This is an opinion column.

When Alabama drew its legislative districts after the 2010 census, Republican lawmakers insisted the process was fair. They were bending over backward to make sure African-Americans were well represented in the Alabama Legislature, Congress and other state offices.

Really! Hand on a Bible!

Sure, it was packing a lot of black voters into a handful of districts, but that was to make certain those folks had people who looked like them in elected office, they argued.

Swear to God!

And some of them did after they got sued. Black lawmakers challenged the new district lines, and the state fought them all the way to the United States Supreme Court — which saw through the nonsense and told Alabama to draw the district lines over again.

However, there was another part of this story that wasn’t reported because it was still secret. But now, thanks to an estranged daughter who inherited her deceased father’s hard drive, that secret is out in the open.

Earlier this year, Stephanie Hofeller, the daughter of national Republican gerrymandering expert Tom Hofeller, began making her deceased father’s papers, emails and other documents public. Those documents have already revealed Hofeller worked with state and federal officials to suppress minority representation and maximize Republican advantages in state and federal elections.

And now new documents show he had a hand in Alabama, too.

On Monday, the investigative journalism website The Intercept reported Hofeller worked with Alabama Republicans and lawyers they hired to draw district lines. He revised and edited guidelines for redistricting and met with state officials. Those documents show Hofeller kept spreadsheets on the racial makeup of Alabama’s electorate, lists of minority districts, and a link to census estimates labeled “Alabama 18 and older race link.”

And he exchanged emails with Rep. Jim McClendon, who chaired the redistricting commission before he moved to the Senate last year.

Only, McClendon and Hofeller didn’t write back and forth through McClendon’s government email address. McClendon used a private account, effectively putting those conversations out of reach of the state’s open records law.

This wasn’t an accident.

As the New Yorker reported earlier this month, secrecy was kind of Hofeller’s thing, and he coached Republican strategists and officials on how to keep their communications away from the public.

On any map, racial gerrymandering is obvious, and historically the Supreme Court has taken a lax view on drawing district lines to maximize political advantage.

But when you actually see it, when it’s out in the open — well, it’s just gross.

And it has a significant impact on our politics and on how people across racial lines see and deal with each other.

In Alabama, we effectively have a white people’s party and a black people’s party. And it shows, over and over again.

In the Alabama Legislature, every Republican is white. All but two Democrats are black. And when those lawmakers go home, all they see — all they have to answer to — are people who look just like them.

That divide has sharpened as black Democrats have begun to call out white Republicans every time they get run slap over in the State House. Earlier this year, Alabama House Speaker Mac McCutcheon warned lawmakers against being nasty to each other after black lawmakers protested too loudly. He didn’t call out the Democrats explicitly, but it was clear who he was talking to.

State Rep. Thomas Jackson, D-Thomasville, argued back, saying race was the thing dividing the chamber, now more than ever before.

“Back then we had Jim Crow,” Jackson said on the House floor. “Now we have James Crow Esq. He puts on a suit and tie, but it’s still the same.”

It was clear then when Thomas said it. It’s clearer now. This racial divide is no accident. It was designed to work that way, and the line was drawn to decidedly benefit only those on one side of it.

Hofeller might be dead. But James Crow Esq. is very much alive.

Kyle Whitmire is the state political columnist for the Alabama Media Group.

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