body who are elected or appointed to represent a whole membership or population (notably a city, county, state, province, nation, club or association), rather than ...
voting for representative seats of 180 Alabama jurisdictions, including counties and school boards. At-large voting had diluted the votes of any minority in a county, as the majority tended to take all seats. Despite African Americans making up a significant minority in the state, they had been unable to elect any representatives in most of the at-large jurisdictions.
As part of settlement of this case, five Alabama cities and counties, including Chilton County, adopted a system of cumulative voting
Cumulative voting (also accumulation voting, weighted voting or multi-voting) is a multiple-winner method intended to promote more proportional representation than winner-take-all elections such as block voting or first past the post. Cumulative ...
for election of representatives in multi-seat jurisdictions. This has resulted in more proportional representation for voters. In another form of proportional representation, 23 jurisdictions use limited voting
Limited voting (also known as partial block voting) is a voting system in which electors have fewer votes than there are positions available. The positions are awarded to the candidates who receive the most votes absolutely. In the special case ...
, as in Conecuh County
Conecuh County () is a county located in the south central portion of the U.S. state of Alabama. As of the 2020 census the population was 11,597. Its county seat is Evergreen. Its name is believed to be derived from a Creek Indian term meaning ...
. In 1982, limited voting was first tested in Conecuh County. Together use of these systems has increased the number of African Americans and women being elected to local offices, resulting in governments that are more representative of their citizens.
Beginning in the 1960s, the state's economy shifted away from its traditional lumber, steel, and textile industries because of increased foreign competition. Steel jobs, for instance, declined from 46,314 in 1950 to 14,185 in 2011. However, the state, particularly Huntsville, benefited from the opening of the George C. Marshall Space Flight Center
The George C. Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC), located in Redstone Arsenal, Alabama (Huntsville postal address), is the U.S. government's civilian rocketry and spacecraft propulsion research center. As the largest NASA center, MSFC's firs ...
in 1960, a major facility in the development of the Saturn rocket program and the space shuttle. Technology and manufacturing industries, such as automobile assembly, replaced some the state's older industries in the late twentieth century, but the state's economy and growth lagged behind other states in the area, such as Georgia and Florida.
21st century
In 2001, Alabama Supreme Court chief justice Roy Moore
Roy Stewart Moore (born February 11, 1947) is an American politician, lawyer, and jurist who served as the 27th and 31st chief justice of the Supreme Court of Alabama from 2001 to 2003 and again from 2013 to 2017, each time being removed fro ...
installed a statue of the Ten Commandments
The Ten Commandments (Biblical Hebrew עשרת הדברים \ עֲשֶׂרֶת הַדְּבָרִים, ''aséret ha-dvarím'', lit. The Decalogue, The Ten Words, cf. Mishnaic Hebrew עשרת הדיברות \ עֲשֶׂרֶת הַדִּבְ ...
in the capitol in Montgomery. In 2002, the 11th US Circuit Court ordered the statue removed, but Moore refused to follow the court order, which led to protests around the capitol in favor of keeping the monument. The monument was removed in August 2003.
A few natural disasters have occurred in the state in the twenty-first century. In 2004, Hurricane Ivan
Hurricane Ivan was a large, long-lived, Cape Verde hurricane that caused widespread damage in the Caribbean and United States. The cyclone was the ninth named storm, the sixth hurricane and the fourth major hurricane of the active 2004 Atlan ...
, a category 3 storm upon landfall, struck the state and caused over $18 billion of damage. It was among the most destructive storms to strike the state in its modern history. A super outbreak of 62 tornadoes hit the state in April 2011 and killed 238 people, devastating many communities.
Geography
Alabama is the thirtieth-largest state in the United States with of total area: 3.2% of the area is water, making Alabama 23rd in the amount of surface water, also giving it the second-largest inland waterway system in the United States. About three-fifths of the land area is part of the Gulf Coastal Plain
The Gulf Coastal Plain extends around the Gulf of Mexico in the Southern United States and eastern Mexico.
This coastal plain reaches from the Florida Panhandle, southwest Georgia, the southern two-thirds of Alabama, over most of Mississippi, wes ...
, a gentle plain with a general descent towards the Mississippi River
The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it f ...
and the Gulf of Mexico. The North Alabama
North Alabama is a region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Several geographic definitions for the area exist, with all descriptions including the nine counties of Alabama's Tennessee Valley region. The North Alabama Industrial Development Associ ...
region is mostly mountainous, with the Tennessee River
The Tennessee River is the largest tributary of the Ohio River. It is approximately long and is located in the southeastern United States in the Tennessee Valley. The river was once popularly known as the Cherokee River, among other names, ...
cutting a large valley and creating numerous creeks, streams, rivers, mountains, and lakes.
Alabama is bordered by the states of Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama has coastline at the Gulf of Mexico, in the extreme southern edge of the state. The state ranges in elevation from sea level at Mobile Bay to more than in the northeast
The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each se ...
, to Mount Cheaha
Cheaha Mountain , often called Mount Cheaha, is the highest natural point in the U.S. state of Alabama. It is located a few miles northwest of the town of Delta in Cheaha State Park, which offers a lodge, a restaurant, and other amenities.
Descr ...
at .
Alabama's land consists of of forest or 67% of the state's total land area. Suburban Baldwin County, along the Gulf Coast, is the largest county in the state in both land area and water area.
Areas in Alabama administered by the National Park Service
The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...
include Horseshoe Bend National Military Park
Horseshoe Bend National Military Park is a 2,040-acre, U.S. national military park managed by the National Park Service that is the site of the last battle of the Creek War on March 27, 1814. General Andrew Jackson's Tennessee militia, aided by ...
near Alexander City
Alexander City, known to locals as "Alex City", is the largest city in Tallapoosa County, Alabama, United States, with a population of 14,843 as of the 2020 census. It has been the largest community in Tallapoosa County since 1910. It is know ...
; Little River Canyon National Preserve
Little is a synonym for small size and may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* ''Little'' (album), 1990 debut album of Vic Chesnutt
* ''Little'' (film), 2019 American comedy film
*The Littles, a series of children's novels by American author John P ...
near Fort Payne
Fort Payne is a city in and county seat of DeKalb County, Alabama, DeKalb County, in northeastern Alabama, United States. At the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 14,877.
European-American settlers gradually developed th ...
; Russell Cave National Monument
Russell Cave National Monument is a U.S. National Monument in northeastern Alabama, United States, close to the town of Bridgeport. The monument was established on May 11, 1961, when 310 acres (1.3 km2) of land were donated by the Nation ...
in Bridgeport
Bridgeport is the most populous city and a major port in the U.S. state of Connecticut. With a population of 148,654 in 2020, it is also the fifth-most populous in New England. Located in eastern Fairfield County at the mouth of the Pequonnoc ...
; Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site
Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site, at Moton Field in Tuskegee, Alabama, commemorates the contributions of African-American airmen in World War II. Moton Field was the site of primary flight training for the pioneering pilots known as the Tusk ...
in Tuskegee; and Tuskegee Institute National Historic Site
Tuskegee University (Tuskegee or TU), formerly known as the Tuskegee Institute, is a private, historically black land-grant university in Tuskegee, Alabama. It was founded on Independence Day in 1881 by the state legislature.
The campus was desi ...
near Tuskegee. Additionally, Alabama has four National Forests
A state forest or national forest is a forest that is administered or protected by some agency of a sovereign state, sovereign or federated state, or territory (country subdivision), territory.
Background
The precise application of the terms va ...
: Conecuh, Talladega, Tuskegee, and William B. Bankhead
William Brockman Bankhead (April 12, 1874 – September 15, 1940) was an American politician who served as the 42nd speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1936 to 1940, representing Alabama's 10th and later 7th congressiona ...
. Alabama also contains the Natchez Trace Parkway
The Natchez Trace Parkway is a national parkway in the southeastern United States that commemorates the historic Natchez Trace and preserves sections of that original trail. Its central feature is a two-lane road that extends 444 miles (715  ...
