1982 Alabama Senate election
November 2, 1982
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All 35 seats in the Alabama State Senate 18 seats needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Turnout | 37.48% | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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District results Democratic: 50–60% 60–70% 70–80% 80–90% 90–100% Unopposed Republican: 50–60% 60–70% | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Elections in Alabama |
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| Government |
The 1982 Alabama Senate election took place on Tuesday, November 2, 1982, to elect 35 representatives to serve four-year terms in the Alabama Senate. Primary elections were held on September 7 with runoff elections on September 28. The state's three Black senators, Michael Figures, Earl Hilliard, and J. Richmond Pearson, all won re-election. The Republicans won three seats at the general election, its best showing of the entire century up to that point.
This was the first time a Republican had been elected to the state senate since Leland Childs was elected in 1966, who himself had been the first Republican elected to the chamber since the Reconstruction Era. The Republicans also made history by electing Ann Bedsole of Mobile to District 34, the state's first-ever female state senator. Across both houses, Republicans were elected to 11 of the 140 legislative seats, the most since Reconstruction.
Democrat John Teague was unanimously elected President pro tempore on January 11, 1983. The map used in the 1982 general election was struck down the next year for violating the Voting Rights Act of 1965, requiring a new map to be drawn. A special election for every seat in the legislature was held in November 1983.