In Alabama’s darkest days, it was the lawbreakers who were the heroes. History has honored those who violated laws treating humans as property. It has vindicated the actions of those who found laws requiring segregation so repugnant that morality demanded that they be broken.

We can thank our elected state legislators for an illegal immigration law so lacking in human decency that civil disobedience has again become the only moral choice for Alabamians.

A pastor breaks the law if he transports an “unauthorized alien” to her baptism. A school breaks the law if it attempts to educate a child without determining the citizenship of the parents. A neighbor breaks the law if he takes a person he has reason to believe is undocumented to a doctor. A prosecutor breaks the law if he declines to prosecute the pastor, the school or the neighbor.

Those who voted for the law — including Reps. Micky Hammon and Terri Collins of Decatur and Ed Henry of Hartselle, and Sen. Arthur Orr of Decatur — cannot easily argue they are unaware of the moral implications. Numerous Southern Baptist pastors, the bishop of the North Alabama Conference of the United Methodist Church and the National Association of Evangelicals spoke out against a law that requires Christians to ignore the most basic tenets of their faith.

We wish our legislators had enough understanding of Alabama history to see the disastrous consequences that result when a law forces moral citizens to become criminals