, the Selma To Montgomery National Historic Trail
The Selma to Montgomery National Historic Trail is a National Historic Trail in Alabama. It commemorates and marks the journey of the participants of the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches in support of the Voting Rights Act.
History
The Selma t ...
, and the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail
The Trail of Tears was an ethnic cleansing and forced displacement of approximately 60,000 people of the "Five Civilized Tribes" between 1830 and 1850 by the United States government. As part of the Indian removal, members of the Cherokee, Mus ...
.
Notable natural wonders include: the "Natural Bridge" rock, the longest natural bridge
A natural arch, natural bridge, or (less commonly) rock arch is a natural landform where an arch has formed with an opening underneath. Natural arches commonly form where inland cliffs, coastal cliffs, fins or stacks are subject to erosion fr ...
east of the Rockies
The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in great-circle distance, straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Can ...
, located just south of Haleyville; Cathedral Caverns in Marshall County, named for its cathedral-like appearance, features one of the largest cave entrances and stalagmites in the world; Ecor Rouge in Fairhope
Fairhope is a city in Baldwin County, Alabama, United States, located on the eastern shoreline of Mobile Bay. The 2020 Census lists the population of the city as 22,477. Fairhope is a principal city of the Daphne-Fairhope-Foley metropolita ...
, the highest coastline point between Maine
Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and north ...
and Mexico; DeSoto Caverns
Majestic Caverns (formerly known as DeSoto Caverns) is a series of caves and a tourist attraction located in Childersburg, Talladega County, Alabama. Located in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, it is touted as "Alabama's Big Cave". In ...
in Childersburg
Childersburg is a city in Talladega County in the U.S. state of Alabama. It was incorporated in 1889. At the 2020 census, the population was 4,754. It has a history dating back before 1540, when it was noted as a village of the Coosa Nation vi ...
, the first officially recorded cave in the United States; Noccalula Falls in Gadsden features a 90-foot waterfall; Dismals Canyon
Dismals Canyon is a sandstone Canyon, gorge near Phil Campbell, Alabama, Phil Campbell in Franklin County, Alabama. It was declared a National Natural Landmark in May 1974.
Dismals Canyon is one of only a few places where insects called dismalite ...
near Phil Campbell, home to two waterfalls, six natural bridges and allegedly served as a hideout for legendary outlaw Jesse James; Stephens Gap Cave in Jackson County boasts a 143-foot pit, two waterfalls and is one of the most photographed wild cave scenes in America; Little River Canyon near Fort Payne, one of the nation's longest mountaintop rivers; Rickwood Caverns near Warrior
A warrior is a person specializing in combat or warfare, especially within the context of a tribal or clan-based warrior culture society that recognizes a separate warrior aristocracies, class, or caste.
History
Warriors seem to have been p ...
features an underground pool, blind cave fish and 260-million-year-old limestone formations; and the Walls of Jericho canyon on the Alabama-Tennessee state line.
A -wide meteorite impact crater is located in Elmore County, just north of Montgomery. This is the Wetumpka crater
The Wetumpka impact crater is the only confirmed impact crater in Alabama, United States. It is located east of downtown Wetumpka in Elmore County. The crater is in diameter, and its age is estimated to be about 85 million years (late Cretaceous) ...
, the site of "Alabama's greatest natural disaster". A -wide meteorite hit the area about 80 million years ago. The hills just east of downtown Wetumpka
Wetumpka () is a city in and the county seat of Elmore County, Alabama, United States. At the 2020 census, the population was 7,220. In the early 21st century Elmore County became one of the fastest-growing counties in the state. The city is ...
showcase the eroded remains of the impact crater that was blasted into the bedrock, with the area labeled the Wetumpka crater or astrobleme ("star-wound") because of the concentric rings of fractures and zones of shattered rock that can be found beneath the surface. In 2002, Christian Koeberl with the Institute of Geochemistry University of Vienna published evidence and established the site as the 157th recognized impact crater on Earth.
Climate
The state is classified as humid subtropical
A humid subtropical climate is a zone of climate characterized by hot and humid summers, and cool to mild winters. These climates normally lie on the southeast side of all continents (except Antarctica), generally between latitudes 25° and 40° ...
(''Cfa'') under the Koppen Climate Classification Koppen is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:
* Dan Koppen (born 1979), American football offensive lineman
* Erwin Koppen (1929–1990), German literary scholar
* Luise Koppen (1855–1922), German author
* Wladimir Köppen (1846 ...
. The average annual temperature is 64°F (18°C). Temperatures tend to be warmer in the southern part of the state with its proximity to the Gulf of Mexico
The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an oceanic basin, ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of ...
, while the northern parts of the state, especially in the Appalachian Mountains
The Appalachian Mountains, often called the Appalachians, (french: Appalaches), are a system of mountains in eastern to northeastern North America. The Appalachians first formed roughly 480 million years ago during the Ordovician Period. They ...
in the northeast, tend to be slightly cooler. Generally, Alabama has very hot summers and mild winters with copious precipitation throughout the year. Alabama receives an average of of rainfall annually and enjoys a lengthy growing season of up to 300 days in the southern part of the state.
Summers in Alabama are among the hottest in the U.S., with high temperatures averaging over throughout the summer in some parts of the state. Alabama is also prone to tropical storms and hurricanes. Areas of the state far away from the Gulf are not immune to the effects of the storms, which often dump tremendous amounts of rain as they move inland and weaken.
South Alabama reports many thunderstorm
A thunderstorm, also known as an electrical storm or a lightning storm, is a storm characterized by the presence of lightning and its acoustic effect on the Earth's atmosphere, known as thunder. Relatively weak thunderstorms are someti ...
s. The Gulf Coast, around Mobile Bay, averages between 70 and 80 days per year with thunder reported. This activity decreases somewhat further north in the state, but even the far north of the state reports thunder on about 60 days per year. Occasionally, thunderstorms are severe with frequent lightning
Lightning is a naturally occurring electrostatic discharge during which two electric charge, electrically charged regions, both in the atmosphere or with one on the land, ground, temporarily neutralize themselves, causing the instantaneous ...
and large hail; the central and northern parts of the state are most vulnerable to this type of storm. Alabama ranks ninth in the number of deaths from lightning and tenth in the number of deaths from lightning strikes per capita.
Alabama, along with Oklahoma and Iowa, has the most confirmed Fujita scale, F5 and Enhanced Fujita scale, EF5 tornadoes of any state, according to statistics from the National Climatic Data Center for the period January 1, 1950, to June 2013. Several long-tracked F5/EF5 tornadoes have contributed to Alabama reporting more tornado fatalities since 1950 than any other state. The state was affected by the 1974 Super Outbreak and was devastated tremendously by the 2011 Super Outbreak. The 2011 Super Outbreak produced a record amount of tornadoes in the state. The tally reached 62.
The peak season for tornadoes varies from the northern to southern parts of the state. Alabama is one of the few places in the world that has a secondary tornado season in November and December besides the typically severe spring. The northern part—along the Tennessee River Valley—is most vulnerable. The area of Alabama and Mississippi most affected by tornadoes is sometimes referred to as Dixie Alley, as distinct from the Tornado Alley of the Southern Plains.
Winters are generally mild in Alabama, as they are throughout most of the Southeastern United States, with average January low temperatures around in Mobile and around in Birmingham. Although snow is a rare event in much of Alabama, areas of the state north of Montgomery may receive a dusting of snow a few times every winter, with an occasional moderately heavy snowfall every few years. Historic snowfall events include New Year's Eve 1963 snowstorm and the 1993 Storm of the Century. The annual average snowfall for the Birmingham area is per year. In the southern Gulf coast, snowfall is less frequent, sometimes going several years without any snowfall.
Alabama's highest temperature of was recorded on September 5, 1925, in the unincorporated community of Centerville, Alabama, Centerville. The record low of occurred on January 30, 1966, in New Market, Alabama, New Market.
Flora and fauna
Alabama is home to a diverse array of flora and fauna in habitats that range from the Tennessee Valley, Appalachian Plateau, and Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians of the north to the Piedmont (United States), Piedmont, Canebrake (region of Alabama), Canebrake, and Black Belt of the central region to the Gulf Coastal Plain
The Gulf Coastal Plain extends around the Gulf of Mexico in the Southern United States and eastern Mexico.
This coastal plain reaches from the Florida Panhandle, southwest Georgia, the southern two-thirds of Alabama, over most of Mississippi, wes ...
and beaches along the Gulf of Mexico in the south. The state is usually ranked among the top in nation for its range of overall biodiversity.
Alabama is in the subtropical coniferous forest biome and once boasted huge expanses of pine forest, which still form the largest proportion of forests in the state. It currently ranks fifth in the nation for the diversity of its flora. It is home to nearly 4,000 pteridophyte and spermatophyte plant species.
Native species, Indigenous animal species in the state include 62 mammal species, 93 reptile species, 73 amphibian species, roughly 307 native freshwater fish species, and 420 bird species that spend at least part of their year within the state. Invertebrates include 97 crayfish species and 383 mollusk species. 113 of these mollusk species have never been collected outside the state.
Census-designated and metropolitan areas
Cities
Demographics
According to the 2020 United States census the population of Alabama was 5,024,279 on April 1, 2020, which represents an increase of 244,543 or 5.12%, since the 2010 United States census, 2010 census. This includes a natural increase since the last census of 121,054 (502,457 births minus 381,403 deaths) and an increase due to net migration of 104,991 into the state.
Immigration to the United States, Immigration from outside the U.S. resulted in a net increase of 31,180 people, and migration within the country produced a net gain of 73,811 people.[ The state had 108,000 foreign-born (2.4% of the state population), of which an estimated 22.2% were undocumented (24,000). Alabama has the 5th highest African American population among US states at 25.8% as of 2020.
The center of population of Alabama is located in Chilton County, outside the town of Jemison, Alabama, Jemison.
]
Ancestry
Those citing "United States, American" ancestry in Alabama are of overwhelmingly English people, English extraction, however most English Americans identify simply as having United States, American ancestry because their roots have been in North America for so long, in many cases since the early 1600s. Demographers estimate that a minimum of 20–23% of people in Alabama are of predominantly English American, English ancestry and state that the figure is probably much higher. In the 1980 census 1,139,976 people in Alabama cited that they were of English American, English ancestry out of a total state population of 2,824,719 making them 41% of the state at the time and the largest ethnic group.
In 2011, 46.6% of Alabama's population younger than age1 were minorities. The largest reported ancestry groups in Alabama are American (13.4%), Irish Americans, Irish (10.5%), English Americans, English (10.2%), German Americans, German (7.9%), and Scotch-Irish Americans, Scots-Irish (2.5%) based on 2006-2008 Census data.
The Scots-Irish were the largest non-English immigrant group from the British Isles before the American Revolution, and many settled in the South, later moving into the Deep South as it was developed.
In 1984, under the Davis–Strong Act, the state legislature established the Alabama Indian Affairs Commission.["Alabama Indian Affairs Commission"](_blank)
, State of Alabama, accessed September 28, 2013 Native American groups within the state had increasingly been demanding recognition as ethnic groups and seeking an end to discrimination. Given the long history of slavery and associated racial segregation, the Native American peoples, who have sometimes been of mixed race, have insisted on having their cultural identification respected. In the past, their self-identification was often overlooked as the state tried to impose a binary breakdown of society into white and black. The state has State-recognized tribes in the United States, officially recognized nine American Indian tribes in the state, descended mostly from the Five Civilized Tribes of the American Southeast. These are the following.
* Poarch Band of Creek Indians (who also have federal recognition)
* MOWA Band of Choctaw Indians
* Star Clan of Muscogee Creeks
* Echota Cherokee Tribe of Alabama
* Cherokee Tribe of Northeast Alabama
* Cher-O-Creek Intra Tribal Indians
* ''Ma-Chis'' Lower Creek Indian Tribe
* ''Piqua'' Shawnee Tribe
* ''Ani-Yun-Wiya'' Nation
The state government has promoted recognition of Native American contributions to the state, including the designation in 2000 for Columbus Day to be jointly celebrated as American Indian Heritage Day.
Language
Most Alabama residents (95.1% of those five and older) spoke only English at home in 2010, a minor decrease from 96.1% in 2000. Alabama English is predominantly Southern American English, Southern, and is related to South Midland speech which was taken across the border from Tennessee. In the major Southern speech region, there is the decreasing loss of the final ''r'', for example the "boyd" pronunciation of "bird". In the northern third of the state, there is a South Midland "arm" and "barb" rhyming with "form" and "orb", respectively. Unique words in Alabama English include: redworm (earthworm), peckerwood (woodpecker), snake doctor and snake feeder (dragonfly), tow sack (Gunny sack, burlap bag), plum peach (Clingstone peach, clingstone), French harp (harmonica), and dog irons (andirons).
Religion
In the 2008 American Religious Identification Survey, 86% of Alabama respondents reported their religion as Christian, including 6% Catholic, with 11% as having no religion. The composition of other traditions is 0.5% Mormon, 0.5% Jewish, 0.5% Muslim, 0.5% Buddhist, and 0.5% Hindu.
Alabama is located in the middle of the Bible Belt, a region of numerous Protestant Christians. Alabama has been identified as one of the most religious states in the United States, with about 58% of the population attending church regularly. A majority of people in the state identify as Evangelical Protestant. , the three largest denominational groups in Alabama are the Southern Baptist Convention, The United Methodist Church, and Nondenominational Christianity, non-denominational Evangelical Protestant.
In Alabama, the Southern Baptist Convention has the highest number of adherents with 1,380,121; this is followed by the United Methodist Church with 327,734 adherents, non-denominational Evangelical Protestant with 220,938 adherents, and the Catholic Church with 150,647 adherents. Many Baptist and Methodist congregations became established in the Great Awakening of the early 19th century, when preachers proselytized across the South. The Assemblies of God had almost 60,000 members, the Churches of Christ had nearly 120,000 members. The Presbyterianism, Presbyterian churches, strongly associated with Scots-Irish immigrants of the 18th century and their descendants, had a combined membership around 75,000 (Presbyterian Church in America, PCA—28,009 members in 108 congregations, Presbyterian Church (USA), PC(USA)—26,247 members in 147 congregations, the Cumberland Presbyterian Church—6,000 members in 59 congregations, the Cumberland Presbyterian Church in America—5,000 members and fifty congregations plus the Edgewater Presbyterian Church, EPC and Associate Reformed Presbyterians with 230 members and nine congregations).
In a 2007 survey, nearly 70% of respondents could name all four of the Christian Gospels. Of those who indicated a religious preference, 59% said they possessed a "full understanding" of their faith and needed no further learning. In a 2007 poll, 92% of Alabamians reported having at least some confidence in churches in the state.
Although in much smaller numbers, many other religious faiths are represented in the state as well, including Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, the Baháʼí Faith, and Unitarian Universalism.
Jews have been present in what is now Alabama since 1763, during the colonial era of Mobile, when Sephardi Jews, Sephardic Jews immigrated from London. The oldest Jewish congregation in the state is Congregation Sha'arai Shomayim (Mobile, Alabama), Congregation Sha'arai Shomayim in Mobile. It was formally recognized by the state legislature on January 25, 1844. Later immigrants in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries tended to be Ashkenazi Jews from eastern Europe. Jewish denominations in the state include two Orthodox Judaism, Orthodox, four Conservative Judaism, Conservative, ten Reform Judaism, Reform, and one Humanistic Judaism, Humanistic synagogue.
Muslims have been increasing in Alabama, with 31 mosques built by 2011, many by African-American converts.
