United States v. Paradise: Another Look at Alabama's Hiring Quota

Abstract

INTRODUCTION|The Alabama highway patrol has, on more than one occasion, occupied center stage in the constitutional struggle to define the meaning, scope, and extent of "the equal protection of the laws." In 1963, state troopers flanked Alabama Governor George C. Wallace when he refused to desegregate the University of Alabama in defiance of a federal court order. In 1965, the United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama issued an injunction enjoining Governor Wallace from employing the state troopers to intimidate, threaten, coerce, or interfere with the proposed freedom march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama. Seven years later, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) brought suit against the director of the Alabama Department of Public Safety (Department) and the personnel director of the Alabama Personnel Department. The NAACP alleged that the Directors "have followed a continuous and pervasive pattern and practice of excluding Negroes from employment in the Department of Public Safety...