Georgia supreme court clears way for KKK group to adopt a highway

[Eugene]

Source: Associated Press

Georgia’s highest court granted a victory to a Ku Klux Klan group that has been seeking for years to participate in a highway cleanup program, dismissing an appeal on a technicality.

The Georgia supreme court on Tuesday rejected the state’s appeal of a lower court decision that the state had violated the KKK group’s free speech rights. The department of transportation filed its appeal incorrectly, leaving the high court without authority to consider its merits, the opinion said.

The state attorney general’s office, which represents the department, is reviewing the decision and considering its options, spokesman Nicholas Genesi said in an email.

The north Georgia KKK group applied to join the state’s Adopt-A-Highway program in May 2012, hoping to pick up litter along part of Route 515 in the Appalachian Mountains. The program was started in 1989 to get volunteers to clean up sections of roads in the state. In exchange, the department of transportation posts a sponsorship sign along the road with the program logo and the volunteer group’s name.

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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jul/05/kkk-georgia-klan-highway-adoption-legal

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Associated Press in Atlanta
Tuesday 5 July 2016 21.44 BST

[bluestateguy]

1. Disgusting

America's oldest and deadliest terrorist group.

This is the equivalent of allowing ISIS to adopt a highway.

[anigbrowl]

27. 1st amendment's a pain sometimes

KKK is a loathsome organization, but their loathsome views are constitutionally protected speech, just like my characterizations of the organization and its members as horrible people who should do the world a favor and kill themselves.

[jpak]

2. How 'Bout Them Dawgs!!!1

Old Times Thar Are Not Fergotten'

etc.

yup

[jtuck004]

6. Old times? There are KKK members all over the place. And lots of folks

who agree with them but haven't got the spine to join. They would rather hurt black folks from the back, like most white racists.

[jpak]

11. ummm.... the Klan was Southern born and Southern bred

just sayin'

yup

[jtuck004]

17. Do you think there is a wall around those ideas? In a country founded on them?

In a country where I can find examples of racism every god damn day, in every god damn city in the place?

The letters are in their hearts, not on their sleeves.

Just sayin'.

[montana_hazeleyes]

18. You are telling it like it really is!

[jpak]

23. You can take the Klan outta the South, but you can't take the South outta the Klan

History is often inconvenient....

yup

[npk]

24. Yes your history of idiocy is also very inconvenient

I don't even know what your comment means but I am sure it all make sense to you.

[logosoco]

3. They did that here in Missouri.

It did not work well. I think they had to take the sign down because everyone was throwing their trash out in that spot!

[63splitwindow]

5. My first thought but...

I was thinking maybe shredded Confederate flags after bathroom duty or other appropriate trash.

[lastlib]

13. And if I recall correctly, the state renamed that highway....

..designated it the "Martin Luther King Memorial Highway." Poetic justice--the KKK cleaning the MLK highway!

[logosoco]

20. I think it was named for Rosa Parks.

I know there is a stretch of highway named that!

[lastlib]

22. you're probably right!

[greymattermom]

4. ok

Just make sure they clean it up. If there is mess, let all take pictures of it and post it everywhere.

[Midnight Writer]

15. There you go. Hold them accountable.

Ted Nugent "adopted" a highway in my area and it is covered with litter and road kill. Have never seen a single person out there picking up trash and road kill.

[msanthrope]

7. Let 'em pick up trash on the MLK Memorial Highway. Don't have one? Time to name one. nt

[CanonRay]

8. If you've ever wanted to litter with utter abandon

Go drive their stretch of highway and have fun.

[oasis]

25. +1

[rurallib]

9. they'd go out in daylight with their faces uncovered and admit to being in the Klan?

brilliant!




for the humor impaired.

[jmowreader]

19. Klan Robes are old-school

A lot of states passed laws to stop people from doing what the Klan does with their faces covered, so they've quit covering their faces.

[surrealAmerican]

10. This should cause us to question ...

... why the "adopt a highway" program even exists.

In a more rational country, keeping public property clean and maintained would be a public responsibility - paid for by taxes, and preformed by well paid public employees. I guess we can't do that here, though. It might mean higher taxes for somebody.

[Phentex]

21. or why people litter in the first place...

I can't imagine thinking to myself, "I'm just gonna hurl this stuff outta my car..."

And why don't people use ashtrays anymore?

[Snarkoleptic]

12. I hate littering, but it may be time to hurl dildos and asswiped confederate

flags along this stretch of road.

[packman]

14. Make them clean that highway wearing their white robes

and funny pointed hats. Hell, give them a backwoods dirt highway and tell them to keep it clean.

[RAFisher]

16. How do people feel about the ACLU representing the KKK?

And this is not the first time the ACLU represented something very unpopular.

[TeddyR]

26. The ACLU

Is about the most principled organization in the US. They stand for certain principles and defend those principles, even for groups who aren't particularly popular.