Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: It takes an act of Congress

  Last week we talked about how difficult it is to win passage of a piece of legislation in the Alabama Legislature. It does not matter if the proposed bill is for apple pie and motherhood. If for nothing else, the bill has to go before both House and Senate committees, win approval, and not get an amendment put on it. If it gets an amendment placed on it, it has to basically start all over again. It then has to get placed on the special order calendar set by the Rules Committee, and there are hundreds of bills waiting to get on this calendar. Only a few bills ever get on the calendar each day, and there are only 30 legislative days in the session. If it gets on the calendar, it then has to pass both chambers and hopefully the governor is also for apple pie and motherhood, because if he vetoes it, it has to start all over again.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: Becoming VOCAL

  Five days before Christmas in 1976 a beautiful, bright Birmingham-Southern coed named Quenette Shehane was going to a convenience store near her home close to the campus in Birmingham. She was making a quick trip to get salad dressing to go with the steaks she and her boyfriend were cooking at his fraternity house. Quenette never made it back. She was kidnapped from the store parking lot. Her body was found the next day.

  After several years of anguish and justice system logjams, Quenette’s murderers were found and finally tried. One was executed nearly 14 years after the crime. Another was sentenced to life in prison and the third was also sentenced to life in prison but without the possibility of parole.