Longtime Mississippi Sierra Club Director Louie Miller talks about Mississippi’s state parks system, which has suffered from decades of neglected maintenance. The Sierra Club opposes a current push to privatize state parks, and says Mississippi should instead use some of the billions in federal stimulus money flowing to the state to upgrade the state’s parks, and keep them affordable and accessible to Mississippians.
In episode 105 & 106, We have a special guest, JUSTIN (yes, that one) to discuss Stephen King and his intertwining stories in depth for a whimsical two-parter.
All Cats is part of the Truthseekers Podcast Network.
In this episode of Mississippi Stories, esteemed 2016 – 2021 Mississippi Poet Laureate, author and Ole Miss professor Beth Ann Fennelly sits down with Mississippi Today Editor-At-Large Marshall Ramsey to talk about her writing, creativity and how she plows through setbacks.
Fennelly is the author of three poetry collections: Unmentionables (W.W. Norton, 2008), Tender Hooks (W.W. Norton, 2004), and Open House (Zoo Press, 2002), which was a winner of the 2001 Kenyon Review Prize, the Great Lakes College Association New Writers Award and a Book Sense Top Ten Poetry Pick. She is also the author of the nonfiction book Great with Child: Letters to a Young Mother (W.W. Norton, 2007) and coauthor, alongside her husband Tom Franklin, of the novel The Tilted World (HarperCollins, 2014). Her sixth book, Heating & Cooling: 52 Micro-Memoirs (W.W. Norton, 2017), was named an Atlanta Journal Constitution Best Book, a Goodreaders Favorite for 2017, and the winner of the Housatonic Book Prize.
Fennelly teaches in the MFA Program at the University of Mississippi, where she was named Outstanding Teacher of the Year. She and Franklin live in Oxford with their three children. You can purchase Heating & Cooling: 52 Micro-Memoirs at Square Books.
Roger Wicker, Mississippi’s senior U.S. senator, made national headlines last week when he criticized President Joe Biden’s promise to nominate an African American woman to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer.
During a recent interview on Mississippi’s statewide conservative radio network, Wicker said the nominee would be “the beneficiary” of a “quota.”
Wicker offered nary a single word of criticism in 2020 after the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg when then-President Donald Trump promised to nominate a woman to the nation’s highest court.
Wicker’s comments beg the question: Why is he OK if a president promises to nominate a woman, but he’s not OK when a president promises to nominate a Black woman?
Is the problem, from his perspective, one of race and not of gender?
When asked that question a few days after the radio interview, Wicker said in an e-mailed response: “When Mr. Biden was trailing in the primaries, he made a promise to consider only Black females for the Supreme Court vacancy. Some 76% of Americans disagree with such a position, saying it is best for the president to choose from among all qualified applicants for the job.”
Former President Trump also was in the midst of a presidential campaign — for re-election — when he made the commitment to nominate a woman to replace Ginsburg.
And in 2016, during his first campaign, Trump released a list of potential nominees for the Supreme Court who consisted solely of white people. Wicker also did not have a problem with that list. Was the all-white list a “quota?”
It must not have been in Wicker’s eyes.
Later that summer at the Neshoba County Fair, Wicker offered a full-throated endorsement of Trump and offered no thoughts on the list of solely white people he had offered as potential Supreme Court nominees should he win the presidency, which he did later that year.
In recent years, Wicker, a former state senator and U.S. House member who was elected to the U.S. Senate is 2008, has taken some brave stands — stands that many believed could hurt him politically.
In 2015, Wicker and Thad Cochran, then the state’s senior U.S. senator, on the same day announced their support for changing the state flag, which incorporated the Confederate battle emblem in its design. Their announcements came in the wake of the shooting at a Charleston, S.C., church killing nine African Americans by a white supremist who highlighted the Confederate flag on his social media page.
Wicker and Cochran were among the first Republican politicians in the state to take such a stand.
He said, in part, at the time: “I have not viewed Mississippi’s current state flag as offensive. However, it is clearer and clearer to me that many of my fellow citizens feel differently and that our state flag increasingly portrays a false impression of our state to others.
“In I Corinthians 8, the Apostle Paul said he had no personal objection to eating meat sacrificed to idols. But he went on to say that ‘if food is a cause of trouble to my brother, or makes my brother offend, I will give up eating meat.’ The lesson from this passage leads me to conclude that the flag should be removed since it causes offense to so many of my brothers and sisters, creating dissention rather than unity.”