Several Hindu temples and cultural centers in the state have been founded by Indian immigrants and their descendants, the best-known being the Shri Swaminarayan Mandir in Birmingham, the Hindu Temple and Cultural Center of Birmingham in Pelham, Alabama, Pelham, the Hindu Cultural Center of North Alabama in Capshaw, Alabama, Capshaw, and the Hindu Mandir and Cultural Center in Tuscaloosa.
There are six Dharma centre, Dharma centers and organizations for Theravada Buddhists. Most monastic Buddhist temples are concentrated in southern Mobile County, near Bayou La Batre, Alabama, Bayou La Batre. This area has attracted an Indochina refugee crisis, influx of refugees from Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam during the 1970s and thereafter. The four temples within a ten-mile radius of Bayou La Batre, include Chua Chanh Giac, Wat Buddharaksa, and Wat Lao Phoutthavihan.
The first community of adherents of the Baháʼí Faith in Alabama was founded in 1896 by Paul K. Dealy, who moved from Chicago to Fairhope. Baháʼí centers in Alabama exist in Birmingham, Huntsville, and Florence, Alabama, Florence.
Health
In 2018, life expectancy in Alabama was 75.1 years, below the national average of 78.7 years and is the third lowest life expectancy in the country. Factors that can cause lower life expectancy are maternal mortality, suicide, and gun crimes.
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study in 2008 showed that obesity in Alabama is a problem, with most counties having more than 29% of adults obese, except for ten which had a rate between 26% and 29%. Residents of the state, along with those in five other states, were least likely in the nation to be physically active during leisure time. Alabama, and the southeastern U.S. in general, has one of the highest incidences of adult onset Type 2 diabetes, diabetes in the country, exceeding 10% of adults.
On May 14, 2019, Alabama passed the Human Life Protection Act, banning abortion at any stage of pregnancy unless there is a "serious health risk", with no exceptions for rape and incest. The law subjects doctors who perform abortions with 10 to 99 years imprisonment. The law was originally supposed to take effect the following November, but on October 29, 2019, U.S. District Judge Myron H. Thompson, Myron Thompson blocked the law from taking effect due to it being in conflict with the 1973 Supreme Court of the United States, U.S. Supreme Court case ''Roe v. Wade''. On June 24, 2022, after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned ''Roe v. Wade'' in ''Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization'', Judge Thompson lifted the injunction, allowing the law to go into effect.
Economy
The state has invested in aerospace, education, health care, banking, and various heavy industries, including automobile manufacturing, mineral extraction, steel production and Metal fabrication, fabrication. By 2006, crop and animal production in Alabama was valued at $1.5billion. In contrast to the primarily agricultural economy of the previous century, this was only about one percent of the state's gross domestic product. The number of private farms has declined at a steady rate since the 1960s, as land has been sold to developers, timber companies, and large farming conglomerates.
Non-agricultural employment in 2008 was 121,800 in management occupations; 71,750 in business and financial operations; 36,790 in computer-related and mathematical occupation; 44,200 in architecture and engineering; 12,410 in life, physical, and social sciences; 32,260 in community and social services; 12,770 in legal occupations; 116,250 in education, training, and library services; 27,840 in art, design and media occupations; 121,110 in healthcare; 44,750 in fire fighting, law enforcement, and security; 154,040 in food preparation and serving; 76,650 in building and grounds cleaning and maintenance; 53,230 in personal care and services; 244,510 in sales; 338,760 in office and administration support; 20,510 in farming, fishing, and forestry; 120,155 in construction and mining, gas, and oil extraction; 106,280 in installation, maintenance, and repair; 224,110 in production; and 167,160 in transportation and material moving.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, the 2008 total Gross regional domestic product, gross state product was $170billion, or $29,411 per capita. Alabama's 2012 GDP increased 1.2% from the previous year. The single largest increase came in the area of information. In 2010, per capita income for the state was $22,984.
The state's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 5.8% in April 2015. This compared to a nationwide seasonally adjusted rate of 5.4%.
Alabama has no minimum wage and in February 2016 passed legislation preventing municipalities from setting one. (A Birmingham city ordinance would have raised theirs to $10.10.)
, Alabama has the sixth highest poverty rate among states in the U.S. In 2017, United Nations Special Rapporteur Philip Alston toured parts of rural Alabama and observed environmental conditions he said were poorer than anywhere he had seen in the developed world.
Largest employers
The five employers that employed the most employees in Alabama in April 2011 were:[Aneesa Macmillan.]
Top of the List: Alabama's largest employers
" (April 22, 2011). ''Birmingham Business Journal''.
The next twenty largest employers, , included:
Agriculture
Alabama's agricultural outputs include poultry and Egg as food, eggs, cattle, fish, plant nursery items, peanuts, cotton, grains such as Corn production in the United States, corn and sorghum, vegetables, milk, soybeans, and peaches. Although known as "List of U.S. state and territory nicknames, The Cotton State", Alabama ranks between eighth and tenth in Cotton production in the United States, national cotton production, according to various reports, with Texas, Georgia and Mississippi comprising the top three.
Aquaculture
Aquaculture is a large part of the economy of Alabama.[Hanson, TE. 2015. Economics of Aquaculture Production in Alabama. United States Department of Agriculture. Project No. ALA016-1-10022. Available from: https://reeis.usda.gov/web/crisprojectpages/0222158-economics-of-aquaculture-production-in-alabama.html ] Alabamians began to practice aquaculture in the early 1960s. U.S. Farm-Raised Catfish, farm-raised catfish is the 8th most popular seafood product in America. By 2008, approximately 4,000 people in Alabama were employed by the catfish industry and Alabama produced 132 million pounds of catfish. In 2020, Alabama produced of the United States' farm-raised catfish. The total 2020 sales of catfish raised in Alabama equaled $307 million but by 2020 the total employment of Alabamians fell to 2,442.
From the early 2000s to 2020, the Alabamian catfish industry has declined from 250 farms and 4 processors to 66 farms and 2 processors. Reasons for this decline include increased feed prices, catfish alternatives, COVID-19's impact on restaurant sales, disease, and fish size.
Industry
Alabama's industrial outputs include iron and steel products (including cast-iron and steel pipe); paper, lumber, and wood products; mining (mostly coal); plastic products; cars and trucks; and Clothing, apparel. In addition, Alabama produces aerospace
Aerospace is a term used to collectively refer to the atmosphere and outer space. Aerospace activity is very diverse, with a multitude of commercial, industrial and military applications. Aerospace engineering consists of aeronautics and astrona ...
and electronics, electronic products, mostly in the Huntsville area, the location of NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research.
NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...
's George C. Marshall Space Flight Center and the United States Army Materiel Command, U.S. Army Materiel Command, headquartered at Redstone Arsenal.
A great deal of Alabama's economic growth since the 1990s has been due to the state's expanding automotive manufacturing industry. Located in the state are Honda Manufacturing of Alabama, Hyundai Motor Manufacturing Alabama, Mercedes-Benz U.S. International, and Toyota Motor Manufacturing Alabama, as well as their various suppliers. Since 1993, the automobile industry has generated more than 67,800 new jobs in the state. Alabama currently ranks 4th in the nation for vehicle exports.
Automakers accounted for approximately a third of the industrial expansion in the state in 2012. The eight models produced at the state's auto factories totaled combined sales of 74,335 vehicles for 2012. The strongest model sales during this period were the Hyundai Elantra compact car, the Mercedes-Benz GLS-Class, Mercedes-Benz GL-Class sport utility vehicle and the Honda Ridgeline sport utility truck.
Steel producers Outokumpu, Nucor, SSAB, ThyssenKrupp, and U.S. Steel have facilities in Alabama and employ more than 10,000 people. In May 2007, German steelmaker ThyssenKrupp selected Calvert, Alabama, Calvert in Mobile County for a 4.65billion combined stainless steel, stainless and carbon steel processing facility. ThyssenKrupp's stainless steel division, Inoxum, including the stainless portion of the Calvert plant, was sold to Finnish stainless steel company Outokumpu in 2012. The remaining portion of the ThyssenKrupp plant had final bids submitted by ArcelorMittal and Nippon Steel for $1.6billion in March 2013. Companhia Siderúrgica Nacional submitted a combined bid for the mill at Calvert, plus a majority stake in the ThyssenKrupp mill in Brazil, for $3.8billion. In July 2013, the plant was sold to ArcelorMittal and Nippon Steel.
The Hunt Refining Company, a subsidiary of Hunt Consolidated, Inc., is based in Tuscaloosa and operates a refinery there. The company also operates terminals in Mobile, Melvin, and Moundville. JVC, JVC America, Inc. operates an optical disc replication and packaging plant in Tuscaloosa.
The Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company operates a large plant in Gadsden which employs about 1,400 people. It has been in operation since 1929.
Construction of an Airbus A320 family aircraft assembly plant in Mobile was formally announced by Airbus CEO Fabrice Brégier from the Mobile Convention Center on July 2, 2012. The plans include a $600million factory at the Mobile Aeroplex at Brookley, Brookley Aeroplex for the assembly of the A319, A320 and A321 aircraft. Construction began in 2013, with plans for it to become operable by 2015 and produce up to 50 aircraft per year by 2017. The assembly plant is the company's first factory to be built within the United States. It was announced on February 1, 2013, that Airbus had hired Alabama-based Hoar Construction to oversee construction of the facility. The factory officially opened on September 14, 2015, covering one million square feet on 53 acres of flat grassland.
Tourism and entertainment
According to Business Insider, Alabama ranked 14th in most popular states to visit in 2014. An estimated 26 million tourists visited the state in 2017 and spent $14.3 billion, providing directly or indirectly 186,900 jobs in the state, which includes 362,000 International tourists spending $589 million.
The state is home to various attractions, natural features, parks and events that attract visitors from around the globe, notably the annual Hangout Music Festival, held on the public beaches of Gulf Shores, Alabama, Gulf Shores; the Alabama Shakespeare Festival, one of the ten largest Shakespeare festivals in the world; the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail, a collection of championship caliber golf courses distributed across the state; casinos such as Victoryland; amusement parks such as Alabama Splash Adventure; the Riverchase Galleria, one of the largest shopping centers in the southeast; Guntersville Lake, voted the best lake in Alabama by Southern Living Magazine readers; and the Alabama Museum of Natural History, the oldest museum in the state.
Mobile is known for having the oldest organized Mardi Gras in Mobile, Alabama, Mardi Gras celebration in the United States, beginning in 1703. It was also host to the first formally organized Mardi Gras parade in the United States in 1830, a tradition that continues to this day.[ Mardi Gras is an official state holiday in Mobile and Baldwin counties.
In 2018, Mobile's Mardi Gras in Mobile, Alabama, Mardi Gras parade was the state's top event, producing the most tourists with an attendance of 892,811. The top attraction was the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville with an attendance of 849,981, followed by the Birmingham Zoo with 543,090. Of the parks and natural destinations, Alabama's Gulf Coast topped the list with 6,700,000 visitors.
Alabama has historically been a popular region for film shoots due to its diverse landscapes and contrast of environments. Movies filmed in Alabama include: Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Get Out, 42 (film), 42, Selma (film), Selma, Big Fish, The Final Destination, Due Date, Need For Speed (film), Need For Speed and many more.
]
Healthcare
UAB Hospital, University of South Alabama, USA Health University Hospital, Huntsville Hospital System, Huntsville Hospital, and Children's Hospital of Alabama are the only trauma center, LevelI trauma centers in Alabama. UAB is the largest state government employer in Alabama, with a workforce of about 18,000. A 2017 study found that Alabama had the least competitive health insurance market in the country, with Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama having a market share of 84% followed by UnitedHealth Group at 7%.
Banking
Regions Financial Corporation is the largest bank headquartered in or operating in Alabama. PNC Financial Services and Wells Fargo also have a major presence in Alabama.
Wells Fargo has a regional headquarters, an operations center campus, and a $400million data center in Birmingham. Many smaller banks are also headquartered in the Birmingham area, including ServisFirst and New South Federal Savings Bank. Birmingham also serves as the headquarters for several large investment management companies, including Harbert Management Corporation.
Electronics and communications
Telecommunications provider AT&T, formerly BellSouth, has a major presence in Alabama with several large offices in Birmingham.
Many technology companies are headquartered in Huntsville, such as ADTRAN, a network access company; Intergraph, a computer graphics company; and Avocent, an IT infrastructure company.
Construction
Brasfield & Gorrie, BE&K, Hoar Construction, and B.L. Harbert International, based in Alabama and subsidiaries of URS Corporation, are all routinely are included in the Engineering News-Record lists of top design, international construction, and engineering firms.
Law and government
State government
The foundational document for Alabama's government is the Alabama Constitution, which was ratified in 1901. With over 850 amendments and almost 87,000 words, it is by some accounts the world's longest constitution and is roughly forty times the length of the United States Constitution.
There has been a significant movement to rewrite and modernize Alabama's constitution. Critics argue that Alabama's constitution maintains highly centralized power with the state legislature, leaving practically no power in local hands. Most counties do not have home rule. Any policy changes proposed in different areas of the state must be approved by the entire Alabama legislature and, frequently, by state referendum. One criticism of the current constitution claims that its complexity and length intentionally codify segregation and racism.
Alabama's government is divided into three coequal branches. The Legislature, legislative branch is the Alabama Legislature
The Alabama Legislature is the legislative branch of the state government of Alabama. It is a bicameral body composed of the House of Representatives and Senate. It is one of the few state legislatures in which members of both chambers serv ...
, a Bicameralism, bicameral assembly composed of the Alabama House of Representatives, with 105 members, and the Alabama Senate, with 35 members. The Legislature is responsible for writing, debating, passing, or defeating state legislation. The Republican Party (United States), Republican Party currently holds a majority in both houses of the Legislature. The Legislature has the power to override a gubernatorial veto by a simple majority (most state Legislatures require a two-thirds majority to override a veto).
Until 1964, the state elected state senators on a geographic basis by county, with one per county. It had not redistricted congressional districts since passage of its constitution in 1901; as a result, urbanized areas were grossly underrepresented. It had not changed legislative districts to reflect the decennial censuses, either. In ''Reynolds v. Sims'' (1964), the U.S. Supreme Court implemented the principle of "one man, one vote", ruling that congressional districts had to be reapportioned based on censuses (as the state already included in its constitution but had not implemented.) Further, the court ruled that both houses of bicameral state legislatures had to be apportioned by population, as there was no constitutional basis for states to have geographically based systems.
At that time, Alabama and many other states had to change their legislative districting, as many across the country had systems that underrepresented urban areas and districts. This had caused decades of underinvestment in such areas. For instance, Birmingham and Jefferson County taxes had supplied one-third of the state budget, but Jefferson County received only 1/67th of state services in funding. Through the legislative delegations, the Alabama legislature kept control of county governments.
The Executive (government), executive branch is responsible for the execution and oversight of laws. It is headed by the List of governors of Alabama, governor of Alabama. Other members of the executive branch include the cabinet, the List of lieutenant governors of Alabama, lieutenant governor of Alabama, the Attorney General of Alabama, the Secretary of State of Alabama, Alabama Secretary of State, the Alabama State Treasurer, and the State Auditor of Alabama. The current governor is Republican Kay Ivey
Kay Ellen Ivey (born October 15, 1944) is an American politician serving as the 54th and incumbent governor of Alabama since 2017. Originally a conservative Southern Democrat, Ivey became a member of the Republican Party in 2002. She was the 38t ...
.
The members of the Legislature take office immediately after the November elections. Statewide officials, such as the governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, and other constitutional officers, take office the following January.
