When most people hear the words “funeral regulation,” they may assume the subject is distant, technical, or only important to funeral home owners.

But that assumption would be wrong.

What happens inside the Alabama funeral service regulatory system does not stay inside the regulatory system. It reaches grieving mothers. It reaches widows. It reaches children trying to bury a parent. It reaches churches, communities, insurance policyholders, family-owned funeral homes, and especially the Black families and Black-owned funeral businesses that have carried the sacred responsibility of death care for generations.

That is why Wilkie Sherard Frieson’s recent letter to the Alabama Board of Funeral Service deserves public attention.

Read Sherard Frieson’s Letter to the Alabama Board of Funeral Service
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In his letter, Frieson opposes Senate Bill 107, which he pointedly names “The Death Tax.” That phrase may sound strong, but after examining the issue through his eyes — as a third-generation mortician, licensed funeral director, embalmer, and member of a family-owned funeral business that has operated for nearly six decades — the phrase becomes more than rhetoric.

It becomes a warning.

Because this is not just about a fee.

It is about who pays, who benefits, who absorbs the burden, and why families already facing one of the hardest days of their lives may be asked to carry one more government-imposed cost at the very moment they are least able to resist it.

The Public Needs to Understand What Is Being Proposed

According to public summaries of Senate Bill 107, the Alabama Board of Funeral Service would be authorized to impose an administrative fee on funeral establishments for each funeral arranged. The bill also involves increases in other fees connected to funeral establishment authority, branch registration, transfers, preneed activity, and preneed sales agents.

On paper, this may appear to be a routine regulatory matter.

In reality, it is much more.

Every new cost placed on funeral homes eventually has to go somewhere. A funeral home cannot simply pretend the cost does not exist. It must be absorbed by the business, passed along to consumers, or both.

That means a so-called administrative fee imposed on funeral establishments can quickly become a real-world burden on grieving families.

That is the heart of Sherard’s argument.

He is not simply saying, “Do not charge funeral directors more money.” He is saying the public needs to understand that funeral homes are not operating in a vacuum. They serve families whose wages have not kept up with inflation, whose insurance policies often fall short, and whose burial funds are frequently stretched thin before a funeral arrangement ever begins.

In plain language: when the state raises the cost of death care, families feel it.

Funeral Homes Are Private Businesses Performing a Public Service

One of the strongest points in Sherard’s letter is his reminder that funeral homes function as privately funded public service providers.

That phrase matters.

When a death occurs, someone must respond. Someone must remove the remains. Someone must care for the body. Someone must prepare documents. Someone must meet with the family. Someone must coordinate disposition. Someone must work with cemeteries, churches, ministers, newspapers, insurance companies, florists, vault companies, crematories, medical facilities, clergy, musicians, and public officials.

Death care is not optional.

Families may choose different levels of service, but the basic duty of caring for the dead remains necessary in every community.

Yet funeral homes, unlike many public agencies, do not receive broad public funding to carry out this essential role. They must pay staff, maintain facilities, insure vehicles, purchase supplies, cover utilities, comply with regulations, maintain licenses, and still serve families who may not have the money to pay the full cost of services.

This is especially true in rural Alabama and in Black communities where family-owned funeral homes have historically served people regardless of wealth, social status, or political power.

That is why new regulatory fees cannot be casually dismissed as “just the cost of doing business.”

In funeral service, the cost of doing business often becomes the cost of burying someone’s mother.

The Numbers Tell a Larger Story

Sherard’s letter lays out a painful economic comparison.

He recalls that when he became licensed in Alabama in 1999, his funeral director and embalmer licenses cost $50 each, for a total of $100. Years later, those same professional licenses have risen dramatically.

He also points out that funeral costs, business expenses, caskets, embalming supplies, and regulatory fees have all increased over time. Meanwhile, Alabama families — particularly Black Alabama families — have not seen their wages rise at the same pace.

This is where the public needs to pause.

The funeral industry is often criticized for being expensive. And yes, funerals are expensive. But the public also needs to understand why costs rise. It is not only because funeral homes decide to charge more. It is because nearly everything connected to funeral service costs more: supplies, transportation, insurance, compliance, staffing, licensing, facilities, utilities, and now potentially additional administrative fees.

When the Board’s fees rise faster than family income, something has to break.

Either funeral homes become less financially stable, or families pay more, or both.

For Black-owned funeral homes, the pressure is even more serious. Many of these businesses serve communities with lower household income, limited insurance coverage, and families who often need flexibility, patience, and compassion when arranging services.

A large corporate funeral provider may be able to absorb or distribute regulatory increases across many locations. But a small family-owned funeral home in a rural Black community may not have that luxury.

That is how a “small fee” can become part of a larger pattern of economic pressure that pushes independent funeral homes closer to the edge.

Why Sherard Calls It a “Death Tax”

Sherard calls SB107 a “Death Tax” because he believes it functions like a tax on bereavement.

That is a serious charge.

His argument is that if the fee is imposed on each funeral arranged, then it attaches itself to death itself. A family suffers a loss. A funeral home serves that family. Then another government-required charge is added into the economics of that arrangement.

Whether the fee is technically labeled a tax, assessment, administrative charge, or regulatory fee, the practical result may be the same for families: death becomes more expensive.

And this is where language matters.

Government often uses soft language to describe hard burdens. A “fee” sounds harmless. An “administrative charge” sounds routine. A “regulatory mechanism” sounds technical.

But to a grieving family sitting across from a funeral director, trying to bury someone with dignity, every added dollar matters.