Then in 2021, Wicker was the sole Republican in Mississippi’s congressional delegation to vote to certify the presidential election over the protests of Trump, who argued despite no evidence that he had won. Trump was in essence calling for the overthrow of the U.S. system of government. Wicker would have no part in it.
And more recently, Wicker was the only Mississippi Republican to vote for the landmark Biden infrastructure bill.
“I served with Roger Wicker,” said state Rep. Robert Johnson, D-Natchez, a member of the Legislative Black Caucus, referring to when Wicker was a state senator. “I know he is not a racist. I like Roger, but his comment sounded racist. He is better than that.”
Perhaps talking on the conservative radio show, Wicker felt he needed to try to build his credibility with Trump supporters when he spoke of quotas — to save face politically with hardcore conservatives after some of those brave stands.
On the radio show, Wicker proclaimed the Biden nominee “will probably not get a single Republican vote” in the U.S. Senate.
But speaking days later in response to questions, he took a more moderate tone.
“I will review the president’s nominee on the basis of her qualifications and judicial philosophy,” he said. “Republicans will accord her all the courtesy and respect that was not shown to (Republican judicial nominees) Brett Kavanaugh, Clarence Thomas, Miguel Estrada, and Janice Rogers Brown.”
Mississippi Today higher education reporter Molly Minta joined MSNBC’s Last Word show on Feb. 4 to discuss her recent article featuring Mississippi’s only critical race theory course.
As Mississippi Republican lawmakers push to ban critical race theory from being taught in the classroom, Minta featured Brittany Murphree, a Republican student who wrote a letter to lawmakers arguing that they had it wrong about the class.
Minta, a Florida native, covers higher education for Mississippi Today. She works in partnership with Open Campus, a nonprofit news organization focused on higher education. Prior to joining Mississippi Today, Molly worked for The Nation, The Appeal, and Mother Jones.
CLEVELAND — More than 150 people paid tribute to Lusia “Lucy” Stewart-Harris Saturday at Delta State University’s Walter Sillers Coliseum, the arena where the “queen of basketball” had played.
The two-hour ceremony underscored the impact that Harris, the powerful 6’3 center, had on every community she was a part of: Minter City, her hometown; Delta State University; the Mississippi Delta region; and her four children and their ten grandchildren.
Harris was remembered not only as a basketball legend, but as a humble, loving mother.
“I want everyone to know that Lucy Harris from the Mississippi Delta, land of cotton and long roads through fields, (was) the best basketball player in the world,” said Sen. David Jordan of Greenwood. “She’s the best. She’s a record maker and a record breaker.”
Lusia “Lucy” Harris
Harris passed away on Jan. 18 at age 66. Her silver coffin was adorned with colorful bouquets, and a portrait of her sat underneath the banners commemorating her three national titles.
In 1975, Harris was the only Black woman on Delta State’s Lady Statesmen when she led the team to its first national title, an achievement she’d repeat two more times before graduating. She scored the first-ever basket in Women’s Olympic basketball history, and in 1977, she became the first — and so far only — woman to receive an official offer to play for the NBA. Pregnant with her first child, Harris turned down the offer and took a job coaching basketball at Amanda Elzy High School in Greenwood, where she learned to play the game.
During the ceremony, several lawmakers presented proclamations in Harris’ honor. Inez Biles, the chairperson of Minter City, said the community plans to erect a historical marker for Harris. Christopher Stewart, Harris’ youngest child, said that Barack and Michelle Obama had sent the family a letter.
Harris was humble and gracious about her accomplishments, her children said as they shared some lessons she had taught them. Christopher talked about all the ways his mother was first for him: the first person who taught him the meaning of unconditional love, the first person who taught him to dream, to preserve and to sacrifice. Harris’ stepson Antonio Harris recalled that she had the “sneakiest little laugh.”
Christina Jordan, who is Harris’ youngest daughter, talked about the time when Harris encouraged her to pursue her love for chemistry. Crystal Washington, who is older than Christina by two minutes, said that her mother’s favorite saying was, “if you can dream it, you can do it.”
“If a kid from Minter City, Mississippi, can grow to touch millions, there is nothing that is stopping you from doing the same, okay?” Crystal said. “So farewell mother, farewell my queen.”
George Stewart, Jr., Harris’s oldest and tallest son, read a letter titled “Just Mama to Me.”
“She was a tall, strong woman,” he said. She was “generous with her time and resources, humble and confident at the same time, but just Mama to me.”
“She never boasted about her basketball playing days to us,” he said. “We saw the pictures, the newspaper clippings, and we saw her accolades, but she didn’t say much. The only thing she would say is I can go out and shoot the basketball in the hoop. She was just Mama to me.”
“She was a Delta from the Delta that went to Delta State,” he said, tearing up. “A true queen, a hall of famer, a humanitarian, a sister, an aunt, a friend, but most importantly, she was just Mama to me.”
Thousands of patients of Mississippi’s largest hospital and its clinics could be on the hook for higher out-of-pocket costs if the University of Mississippi Medical Center and Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Mississippi do not agree on a new contract by March 31.
The contract dispute dates back to 2018 but was temporarily resolved when an agreement was reached then between the two entities. UMMC, the state’s largest health care provider, wants Blue Cross, the state’s largest insurer, to pay higher reimbursement rates for medical services provided. BCBS has balked at that request.
The contracts negotiated between insurers and providers include massive discounts for the providers in their networks. If an agreement cannot be reached before March 31 and UMMC is forced out of the BCBS network, thousands of patients with BCBS insurance plans would have to pay the hospital’s inflated “chargemaster” prices or find health care elsewhere.
This week, UMMC officials sent a letter to each of its patients with commercial BCBS plans, alerting them to how their coverage could be affected by the outcome of the ongoing negotiations.
“Our negotiations with Blue Cross continue and we are hopeful that a new contract can be agreed upon before the current agreement ends,” Dr. LouAnn Woodward, UMMC vice chancellor for health affairs, said in a statement to Mississippi Today on Friday. “It’s a top priority that all Mississippians have uninterrupted access to the physicians and other services provided by the state’s only academic medical center and no patients experience disruption to their trusted UMMC care.”
Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Mississippi officials did not respond to a request for comment on Friday.
Even if a new agreement isn’t reached, those enrolled in the Mississippi State and School Employees’ Health Insurance Plan would not be affected. Though that plan is administered through BCBS, the current negotiations only affect the insurer’s commercial insurance plans.
Still, thousands of Mississippians would be affected because BCBS is the largest private health insurance provider in the state, with a 17.56% market share, according to data from the Mississippi Department of Insurance. Those patients would have to find a new in-network provider or face higher costs. Many wouldn’t have a choice if they were to need emergency care at UMMC, or required any of the specialized services only exclusively by the medical center.
These services include Mississippi’s only Level 1 trauma center, Level IV neonatal intensive care unit and children’s hospital, among other critical care services.
This isn’t the first time UMMC and BCBS have battled over contract negotiations. UMMC pursued higher reimbursement rates before their original 28-year-old contract with BCBS was set to expire on June 30, 2018.
That negotiation period dragged on for months and passed the expiration date, though patients with BCBS plans were still treated as being in-network while the two parties haggled.
A new contract was eventually signed in August 2018. That contract is at the center of the current dispute.
On February 9, 2022 from 6:00 pm – 7:30 pm at Fondren Guitars in Jackson, Mississippi, join Mississippi Today for a captivating live storytelling event featuring Mississippi Today journalists, music and community.
Local Live(s) is a show that brings together journalists and locals for a night of entertainment and conversation by and for the people of Mississippi. Think of it as a podcast, but live and on stage. The theme of this event is Power: Stories of Strength, Imbalance and Untapped Potential.
Journalists share stories behind their reporting, inviting readers into a world they’ve only observed from the outside. Community members also share true, unvarnished stories from their lives. The result is an entertaining, captivating event filled with new connections and suspense.
museum director of the Emmett Till Interpretive Center Benjamin Saulsberry, and
comedian Merc BWilliams as emcee.
Vitamin Cea
Vibrant, refreshing, and in a league of her own, Vitamin Cea is a singer, writer and rapper from Gautier, Mississippi. Her first body of work, 2017 release, “JoyFull Noise” is a reminder to stay full of joy in spite of the noise of life. “‘Cause the noise is gonna come. You just have to be intentional about keeping your joy intact throughout it.”
Benjamin Saulsberry
Benjamin Saulsberry joined the Emmett Till Interpretive Center as Museum Director in 2016. He has spoken on race, racism, and racial reconciliation across the country on behalf of the Center, including at Harvard Law in 2017 and the University of Detroit at Mercy in 2019. He attended Mississippi Valley State University and the University of Mississippi for graduate work in music.
Merc B Williams
Jackson resident Merc B. Williams is a comedian, host, writer and speaker who is shaking things up with his Jackson resident Merc B. Williams is a comedian, host, writer and speaker who is shaking things up with his versatile comedic style that crosses all social and economic classes. This comedic gem is fresh off Comedy Central’s “Hart of The City” Season 2 created by iconic comedian Kevin Hart. He also hosts a variety of local podcasts and web series with fellow Jackson artists.