The judiciary is responsible for interpreting the Constitution of Alabama and applying the law in state criminal and civil cases. The State supreme court, state's highest court is the Supreme Court of Alabama
The Supreme Court of Alabama is the highest court in the state of Alabama. The court consists of a chief justice and eight associate justices. Each justice is elected in partisan elections for staggered six-year terms. The Supreme Court is house ...
. Alabama uses partisan elections to select judges. Since the 1980s judicial campaigns have become increasingly politicized.[Judicial Selection in the States: Alabama](_blank)
, American Judicature Society. The current chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court is Republican Tom Parker (judge), Tom Parker. All sitting justices on the Alabama Supreme Court are members of the Republican Party. There are two intermediate appellate courts, the Court of Civil Appeals and the Court of Criminal Appeals, and four trial courts: the circuit court (trial court of general jurisdiction), and the district, probate, and municipal courts.
Some critics believe the election of judges has contributed to an exceedingly high rate of executions. Alabama has the highest per capita Capital punishment in Alabama, death penalty rate in the country. In some years, it imposes more death sentences than does Texas, a state which has a population five times larger. However, executions per capita are significantly higher in Texas. Some of its cases have been highly controversial; the U.S. Supreme Court has overturned 24 convictions in death penalty cases. It was the only state to allow judges to override jury decisions in whether or not to use a death sentence; in 10 cases judges overturned sentences of Life imprisonment, life imprisonment without parole that were voted unanimously by juries. This judicial authority was removed in April 2017.
Alabama is one of the very few states that does not allow the creation of state lotteries.
Taxes
Taxes are collected by the Alabama Department of Revenue. Alabama levies a 2%, 4%, or5% State income tax, personal income tax, depending on the amount earned and filing status. Taxpayers are allowed to deduct their Income tax in the United States, federal income tax from their Alabama state tax, even if taking the standard deduction; those who itemize can also deduct Federal Insurance Contributions Act tax, FICA (the Social Security and Medicare tax).
The state's general sales tax rate is 4%. Sales tax rates for cities and counties are also added to purchases. For example, the total sales tax rate in Mobile County, Alabama is 10% and there is an additional restaurant tax of 1%, which means a diner in Mobile County, Alabama would pay an 11% tax on a meal.
In 2020, sales and excise taxes in Alabama accounted for 38% of all state and local revenue.
Only Alabama, Mississippi
Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...
, and South Dakota tax groceries at the full state sales tax rate.
The corporate income tax rate in Alabama is 6.5%. The overall federal, state, and local tax burden in Alabama ranks the state as the second least tax-burdened state in the country.
Property taxes of .40% of assessed value per year, are the second-lowest in the U.S., after Hawaii. The current state constitution requires a voter referendum to raise property taxes.
County and local governments
Alabama has 67 county (United States), counties. Each county has its own elected legislative branch, usually called the county commission. It also has limited executive authority in the county. Because of the constraints of the Alabama Constitution, which centralizes power in the state legislature, only seven counties (Jefferson, Lee, Mobile, Madison, Montgomery, Shelby, and Tuscaloosa) in the state have limited home rule. Instead, most counties in the state must lobby the Local Legislation Committee of the state legislature to get simple local policies approved, ranging from waste disposal to land use zoning.
The state legislature has retained power over local governments by refusing to pass a constitutional amendment establishing home rule for counties, as recommended by the 1973 Alabama Constitutional Commission. Legislative delegations retain certain powers over each county. United States Supreme Court decisions in ''Baker v. Carr'' (1964) required that both houses have districts established on the basis of population, and redistricted after each census, to implement the principle of "one man, one vote". Before that, each county was represented by one state senator, leading to under-representation in the state senate for more urbanized, populous counties. The rural bias of the state legislature, which had also failed to redistrict seats in the state house, affected politics well into the 20th century, failing to recognize the rise of industrial cities and urbanized areas.
"The lack of home rule for counties in Alabama has resulted in the proliferation of local legislation permitting counties to do things not authorized by the state constitution. Alabama's constitution has been amended more than 700 times, and almost one-third of the amendments are local in nature, applying to only one county or city. A significant part of each legislative session is spent on local legislation, taking away time and attention of legislators from issues of statewide importance."
Alabama is an alcoholic beverage control state, meaning the state government holds a monopoly on the sale of alcohol. The Alabama Alcoholic Beverage Control Board controls the sale and distribution of alcoholic beverages in the state. A total of 25 of the 67 counties are "Dry county, dry counties" which ban the sale of alcohol, and there are many dry municipalities in counties which permit alcohol sales.
Politics
During Reconstruction following the American Civil War, Alabama was occupied by federal troops of the Third Military District under John Pope (military officer), General John Pope. In 1874, the political coalition of white Democrats known as the Redeemers took control of the state government from the Republicans, in part by suppressing the black vote through violence, fraud, and intimidation.
After 1890, a coalition of White Democratic politicians passed laws to segregate and disenfranchise African American residents, a process completed in provisions of the 1901 constitution. Provisions which disenfranchised blacks resulted in excluding many poor Whites. By 1941 more Whites than Blacks had been disenfranchised: 600,000 to 520,000. The total effects were greater on the black community, as almost all its citizens were disfranchised and relegated to separate and unequal treatment under the law.
From 1901 through the 1960s, the state did not redraw election districts as population grew and shifted within the state during urbanization and industrialization of certain areas. As counties were the basis of election districts, the result was a rural minority that dominated state politics through nearly three-quarters of the century, until a series of federal court cases required redistricting in 1972 to meet equal representation.
Alabama state politics gained nationwide and international attention in the 1950s and 1960s during the civil rights movement, when whites bureaucratically, and at times violently, resisted protests for electoral and social reform. Governor George Wallace, the state's only four-term governor, was a controversial figure who vowed to maintain segregation. Only after passage of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 did African Americans regain the ability to exercise suffrage, among other civil rights. In many jurisdictions, they continued to be excluded from representation by at-large electoral systems, which allowed the majority of the population to dominate elections. Some changes at the county level have occurred following court challenges to establish single-member districts that enable a more diverse representation among county boards.
In 2007, the Alabama Legislature passed, and Republican governor Bob Riley signed a resolution expressing "profound regret" over slavery and its lingering impact. In a symbolic ceremony, the bill was signed in the Alabama State Capitol, which housed Congress of the Confederate States of America.
In 2010, Republicans won control of both houses of the legislature for the first time in 136 years.
, there are a total of 3,589,839 registered voters, with 3,518,285 active, and the others inactive in the state.
Elections
In a 2020 study, Alabama was ranked as the 12th most difficult state for citizens to vote.
State elections
With the disfranchisement of Blacks in 1901, the state became part of the "Solid South", a system in which the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party operated as effectively the only viable political party in every Southern state. For nearly a hundred years local and state elections in Alabama were decided in the Democratic Party primary election, primary, with generally only token Republican Party (United States), Republican challengers running in the General Election. Since the mid- to late 20th century, however, white conservatives started shifting to the Republican Party. In Alabama, majority-white districts are now expected to regularly elect Republican candidates to federal, state and local office.
Members of the nine seats on the Supreme Court of Alabama
The Supreme Court of Alabama is the highest court in the state of Alabama. The court consists of a chief justice and eight associate justices. Each justice is elected in partisan elections for staggered six-year terms. The Supreme Court is house ...
and all ten seats on the state appellate courts are elected to office. Until 1994, no Republicans held any of the court seats. In that general election, the then-incumbent chief justice, Ernest C. Hornsby, refused to leave office after losing the election by approximately 3,000 votes to Republican Perry Hooper Sr., Perry O. Hooper Sr. Hornsby sued Alabama and defiantly remained in office for nearly a year before finally giving up the seat after losing in court. The Democrats lost the last of the nineteen court seats in August 2011 with the resignation of the last Democrat on the bench.
