Alabama legislature approves pardons for Rosa Parks, civil rights activists News
Alabama legislature approves pardons for Rosa Parks, civil rights activists

[JURIST] The Alabama Legislature [official website] on Monday approved a bill that would pardon Rosa Parks [TIME profile], the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. [King Center profile] and other civil rights activists convicted of violating Jim Crow laws in the state. Under an amendment to the bill, the arrest records of Parks and others would remain at museums where they are on display. The state House of Representatives first approved the bill [JURIST report] last month, and the State Senate approved the bill with changes, which were approved by the House late Monday. The bill now goes to Gov. Bob Riley [official website] for signature.

Rosa Parks helped trigger the civil rights movement across the country after she was arrested in Montgomery, AL, in 1955 for refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white man. Parks died last year [JURIST report] at the age of 92. AP has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Georgia became first US state to ban lynching

On December 20, 1893, Georgia became the first state in the Union to pass a law against lynching, making the act punishable by four years in prison. The statute was not particularly effective—read the text of the 1899 pamphlet Lynch Law in Georgia by anti-lynching activist Ida Wells-Barnett.