Mississippi Today
How Jim Barksdale’s $100 million gift 25 years ago changed the course of Mississippi public education

This week marks the 25th anniversary of the landmark contribution of $100 million by Jim Barksdale to improve reading skills in Mississippi.
Standing with state education officials on Jan. 20, 2000, in the old Central High School auditorium in downtown Jackson, Barksdale and his late wife Sally announced their historic gift that would launch the Barksdale Reading Institute, which would create an innovative reading program that would be implemented in public schools across the state.
The contribution, still one of the largest in the state’s history, made headlines across America and the world. Slate Magazine listed the contribution by Barksdale, former head of internet software provider Netscape, as the sixth largest in the nation for 2000. The New York Times, which praised the Barksdales on its editorial page, wrote at the time that the contribution was “thought by authorities to be by far the largest in the field of literacy.”
The $100 million gift not only provided tangible benefits to Mississippi’s schools and children, but it provided a critical symbolic boost to public education in the state.
In a letter to the editor published in The New York Times a couple days after the gift was announced, retired sociology professor Beth Hess of Mountain Lake, N.J, praised the Barksdales but added a telling addendum to her note.
“It is disturbing that the state of Mississippi will be rewarded for its continuing failure to tax its citizens fairly and to allocate enough money to educate students, especially in predominantly Black districts,” Hess wrote. “This should have been a public rather than private responsibility.”
Indeed, this exact point was on the minds of many Mississippians — certainly including the Barksdales — at the time. And given the then-fresh history of segregation of the state’s public schools, how could it not be?
The historic financial commitment made by the Barksdales came less than a quarter of a century from the vote in 1978 to finally remove from the state constitution the provision creating a “separate but equal” system to prevent the integration of the schools.
And it came much less than a quarter of a century from the vote in 1987 to finally remove from the constitution the provision that allowed the Legislature to disband the public schools rather than integrate them. That segregationist provision had been added to the Mississippi Constitution in 1960, with voters in only three of the state’s 82 counties rejecting it: Itawamba and Tishomingo counties in northeast Mississippi and Jackson County on the Gulf Coast.
To say in the year 2000 that there were still Mississippians not enamored with a fully integrated Mississippi public school system would be an understatement.
The history of public education in Mississippi, like the history of the state itself, is marred by racial strife and hate-inspired division that continues even today in some ways.
But on that January day in 2000, Jim Barksdale, a Mississippi native and one of the nation’s leading business executives, showed them and the nation another way forward, proclaiming his commitment “to keeping the main thing the main thing.” And it was clear that he believed the “main thing” was support of an integrated Mississippi public education system.
Barksdale’s brother, Claiborne, who ran the Barksdale Reading Institute that was created with the contribution, said that Jim and Sally Barksdale viewed their action as a $100 million investment in Mississippi and its children, not as a gift. If positive results were not being achieved, the Barksdales were prepared to halt the program and invest their money in other beneficial ways.
The program worked, however, and looking back over these past 25 years since the gift, the results are clear. The historic investment produced historic gains that are now dubbed “The Mississippi Miracle.”
“The state ranks second in its reading scores for children in poverty and seventh for children from households of color,” Claiborne Barksdale wrote this week for Mississippi Today Ideas. “… Tens of thousands of Mississippi children are reading, and reading proficiently, thanks to Jim and Sally’s persistent desire to help them achieve a brighter future. I’d say that’s a pretty damn good return on their investment.”
It could still be argued, as the retired sociology professor did on the New York Times editorial pages in 2000, that Mississippi leaders are not doing enough for public education. But important strides have been made. The state still funds a reading initiative based on the Barksdale model.
While state politicians line up to claim credit for Mississippi’s improved reading scores and “The Mississippi Miracle,” it’s worth remembering that it all started with the Barksdales’ investment 25 years ago.
Editor’s note: Jim and Donna Barksdale are Mississippi Today donors and founding board members. Donors do not in any way influence our newsroom’s editorial decisions. For more on that policy or to view a list of our donors, click here.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1944

Feb. 16, 1944

The U.S. Navy began training for its first Black officers.
Sixteen officer candidates began their work at the Great Lakes Naval Training Center. All 16 passed the course, but the Navy only commissioned 13.
They overcame racism and became known as “the Golden 13” for their excellence, paving the way for President Harry Truman to desegregate the military four years later.
In Paul Stillwell’s book on the men, Gen. Colin Powell wrote that these men understood that “history had dealt them a stern obligation. They realized that in their hands rested the chance to help open the blind moral eye that America had turned on the question of race.”
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
House gasoline tax proposal would hurt most when prices are highest

