To the point of getting into fights on the floor of the State Senate:
MONTGOMERY, Ala. — A Republican state senator who punched a Democratic lawmaker in the head expressed regret, saying “that’s not the way grown men solve their problems,” but he said he won’t immediately apologize.
Republican Sen. Charles Bishop claimed that Democratic Sen. Lowell Barron called him a “son of a (expletive)” in the Senate chamber on Thursday.
“I responded to his comment with my right hand,” Bishop said.
Alabama Public Television tape captured the punch.
“I was raised in the woods of Arkansas and people don’t say that about your mom,” Bishop said.
So what was this all about ? Apparently, an election reform bill:
The fight came on the final day of the 2007 regular session of the Legislature. Republican senators were using delaying tactics to force Democratic leadership to bring up an election reform bill to ban transfers between political action committees.
Barron is chairman of the Senate Rules Committee, which sets the chamber’s work agenda, and Republicans were angry that he had not put the election reform bill in a position to come up for debate.
The Senate had just taken a recess Thursday afternoon when Bishop approached the chair where Barron was sitting. Moments later security officers and others rushed to separate the two senators.
Like I said, they take their politics seriously in Alabama.
Here’s the video of the fight, thanks to YouTube:
