Jan. 17, 1931

Born in Arkabutla, Mississippi, James Earl Jones moved to his grandparents’ farm in Michigan at age 5. 

He had a stutter so severe, he hardly spoke. An English teacher realized his gift for writing poetry and had him recite poetry in front of the class, overcoming his stuttering. 

At the University of Michigan, he was majoring in pre-med when he discovered drama. After training troops in the Korean War, he starred in “Othello” at the Ramsdell Theatre in Michigan. In 1967, he starred opposite actress Jane Alexander in “The Great White Hope,” loosely based on heavyweight champion Jack Johnson and society’s demand for a white boxer that would defeat Johnson. The play began at the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., before moving to Broadway, where the play, Jones and Alexander all won Tonys. In the film adaptation, Jones won a Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination. 

He went on to play Shakespeare on Broadway and win another Tony, three Emmys and an honorary Oscar prior to his 2024 death. The first celebrity guest on “Sesame Street,” he may be best known for providing the voice for Darth Vader in the Star Wars movies and for Mufasa in Disney’s “The Lion King.” 

He saw the two biggest challenges to society as health and sanity. “I won’t say racism,” he said. “I say sanity because racism is a form of insanity.”

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

A bill that phases out the state income tax, cuts the state grocery tax and raises sales taxes and gasoline taxes passed the House of Representatives with a bipartisan vote on Thursday. 

House Bill 1 — authored by Republican Rep. Trey Lamar of Senatobia and other House leaders – passed 88-24 with only Democratic House members voting against it. It now goes to the Senate for consideration.

Nine House Democrats joined with the GOP majority to support the plan, and seven Democrats voted “present,” meaning they did not vote yes or no. 

“A lot of my Republicans were speaking as one as a caucus that this is important to them and to their constituents,” House Speaker Jason White told reporters after the bill passed. “I think it’s a good, strong vote for us and it’ll be a strong position for me as speaker to advocate for its passage and advancement on the other (Senate) end of the building.” 

The plan would over time cut about $1.1 billion from the state’s current $7 billion general fund money. Proponents say economic growth would cover the loss and not result in major cuts to government services or spending. Critics believe lawmakers should be cautious with long-term tax cuts and restructuring in the middle of an unstable economy, or oppose a shift to more “regressive” taxation that could hit lower income people harder. 

The legislation would reduce the income tax rate from 4% to 3% next year. Then, it would reduce the rate by .3% each additional year until the tax is eliminated in 10 years. 

The plan would add a 1.5% sales tax for local governments, unless they opt out, increasing the state’s net sales tax from 7% to 8.5%.

The plan would over a decade reduce the tax on unprepared food from 7% to 2.5%, but the new local sales tax would still be levied on food, for a net 4% grocery tax once fully enacted.

The sales taxes collected by counties would go toward local road maintenance.

Some Democratic members, including House Minority Leader Robert Johnson III of Natchez, raised concerns that the measure does not contain enough safeguards to ensure that state government funds all of its needs and that the sales tax hike would negatively impact poorer Mississippians. 

“This is putting a burden on working people,” Johnson told Mississippi Today. 

Democratic Rep. Omeria Scott of Laurel introduced an amendment to immediately cut the grocery tax, instead of gradually reducing it over time, but Republican members defeated the amendment. 

The legislation also adds a new 5% tax on gasoline sales, which would go toward the Mississippi Department of Transportation’s budget for road and bridge infrastructure. 

The tax is expected to generate $400 million a year. Currently, Mississippi has an 18.4 cents-a-gallon flat tax on gasoline — a flat rate no matter the cost of a gallon. Transportation leaders have for years said they need an indexed tax that would rise with the cost of gasoline in order to generate enough money to keep up road maintenance.

Using current average gasoline price in Mississippi of $2.62 a gallon, the proposed new tax would cost consumers 13 more cents a gallon.

Willie Simmons, a Democrat who is the central district transportation commissioner, and Brad White, executive director of the Mississippi Department of Transportation, in a joint statement thanked House leadership for having substantive discussions about infrastructure funding, though they didn’t specifically endorse the legislation. 

“HB1 accomplishes a significant net tax cut for the people of Mississippi while still taking strides to make our transportation dollars both reliable and adequate,” the two transportation leaders said.

Both White and Lamar have said they believe Reeves supports the tax cut plan, but the governor’s office has not responded to questions about his stance on the House’s legislation. 

Reeves in past years has opposed what he called “tax swaps,” tax cut proposals that sought to decrease the overall tax burden, yet raised another type of tax such as the latest House proposal. He’s also opposed past efforts to raise the gasoline tax. 

Reeves, in 2021 notably opposed an effort led by Lamar and former House Speaker Philip Gunn that sought to eliminate the income tax and cut the sales tax on groceries in half while increasing the sales tax on other items by 2.5 cents on the dollar. 

READ MORE: How soon we forget: Mississippi House push for record tax cuts revives fear of repeat budget crises

“I wouldn’t want to be a Republican that votes to increase taxes substantially for certain segments of the public,” Reeves said during a 2021 news conference. “… I personally support tax cuts, not tax swaps or tax transfers or tax increases … I don’t think we ought to sit here and pick and choose who to take money from. I think we ought to take less from everybody.”

Before Reeves can consider the proposal, though, it would have to pass the GOP-majority Senate which, in the past, has been more cautious with its tax cut plans and not agreed to totally abolish the income tax. In 2022 the chambers agreed and passed a large tax cut that is still being phased in.

Republican Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, the Senate’s presiding officer, previously said he will push a plan this year that immediately lowers the state’s 7% sales tax on grocery items to 5% and trims the state’s 4% income tax down to 3% over the next four years, though no senator has yet introduced such a bill. 

Speaker White told reporters that he was willing to negotiate with Senate leaders on a tax cut package, but his ultimate goal is to send legislation to Reeves that would abolish the income tax. 

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

A new guided missile Navy destroyer ship will be named in honor of former Mississippi governor and U.S. Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus.

Current Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro made the announcement this week at the Surface Navy Association’s 37th National Symposium in Arlington, Virginia.

The USS Ray Mabus will be built at Pascagoula’s Ingalls Shipbuilding, and Mabus’ daughter Liz Mabus will sponsor the ship.

“I am honored to announce four new ships which represent the future of our fleet,” Del Toro said in a news release.

Mabus served as Mississippi’s governor from 1988 until 1992 and was 39 years old when first elected. Before then, he was the state auditor. He later became the nation’s secretary of the Navy from 2009 until 2017, making him the longest serving Navy secretary since World War I.

Mabus was a surface warfare officer on the USS Little Rock in the early 1970s. He was later the ambassador to Saudi Arabia under President Bill Clinton.

“Serving my country in uniform as a young LTJG aboard a guided missile cruiser and then, decades later, leading our naval services are the greatest privileges and most consequential times of my life,” Mabus, an Ackerman native, said in a news release. “The highest honor of my life is to know that sailors will defend our country and represent our values around the world for years aboard a ship bearing my name. That LTJG would never have imagined and this former SECNAV could not be more thankful, more honored, or more moved.”

According to the news release, during Mabus’s tenure as secretary, “the Navy went from building fewer than five ships per year to having more than 70 under contract. He championed the ‘21st Century Sailor and Marine’ initiative to build and maintain the most resilient and ready force possible. He directed the Navy and Marine Corps to change the way they use, produce, and acquire energy, setting an aggressive goal of relying on alternative sources for at least 50% of their energy by 2020.”

Mabus also, at the direction President Barack Obama, developed the plan, the bulk of which was passed by Congress, to restore the Gulf of Mexico after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion and massive oil spill.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.