Alabama Enshrines Secret Ballots

Amendment 7 makes the right to a secret ballot a "fundamental" part of the state constitution

Voters elected to keep language requiring separate schools for black and white students intact within the Alabama Constitution by rejecting Amendment 4 on Tuesday, responding to outcry from educators and legislators that argued the amendment did not go far enough in its attempts to rewrite the state's most powerful document.

Federal law has since made the controversial language, which also requires the levy of a poll tax, legally obsolete. But the amendment's supporters had argued that the language sent the wrong message about Alabama to individuals and entities outside the state.