Everything Wrong with Mississippi

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Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission
No Southern state was more resistant to segregation than Mississippi. Initiating a ‘southern respectable’ resistance, Mississippi set out to create a permanent authority for the maintenance of racial segregation, fully staffed and state funded. On May 20, 1956, Mississippi state legislators passed House Bill 880 establishing the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission (MSSC) as part of the executive branch, under the protection of the U.S. Constitutional 10th amendment, [“powers not delegated to the United States by the constitution or prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people” (Bill of Rights Transcript Text, 2014)] and the institutional order of federalism.
HOUSE BILL 880
House Bill (HB) 880 creating the Sovereignty Commission was a legitimate effect to legally protect ‘segregation’ and prevent federal mandated ‘integration.’ Cleverly constructed, HB 880 under the guise of ‘protect the sovereignty of Mississippi’ [Mississippi’s segregated way of life] from federal encroachment [forced integration], reflected its true purpose, “the perfect weapon in the battle against segregation” (Williams, 2011, p. 139). Jackson Daily News reported; the powers vested to the sovereignty commission “virtually amount to a blank check” (Katagiri, 2001, p. 6) citing a generous budget and ambiguous powers.
Section 5 of HB 880 granted authority to do and perform “any and all acts and things deemed necessary and proper to protect the sovereignty of Mississippi and her sister states from encroachment thereon by the federal government or any other branch, department or agency thereof…” then goes on to affirm through Section 6, “the commission may co-operate with on...

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Sovereignthy Commission Online. (2002). Retrieved from MIssissippi Department of Archives and History : http://mdah.state.ms.us/arrec/digital_archives/sovcom/scagencycasehistory.php.
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Williams, M. V. (2011). Medgar Evers: Mississippi Martyr. Fayetteville : The University of Arkansas Press .

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