By Brandon Moseley
Alabama Political Reporter
Monday, September 21, State Auditor Jim Zeigler (R) responded to criticism leveled at him by the Southern Poverty Law Center for speaking on Thursday, September 17, to the pro-secession group, “The League of the South.”
Auditor Zeigler spoke back at the criticism: “The Southern Political Correctness Center is harassing me for speaking to the League of the South about my efforts to return the Wallace portraits to their legal and historical place in the capitol rotunda. Their inaccurate and biased opposition will only help me and this mission.”
Zeigler said, “Here was my response: As long as I am an elected servant of the citizens of Alabama, I will side with those who built our heritage, not with those who tear it down.”
Southern Poverty Law Center President Richard Cohen said on Monday, “It’s quite unfortunate that a public official would lend legitimacy to a hate group by appearing at one of its functions. And believe me, the League of the South is about hate, not heritage.”
The League of the South advocates for southern secession, though it states that it opposes the violent overthrow of the federal government or any of the states. According to League of the South President Dr. Michael Hill, “The League of the South is a Southern Nationalist organization whose ultimate goal is a free and independent Southern republic.” “At present, the League is more concerned with the survival of our people on their ancestral lands and resurrecting our cultural base than with entering into the conventional political arena. Once our Southern nation is secure and our culture is re-established, then the political issues will begin to take care of themselves.”
Some have accused the League of the South of being racist.
President Hill wrote recently that, “A free South will have a name and place among the nations of the earth. And we will understand the meaning of the term “nation.” It means people of historic European stock. We will not be a “melting pot” or a misnamed “nation of immigrants.” Others already have their own countries; the South is ours. From this premise flows our immigration policy.” “That policy will be one that serves the interests and needs of our people, our Folk, our nation. It will not serve sentimental fantasies about the “huddled masses” of immigrants that pour into the USA. Neither will it serve the utopian fanatics who wish to remake society in the image of anti-white “diversity.” And it will not serve profiteers with endless streams of cheap labor.”
Dr. Hill writes that, “The strength of a nation-state is continuity from past to future. Currently, the USA regime is engaged in endless demographic revolution, fed continuously by Third World immigration of non-Whites from Central and South America, Asia, Africa, and various Muslim countries. Therefore, the immigration policy of a free South will not bring radical changes to our people and lands.” “Southern immigration policy will limit the overall numbers of immigrants to prevent burgeoning population growth and attendant problems of overcrowding, excessive urban and suburban development, and environmental stress. Our new policy will limit immigration to people of historic European ancestry, thereby preventing extensive changes to the South’s racial/ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic make-up.” “Candidates for immigration to a free South shall be people of good character and the possessors of skills and talents deemed useful to our society. We shall also permit entry to a selected number of foreigners, who, as refugees, are fleeing genuine persecution such as whites in South Africa and the former Rhodesia.”
Auditor Zeigler has passionately argued for returning the portraits of former Governors Lurleen and George C Wallace to their places on the Second Floor of the Capitol Rotunda, as required by state law.
Alabama’s Director of Historic Sites, Dr. Stephen McNair, moved the Wallace portraits January 15. McNair has since been replaced; but the portraits have not.
Zeigler said removal of the Wallace portraits was “unauthorized, violated a joint resolution of the legislature, and was an attempt to revise Alabama history.”
Zeigler said, “This was a wrong that needs to be righted,” Zeigler said at the River Region Republican March meeting in Montgomery. We need to preserve our state’s heritage. These politically-correct government officials want their own version of history instead of what actually happened.”
Zeigler has also defended the Capitol gift store selling Confederate merchandise and opposed Governor Robert Bentley (R)’s controversial decision to take down the Confederate flags from the First Whitehouse of the Confederacy and the Confederate Veterans Memorial.
The Republican supermajority punished Zeigler with a 25 percent cut to his office last Wednesday when the 2016 State General Fund Budget was passed. Less essential agencies like Commerce, ADECA, and Tourism received much smaller cuts on a percentage basis.
