A Historians Tribute To Thomas Goode Jones

Thomas Goode Jones of Alabama is the first comprehensive biography of a key Alabama politician and federal jurist whose life and times embody the conflicts and transformations in the Deep South between the Civil War and World War I.

A Rift in the Clouds chronicles the efforts of three white southern federal judges to protect the civil rights of African Americans at the beginning of the twentieth century, when few in the American legal community were willing to do so. Jacob Treiber of Arkansas, Emory Speer of Georgia, and Thomas Goode Jones of Alabama challenged the Supreme Court's reading of the Reconstruction amendments that were passed in an attempt to make disfranchised and exploited African Americans equal citizens of the United States. These unpopular white southerners, two of whom who had served in the Confederate Army and had themselves helped to bring Reconstruction to an end in their states, asserted that the amendments not only established black equality, but authorized the government to protect blacks. Although their rulings won few immediate gains for blacks and were overturned by the Supreme Court, their legal arguments would be resurrected, and meet with greater success, over half a century later during the civil rights movement.

Taming Alabama focuses on persons and groups who sought to bring about reforms in the political, legal, and social worlds of Alabama. Most of the subjects of these essays accepted the fundamental values of nineteenth and early twentieth century white southern society; and all believed, or came to believe, in the transforming power of law. As a starting point in creating the groundwork of genuine civility and progress in the state, these reformers insisted on equal treatment and due process in elections, allocation of resources, and legal proceedings. To an educator like Julia Tutwiler or a clergyman like James F. Smith, due process was a question of simple fairness or Christian principle. To lawyers like Benjamin F. Porter, Thomas Goode Jones, or Henry D. Clayton, devotion to due process was part of the true religion of the common law. To a former Populist radical like Joseph C. Manning, due process and a free ballot were requisites for the transformation of society.

When one reads the history of the state of Alabama, courageous judicial decisions appears to be an oxymoron because there have not been many such decisions. Most that did occur were related in some fashion to the racial problems that have existed in Alabama from the very beginning of statehood. It is important that we understand just what we mean when we speak of courage. Sustained courage emanates from character, which in itself takes a lifetime to build. Courage can be defined as the moral strength that permits one to face fear and difficulty. Courage requires a certain amount of leadership, and this leadership behavior is admirable and excellent. Making judicial decisions that changed ways of living in Alabama during the days of segregation required courage. These decisions could have severe consequences for ones safety and could affect ones family. Yet despite the potential consequences, there were at least four judges in Alabama who made decisions based on what they thought was the right thing to do and would lead Alabama in the right direction. The judges whose names come immediately to the forefront are George Stone, Thomas G. Jones, James E. Horton Jr., and Frank M. Johnson.