In the early 21st century, Republicans hold all seven of the statewide elected executive branch offices. Republicans hold six of the eight elected seats on the Alabama State Board of Education. In 2010, Republicans took large majorities of both chambers of the state legislature, giving them control of that body for the first time in 136 years. The last remaining statewide Democrat, who served on the Alabama Public Service Commission, was defeated in 2012.
Only three Republican lieutenant governors have been elected since the end of Reconstruction, when Republicans generally represented Reconstruction government, including the newly emancipated freedmen who had gained the franchise. The three GOP lieutenant governors are Steve Windom (1999–2003), Kay Ivey
Kay Ellen Ivey (born October 15, 1944) is an American politician serving as the 54th and incumbent governor of Alabama since 2017. Originally a conservative Southern Democrat, Ivey became a member of the Republican Party in 2002. She was the 38t ...
(2011–2017), and Will Ainsworth
Will Ainsworth (born March 22, 1981) is an American politician serving who is the 31st lieutenant governor of Alabama, since 2019. He formerly was a representative of the 27th district of the Alabama House of Representatives, a position he was el ...
(2019–present).
Local elections
Many local offices (county commissioners, boards of education, tax assessors, tax collectors, etc.) in the state are still held by Democrats. Many rural counties have voters who are majority Democrats, resulting in local elections being decided in the Democratic primary. Similarly many metropolitan and suburban counties are majority-Republican and elections are effectively decided in the Republican Primary, although there are exceptions.
Alabama's 67 county sheriffs are elected in partisan, at-large races, and Democrats still retain the narrow majority of those posts. The current split is 35 Alabama Democratic Party, Democrats, 31 Alabama Republican Party, Republicans, and one Independent Fayette. However, most of the Democratic sheriffs preside over rural and less populated counties. The majority of Republican sheriffs have been elected in the more urban/suburban and heavily populated counties. , the state of Alabama has one female sheriff, in Morgan County, Alabama, and ten African-American sheriffs.
Federal elections
The state's two United States Senate, U.S. senators are Richard Shelby, Richard C. Shelby and Tommy Tuberville
Thomas Hawley Tuberville ( ; born September 18, 1954) is an American retired college football coach and politician serving as the junior United States senator from Alabama since 2021. Before entering politics, Tuberville was the head football co ...
, both of whom are Republican. Shelby was originally elected to the Senate as a Democrat in 1986 and re-elected in 1992, but switched parties immediately following the November 1994 general election.
In the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives, the state is represented by seven members, six of whom are Republicans: (Jerry Carl, Mike Rogers (Alabama politician), Mike Rogers, Robert Aderholt, Mo Brooks, Barry Moore (Alabama politician), Barry Moore, and Gary Palmer (politician), Gary Palmer) and one Democrat: Terri Sewell, who represents the Black Belt as well as most of the predominantly black portions of Birmingham, Tuscaloosa and Montgomery.
Education
Primary and secondary education
Public primary and secondary education in Alabama is under the purview of the Alabama State Board of Education as well as local oversight by 67 county school boards and 60 city boards of education. Together, 1,496 individual schools provide education for 744,637 elementary and secondary students.
Public school funding is appropriated through the Alabama Legislature through the Education Trust Fund. In FY 2006–2007, Alabama appropriated $3,775,163,578 for primary and secondary education. That represented an increase of $444,736,387 over the previous fiscal year. In 2007, more than 82 percent of schools made adequate yearly progress (AYP) toward student proficiency under the National No Child Left Behind Act, No Child Left Behind law, using measures determined by the state of Alabama.
While Alabama's public education system has improved in recent decades, it lags behind in achievement compared to other states. According to U.S. Census data (2000), Alabama's high school graduation rate (75%) is the fourth lowest in the U.S. (after Kentucky, Louisiana and Mississippi). The largest educational gains were among people with some college education but without degrees.
Generally prohibited in the West at large, school corporal punishment is not unusual in Alabama, with 27,260 public school students paddle (spanking), paddled at least one time, according to government data for the 2011–2012 school year. The rate of school corporal punishment in Alabama is surpassed by only Mississippi and Arkansas.
Colleges and universities
Alabama's programs of higher education include 14 four-year public universities, two-year community colleges, and 17 private, undergraduate and graduate universities. In the state are four medical schools (as of fall 2015) (University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Medicine, University of Alabama School of Medicine, University of South Alabama and Alabama College of Osteopathic Medicine and The Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine—Auburn Campus), two veterinary colleges (Auburn University and Tuskegee University), a dental school (UAB School of Dentistry, University of Alabama School of Dentistry), an optometry college (University of Alabama at Birmingham), two pharmacy schools (Auburn University and Samford University), and five law schools (University of Alabama School of Law, Birmingham School of Law, Cumberland School of Law, Miles Law School, and the Thomas Goode Jones School of Law). Public, post-secondary education in Alabama is overseen by the Alabama Commission on Higher Education and the Alabama Department of Postsecondary Education. Colleges and universities in Alabama offer degree programs from two-year associate degrees to a multitude of doctoral level programs.
The largest single campus is the University of Alabama, located in Tuscaloosa, with 37,665 enrolled for fall 2016. Troy University was the largest institution in the state in 2010, with an enrollment of 29,689 students across four Alabama campuses (Troy, Alabama, Troy, Dothan, Alabama, Dothan, Montgomery, and Phenix City
Phenix City is a city in Lee and Russell counties in the U.S. state of Alabama, and the county seat of Russell County. As of the 2020 Census, the population of the city was 38,817.
Phenix City lies immediately west across the Chattahoochee ...
), as well as sixty learning sites in seventeen other states and eleven other countries. The oldest institutions are the public University of North Alabama in Florence and the Catholic Church-affiliated Spring Hill College in Mobile, both founded in 1830.
Accreditation of academic programs is through the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) as well as other subject-focused national and international accreditation agencies such as the Association for Biblical Higher Education (ABHE), the Council on Occupational Education (COE), and the Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools (ACICS).
According to the 2011 ''U.S. News & World Report'', Alabama had three universities ranked in the top 100 Public Schools in America (University of Alabama at 31, Auburn University at 36, and University of Alabama at Birmingham at 73).
According to the 2012 ''U.S. News & World Report'', Alabama had four College and university rankings, tier one universities (University of Alabama, Auburn University, University of Alabama at Birmingham and University of Alabama in Huntsville).
Media
Major newspapers include ''The Birmingham News, Birmingham News'', Mobile ''Press-Register'', and ''Montgomery Advertiser''.
Major television network affiliates in Alabama include:
* American Broadcasting Company, ABC
** WBMA-LD, WGWW 40.2 ABC, Anniston
** WBMA-LD, WBMA 58/WABM, WABM 68.2 ABC, Birmingham
** WDHN 18 ABC, Dothan
** WAAY-TV, WAAY 31 ABC, Huntsville
** WEAR-TV, WEAR 3 ABC Pensacola, Florida/Mobile
** WNCF 32 ABC, Montgomery
** WBMA-LD, WDBB 17.2 ABC, Tuscaloosa
* CBS
** WIAT 42 CBS, Birmingham
** WTVY (TV), WTVY 4 CBS, Dothan
** WHNT 19 CBS, Huntsville
** WKRG 5 CBS, Mobile
** WAKA 8 CBS, Selma/Montgomery
* Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox
** WBRC 6 FOX, Birmingham
** WZDX 54 FOX, Huntsville
** WALA 10 FOX, Mobile
** WCOV-TV, WCOV 20 FOX, Montgomery
** WDFX-TV, WDFX 34 FOX, Ozark/Dothan
* NBC
** WVTM 13 NBC, Birmingham
** WRGX-LD, WRGX 23 NBC, Dothan
** WAFF (TV), WAFF 48 NBC, Huntsville
** WPMI 15 NBC, Mobile
** WSFA 12 NBC, Montgomery
* PBS/Alabama Public Television
** WBIQ 10 PBS, Birmingham
** WIIQ 41 PBS, Demopolis
** WDIQ 2 PBS, Dozier
** WFIQ 36 PBS, Florence
** WHIQ 25 PBS, Huntsville
** WGIQ 43 PBS, Louisville
** WEIQ 42 PBS, Mobile
** WAIQ 26 PBS, Montgomery
** WCIQ 7 PBS, Mount Cheaha
* The CW
** WTTO 21, Homewood/Birmingham
** WTVY (TV), WTVY 4.3, Dothan
** WHDF 15, Florence/Huntsville
** WFNA (TV), WFNA 55, Gulf Shores/Mobile/Pensacola, FL
** WDBB 17, Tuscaloosa
** WBMM 22, Tuskegee/Montgomery
Culture
Literature
Sports
Professional sports
Alabama has several professional and semi-professional sports teams, including three minor league baseball teams.