Legislation passed by the state House would increase the tax burden on Mississippi drivers as the price of gasoline rises.
That cruel reality, which would be especially onerous for low income Mississippians, is a simple fact of how a sales tax works.
Mississippi’s current tax on motor fuel of 18.4 cents per gallon is the second lowest in the nation.
Transportation officials and others say the state needs additional revenue to pay for the ever-increasing costs of building new roads and bridges and maintaining the existing transportation system.
It is not surprising that both chambers are responding to those concerns of the need for more funding for transportation.
But the leaders of the two chambers are taking very different approaches to increasing the tax to pay for transportation needs. Senate leaders, led by Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann, are proposing increasing the tax 3 cents per gallon for three years until it caps out at 27.4 cents per gallon – which would still be lower than the gasoline tax in most states.
The House proposal would move Mississippi out of the mainstream of how states levy taxes on gasoline. The House, led by Speaker Jason White and Ways and Means Chair Trey Lamar, has passed out of the House legislation to impose a 5% sales tax on the cost of each purchase of motor fuel, both diesel and gasoline.
Simply put, the Senate plan taxes a gallon of gas. The House proposal places a tax on the cost of a gallon of gas.
For instance, a tax of 5% would be added to the purchase of $40 of gas. The Senate plan, when fully enacted, would add 9 cents to each gallon of gas – whether the gallon cost $1 or $5.
Only 10 states levy a sales tax on gasoline, according to the Tax Policy Center.
Already, the gasoline tax increase proposed by the House is higher than the Senate plan would be when fully enacted. According to AAA, the average cost of a gallon of gasoline in the state is currently $2.67, meaning Mississippi drivers would be paying about 13.4 cents more per gallon than they are paying now if the House tax hike is enacted. Drivers of diesel vehicles would be paying an extra 16.5 cents per gallon since the average cost of a gallon of diesel is currently $3.31 cents per gallon.
Remember, that tax would be in addition to the 18.4 cents already levied on a gallon of motor fuel.
Under the House plan, as the cost of gasoline increases making it more difficult to afford, the tax levied by the state also would increase, creating a double whammy. The double whammy would be exacerbated in a state with a large rural population often driving long distances to work. The average commute time in Mississippi is 25.2 minutes.
Despite that hardship, there is some logic to the House plan. The 18.4 cent per gallon tax on a gallon of gas has been in effect since 1987. Since that tax was imposed, vehicles have become much more energy efficient, meaning less gasoline is being purchased resulting in the revenue collected from the 18.4 cent-per gallon tax decreasing over time when adjusted for inflation. A sales tax most likely would ensure the revenue generated would not be static.
To offset the lost revenue from a tax on a gallon of gas, some states have tried to impose a tax based on the miles driven.
In the past fiscal year, the 18.4-cent per gallon levy generated $440 million in revenue with the bulk (71%) going directly to the state Department of Transportation for road and bridge construction.
Both chambers are proposing increasing the tax on motor fuels while reducing other taxes. The House would totally eliminate the income tax and reduce the tax on groceries while increasing the sales tax on most retail items by 1.5 cents. The Senate wants to reduce both the income tax and the tax on groceries.
As lieutenant governor, current Gov. Tate Reeves blocked all efforts to increase the tax on motor fuels to pay for transportation needs.
As governor, Reeves badly wants his legacy to be the elimination of the income tax. He calls it his No. 1 priority.
Whether he would sign legislation increasing the tax on gasoline in exchange for the elimination of the income tax is questionable. On social media, though, he has expressed support for the House plan to eliminate the income tax while increasing the gasoline tax and the sales tax on most retail items.
Whether such a tax swap would benefit the working poor, who comprise a large portion of the Mississippi population, is debatable.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Mississippi Today
On this day in 1848

Feb. 15, 1848

Sarah Roberts, a 5-year-old Black American, entered an all-white school in Boston, only to be turned away. She wound up entering four more white schools, and each time she was shown the door. And so she found herself walking from home, passing five all-white schools on the way to an all-black school the city of Boston was forcing her to attend.
This angered her father, Benjamin, one of the nation’s first Black American printers, and he sued the city. Robert Morris, one of the nation’s first Black lawyers, took up the case.
“Any child unlawfully excluded from public school shall recover damages therefore against the city or town by which such public instruction is supported,” Morris wrote.
He and co-counsel Charles Sumner argued that the Constitution of Massachusetts held all are equal before the law, regardless of race, and that the laws creating public schools made no distinctions.
Sumner wrote, “Prejudice is the child of ignorance … sure to prevail where people do not know each other.”
In 1850, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court upheld the racial segregation of public schools. The attorneys brought the issue to state lawmakers. In 1855, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts banned segregated schools — the first law barring segregated schools in the U.S.
This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
-
News from the South - Florida News Feed6 days ago
Family of heart transplant patient who died after leaving JSO custody set to receive $300K settlement
-
News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed5 days ago
'My house is my jail': Undocumented woman living in Oklahoma for 30 years faced with uncertainty
-
News from the South - Florida News Feed6 days ago
Trump is expected to pardon ex-Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich 5 years after commuting his sentence
-
News from the South - Georgia News Feed4 days ago
Your closed Party City may soon turn into one of these familiar stores
-
News from the South - Texas News Feed5 days ago
ICE continues to make major arrests in Texas, including cartel, gang members | Texas
-
News from the South - Tennessee News Feed6 days ago
Bird flu impacting Tennessee's egg supply
-
News from the South - Tennessee News Feed6 days ago
The Lower Mississippi River’s largest ecosystem restoration project got the federal go-ahead • Tennessee Lookout
-
News from the South - Oklahoma News Feed6 days ago
Mother & son die in early morning house fire