For most of the nation, Alabama government is emblemized by Governor George Wallace blocking the entry to the University of Alabama, defying court-ordered integration and championing states'-rights slogans. But Wallace’s return to power in the 1980s witnessed sweeping social and political changes in Alabama. Today the state for the most part enjoys the aura of "the new South." James D. Thomas and William H. Stewart, both natives of Alabama, bring a detailed sense of its colorful past to their forward-looking book about its government and political institutions.

In the course of writing about Alabama's legislative, administrative, and judiciary branches; its local politics; and its historic relations with the federal government, Thomas and Stewart reveal much about life today in this southern state. Low taxes, industrialization and urbanization, the civil rights movement, and a trend toward two-party politics have helped to usher in dramatic changes. Although continued change is in the wind, the authors do not think that Alabama's political institutions will soon lose their distinctive Alabama character, and no book has ever described that better than Alabama Government and Politics.

James D. Thomas is an emeritus professor and William H. Stewart a professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Alabama. Professor Thomas is the author of Government in Alabama (1969; revised edition, 1974). Professor Stewart's recent publications include Concepts of Federalism (1984) and the chapter on Alabama in The 1984 Presidential Election in the South (1986).

"Alabama Government and Politics will be the book on Alabama politics. It will also be useful to students of state politics everywhere."—Daniel J. Elazar, Temple University