If the ticket price is at all a barrier to entry, please contact us at info@mississippitoday.org and put Local Live(s) in the email subject line.
More About Local Live(s):
This event is part of a national series Back Pocket is co-producing with local and state news organizations across the country. Other newsrooms that are a part of the Power series are: Miami Herald, Buckeye Flame, The Forward, and a collaborative event by KHOL Jackson Hole Community Radio, WyoFile, and Jackson Hole News and Guide.
Local Live(s) is sponsored by the Meta Journalism Project and is funded in part by the Brown Institute of Media Innovation
It was a Saturday in the early 1980s before then-Gov. William Winter attended a college football game at Memorial Stadium in Jackson that he ordered the statue of perhaps the state’s most vocal racist, Theodore Bilbo, be moved out of the Capitol rotunda.
“I was with him when he did it,” said Andy Mullins, who at the time was a special assistant to the governor.
The Bilbo statue, which has rested in room 113 of the state Capitol since that fateful football Saturday in the early 1980s, has mysteriously disappeared, Mississippi Today reported this week.
As of Friday afternoon, no one had publicly claimed credit for the removal of the statue, and its whereabouts are still not known.
Bilbo served two terms as Mississippi governor in the 1920s and 30s and was later elected three times as U.S. senator. Among his many egregiously racist actions, he advocated for the deportation of Black Americans to Africa and fought national efforts to pass anti lynching legislation.
The bronze, allegedly life-size statue of Bilbo had been prominently displayed in the Capitol rotunda beginning in the 1950s. But it was the early 1980s when the statue experienced its first upheaval.
At that time, the Capitol building was closed for a massive renovation. The Legislature, during the renovation, was meeting a few blocks away in Jackson at the old Central High School.
On the way to a football game in the early 80s, Mullins recalled, then-Gov. Winter said he wanted to stop by the Capitol to check on the renovation. Mullins said Winter walked into the Capitol, looked at the Bilbo statue in the rotunda and told the workers he wanted it moved to another, less visible location.
“Those workers looked at him like he was crazy,” said Mullins, now an Oxford resident, retired after serving in various education-related capacities in state government including chief of staff to the University of Mississippi chancellor.
“The governor told the workers he wanted the statue moved by the time he came back by after the football game,” Mullins said. “It was not moved when he stopped back by. He called the building commissioner … and told him he wanted the statue moved.”
When the Capitol reopened in 1982, the Bilbo statue was no longer in the prime location in the rotunda. Instead, it was placed in room 113, the largest House committee room — though in the early 1980s, room 113 was used substantially less than it is now with the growth of legislative committee action.
Bilbo died of throat cancer in 1947 in the midst of efforts by his colleague to not seat him in the Senate after his most recent election victory. Soon after Bilbo’s death, a joint resolution adopted by the Mississippi Legislature in 1948 established a commission to memorialize the former governor who, according to the resolution, “worked unceasingly and often alone to preserve Southern customs and traditions and in so doing sought to preserve the true American way of life…and particularly his efforts to preserve this state and nation by his successful fight against the enactment of national legislation, which would have destroyed the United State of America, if the same had been enacted.”
The resolution called for the statue to be placed “in a prominent place on the first floor of the new Capitol building.”
Based on newspaper accounts, Rep. Walter Ray of Madison County was selected to chair the Bilbo statue commission. State funds were appropriated and private funds raised for the effort. Long-time Secretary of State Heber Ladner, who like Bilbo hailed from Pearl River County, served as finance chair for the effort.
A German artist, Fritz Behn, was commissioned to sculpt the allegedly life-size bronze statue of Bilbo, who according to accounts stood about 5 feet 2 inches.
The statue was unveiled in the Capitol on April 12, 1954. Ladner gave the memorial address.
Interestingly, Ladner’s long tenure as secretary of state had just ended when Winter became governor and took the bold action of moving the statue. Mullins said Winter, who years later apologized for some of his own earlier segregationist views, knew Bilbo and heard Bilbo speak on the political trail.
“Gov. Winter was no fan (of Bilbo),” Mullins said.
On the U.S. Senate floor, Bilbo once proclaimed: “The Germans appreciate the importance of race values. They understand that racial improvement is the greatest asset that any country can have … They know, as few other nations have realized, that the impoverishment of race values contributes more to the impairment and destruction of a civilization than any other agency.”
While all governors have portraits in the Capitol, Bilbo and Thomas Bailey were the only two governors with statues. There was a bust of Bailey in room 113 before it was returned recently to the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.
