There's a thread here on DU about this already (
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1028481) and when I read the article I couldn't believe the argument against revising the amendment - taxes.
Here's a clip from the article found here:
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=1802&u=/washpost/20041128/ts_washpost/a16443_2004nov27&printer=1<clip>There are people here who are still fighting the Civil War," said Tommy Woods, 63, a deacon at Bethel and a retired school administrator. "They're holding on to things that are long since past. It's almost like a religion."
There are competing theories about the defeat of Amendment 2, the measure that would have taken "colored children" and segregated schools out of Alabama's constitution. One says latent, persistent racism was to blame; another says voters are suspicious of all constitutional amendments; and a third says it was not about race but about taxes.
The amendment had two main parts: the removal of the separate-schools language and the removal of a passage -- inserted in the 1950s in an attempt to counter the Brown v. Board of Education ruling against segregated public schools -- that said Alabama's constitution does not guarantee a right to a public education. Leading opponents, such as Alabama Christian Coalition President John Giles, said they did not object to removing the passage about separate schools for "white and colored children." But, employing an argument that was ridiculed by most of the state's newspapers and by legions of legal experts, Giles and others said guaranteeing a right to a public education would have opened a door for "rogue" federal judges to order the state to raise taxes to pay for improvements in its public school system. <end clip>