The Talladega Superspeedway motorsports complex hosts a series of NASCAR events. It has a seating capacity of 143,000 and is the thirteenth largest stadium in the world and sixth largest stadium in America. Also, the Barber Motorsports Park has hosted IndyCar Series and Rolex Sports Car Series races.
The ATP Birmingham was a World Championship Tennis tournament held from 1973 to 1980.
Alabama has hosted several professional golf tournaments, such as the 1984 and 1990 PGA Championship at Shoal Creek Golf and Country Club, Shoal Creek, the Barbasol Championship (PGA Tour), the Mobile LPGA Tournament of Champions, Airbus LPGA Classic, and Yokohama Tire LPGA Classic (LPGA Tour), and The Tradition (Champions Tour).
College sports
College football is extremely popular in Alabama, particularly the University of Alabama Alabama Crimson Tide, Crimson Tide and Auburn University Auburn Tigers, Tigers, rivals in the Southeastern Conference. Alabama averages over 100,000 fans per game and Auburn averages over 80,000—both numbers among the top twenty in the nation. Bryant–Denny Stadium is the home of the Alabama football team, and has a seating capacity of 101,821, and is the fifth largest stadium in America. Jordan-Hare Stadium is the home field of the Auburn football team and seats up to 87,451.
Legion Field is home of the UAB Blazers football program and the Birmingham Bowl. It seats 71,594. Ladd–Peebles Stadium in Mobile is the home of the University of South Alabama football team, and serves as the home of the NCAA Senior Bowl, LendingTree Bowl, and Alabama-Mississippi All Star Classic; the stadium seats 40,646. In 2009, Bryant–Denny Stadium and Jordan-Hare Stadium became the homes of the Alabama High School Athletic Association state football championship games, after previously being held at Legion Field in Birmingham.
Transportation
Aviation
Major airports with sustained operations in Alabama include Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport (BHM), Huntsville International Airport (HSV), Dothan Regional Airport (DHN), Mobile Regional Airport (MOB), Montgomery Regional Airport (MGM), Northwest Alabama Regional Airport (MSL) and Northeast Alabama Regional Airport (GAD).
Rail
For rail transport, Amtrak schedules the ''Crescent (train), Crescent'', a daily passenger train, running from New York to New Orleans with station stops at Anniston station, Anniston, Birmingham station (Alabama), Birmingham, and Tuscaloosa station, Tuscaloosa.
Roads
Alabama has six major interstate routes: Interstate 65 in Alabama, Interstate 65 (I-65) travels north–south roughly through the middle of the state; Interstate 20 in Alabama, I-20/Interstate 59 in Alabama, I-59 travel from the central west Mississippi state line to Birmingham, where I-59 continues to the north-east corner of the state and I-20 continues east towards Atlanta; Interstate 85 in Alabama, I-85 originates in Montgomery and travels east-northeast to the Georgia state line, providing a main thoroughfare to Atlanta; and Interstate 10 in Alabama, I-10 traverses the southernmost portion of the state, traveling from west to east through Mobile. Interstate 22 in Alabama, I-22 enters the state from Mississippi and connects Birmingham with Memphis, Tennessee. In addition, there are currently five auxiliary interstate routes in the state: Interstate 165 (Alabama), I-165 in Mobile, Interstate 359, I-359 in Tuscaloosa, Interstate 459, I-459 around Birmingham, Interstate 565, I-565 in Decatur and Huntsville, and Interstate 759, I-759 in Gadsden. A sixth route, Interstate 685 (Alabama), I-685, will be formed when I-85 is rerouted along a new southern bypass of Montgomery. A proposed northern bypass of Birmingham will be designated as Interstate 422, I-422. Since a direct connection from I-22 to I-422 will not be possible, Interstate 222, I-222 has been proposed, as well.
Several U.S. Highways also pass through the state, such as U.S. Route 11 in Alabama, U.S. Route 11 (US-11), U.S. Route 29 in Alabama, US-29, U.S. Route 31 in Alabama, US-31, U.S. Route 43 in Alabama, US-43, U.S. Route 45 in Alabama, US-45, U.S. Route 72 in Alabama, US-72, U.S. Route 78 in Alabama, US-78, U.S. Route 80 in Alabama, US-80, U.S. Route 82 in Alabama, US-82, U.S. Route 84 in Alabama, US-84, U.S. Route 90 in Alabama, US-90, U.S. Route 98 in Alabama, US-98, U.S. Route 231 in Alabama, US-231, U.S. Route 278 in Alabama, US-278, U.S. Route 280 in Alabama, US-280, U.S. Route 331 in Alabama, US-331, U.S. Route 411 in Alabama, US-411, and U.S. Route 431 in Alabama, US-431.
There are four toll roads in the state: Montgomery Expressway in Montgomery; Northport/Tuscaloosa Western Bypass in Tuscaloosa and Northport, Alabama, Northport; Emerald Mountain Expressway in Wetumpka; and Beach Express in Orange Beach, Alabama, Orange Beach.
Ports
The Port of Mobile, Alabama's only saltwater port, is a large seaport on the Gulf of Mexico with inland waterway access to the Midwestern United States, Midwest by way of the Tennessee–Tombigbee Waterway. The Port of Mobile was ranked 12th by tons of traffic in the United States during 2009. The newly expanded Container port, container terminal at the Port of Mobile was ranked as the 25th busiest for container traffic in the nation during 2011. The state's other ports are on rivers with access to the Gulf of Mexico.
Water ports of Alabama, listed from north to south:
See also
* Index of Alabama-related articles
* Outline of Alabama — organized list of topics about Alabama
Notes
Subnotes
Other notes
References
Further reading
* Atkins, Leah Rawls, Wayne Flynt, William Warren Rogers, and David Ward. ''Alabama: The History of a Deep South State'' (1994).
* Flynt, Wayne. ''Alabama in the Twentieth Century'' (2004).
* Owen Thomas M. ''History of Alabama and Dictionary of Alabama Biography'' (4 vols, 1921).
* Jackson, Harvey H. ''Inside Alabama: A Personal History of My State'' (2004).
* Mohl, Raymond A. "Latinization in the Heart of Dixie: Hispanics in Late-twentieth-century Alabama" ''Alabama Review'' (2002, 55(4): 243–274).
* Peirce, Neal R. ''The Deep South States of America: People, Politics, and Power in the Seven Deep South States'' (1974).
* Williams, Benjamin Buford. ''A Literary History of Alabama: The Nineteenth Century'' (1979).
* WPA ''Guide to Alabama'' (1939).
External links
*
*
Alabama State Guide, from the Library of Congress
Your Not So Ordinary Alabama Tourist Guide
, at the Alabama Department of Archives and History
Code of Alabama 1975
USGS real-time, geographic, and other scientific resources of Alabama
from the U.S. Census Bureau
Alabama State Fact Sheet
*
{{coord, 33, -87, dim:300000_region:US-AL_type:adm1st, name=State of Alabama, display=title
Alabama,
1819 establishments in the United States
Southern United States
States and territories established in 1819
States of the Confederate States of America
States of the Gulf Coast of the United States
States of the United States
U.S. states with multiple time zones
Contiguous United States
List of place names of Choctaw origin in the United States