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Alabama Defies Supreme Court Ruling on Bible Reading in Public Schools

August 7, 1963
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The Alabama State Board of Education adopted unanimously yesterday a resolution generally considered an act of defiance against the United States Supreme Court decision last June barring Bible reading in public schools.

The resolution requires such study in Alabama schools and, with it, the Board adopted a statement of denunciation of the court decision as a “calculated effort to take God out of the public affairs of this nation.”

Gov. George Wallace, who temporarily blocked a Federal court order for admission of two Negroes to the University of Alabama earlier this year, said he would personally oppose any Federal action against the new school Bible reading order. He said that, if the courts ruled that “we cannot read the Bible in some school” while he was governor, “I’m going to that school and read it myself.”

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