That is why Sherard’s phrase cuts through the fog.

“The Death Tax” forces the public to ask: why should bereaved families be used as a revenue source?

Who Benefits?

Sherard asks a direct question in his letter: what does the Board need with all this money?

That question deserves an answer.

If the justification is that additional funds are needed for investigations, oversight, and regulatory enforcement, then the public has a right to ask how many complaints actually occur, how often enforcement is needed, and whether the scale of the proposed revenue increase is proportionate to the actual problem.

Regulation has a legitimate purpose. Families should be protected from negligence, fraud, misconduct, and abuse. No serious funeral professional would argue otherwise.

But regulation should be fair, transparent, proportionate, and publicly accountable.

If nearly every bereaved family is indirectly paying into a system that only a tiny fraction will ever use, then the public deserves to know whether the system is solving a real problem or simply expanding the budget of a regulatory agency.

Oversight is necessary.

But unchecked fee expansion is not the same thing as protection.

Why Black Funeral Home Owners Should Be Especially Concerned

The impact on Black funeral home owners cannot be separated from the broader history of economic exclusion.

Black funeral homes have never been just businesses. In many communities, they have been institutions of dignity, resistance, stability, and service.

During times when Black families were denied equal treatment in hospitals, cemeteries, insurance systems, public accommodations, and white-owned businesses, Black funeral homes stepped forward to care for their own people. They buried teachers, farmers, veterans, ministers, children, civil rights workers, mothers, fathers, and elders. They helped families navigate grief when few other institutions showed equal respect.

These businesses were built under conditions that were never equal.

And now, many are trying to survive under modern economic pressures that still are not equal.

Additional fees and regulatory costs may appear neutral on paper, but they do not land equally in real life. A fee imposed across the board may be felt very differently by a large corporate provider than by a small Black-owned funeral home serving families in one of Alabama’s poorer regions.

That is the part the public must understand.

Economic policy can discriminate in effect even when it does not announce discrimination in language.

A rule does not have to mention race to harm Black businesses disproportionately.

Families Will Feel This Too

This issue is not only about funeral home owners.

It is about the families they serve.

When fees increase, funeral homes face difficult choices. They can absorb the cost and weaken their own business. They can raise prices and risk burdening families. Or they can reduce services, delay improvements, or operate under even greater financial stress.

None of those options benefits the public.

Families already struggle to cover funeral costs. Many rely on small burial policies, church support, family contributions, crowdfunding, or payment arrangements. Some arrive at the funeral home with almost nothing but grief and hope.

To those families, ten dollars may not sound like much to policymakers, but the problem is not simply ten dollars.

The problem is the pattern.

Ten dollars becomes twenty. Twenty becomes fifty. A “modest fee” becomes a permanent revenue stream. Once a fee is accepted, history teaches us that it rarely disappears. It grows.

Sherard makes that point clearly.

The issue is not only what the fee is today. The issue is what it opens the door to tomorrow.

The Public Must Stop Ignoring Regulatory Power

One reason laws and rules like this pass quietly is because the public does not always know where to look.

People pay attention to presidential elections, major court cases, and dramatic headlines. But many of the policies that shape daily life are created through boards, agencies, commissions, and administrative rules that most citizens never hear about until the consequences reach their pockets.

That is why Southern Justice Archive exists.

To connect the dots.

To show that injustice is not always loud. Sometimes it is buried in legislation. Sometimes it is hidden in fee schedules. Sometimes it arrives as an administrative rule. Sometimes it looks small until it lands on people who are already carrying too much.

The public must learn to ask better questions:

Who proposed this?

Who profits from it?

Who pays for it?

Who was consulted?

Who was ignored?

What communities will feel it first?

And what happens if nobody speaks up?

Sherard’s Letter Is More Than a Complaint

Wilkie Sherard Frieson’s letter is not simply a professional objection from a licensed funeral director.

It is a public warning from someone who knows the funeral industry from the inside.

He writes as a third-generation mortician. He writes as a licensed professional. He writes as someone connected to a long-standing family-owned funeral home. He writes as an African American funeral service professional serving African American families. He writes as someone who understands both the business side and the human side of death care.

That perspective matters.

Too often, the people most affected by policy are the last ones invited to explain the consequences. Sherard’s letter does what public comment is supposed to do: it places lived experience into the official record.

But the public record is not enough.

The community needs to understand it too.

This Is About Dignity

At the deepest level, this issue is about dignity.

Death is one of the most vulnerable moments in human life. Families are emotional, overwhelmed, and often financially exposed. They should not become easy targets for revenue schemes dressed up as regulation.

Funeral homes should be accountable. Consumers should be protected. Bad actors should be investigated. But those goals should not become an excuse to place new burdens on every grieving family in Alabama.

There must be a better way to fund oversight than attaching yet another cost to death.

There must be a better way to regulate funeral service than squeezing small family-owned businesses that are already struggling to remain viable.

There must be a better way to protect consumers than making consumers pay more.

The Bottom Line

Sherard’s warning is clear:

The so-called “Death Tax” does not simply affect funeral directors.

It affects the people.

It affects Black-owned funeral homes.

It affects rural communities.

It affects widows, children, elders, churches, and families who are already doing everything they can to bury loved ones with dignity.

This is why the public must pay attention.

Because when economic pressure is placed on funeral homes, it does not stop at the funeral home door. It follows the family into the arrangement room. It shows up on the contract. It becomes part of the burden of grief.

And in communities already carrying historic and economic hardship, one more fee is not just one more fee.

It is one more weight.

The people of Alabama deserve transparency. Funeral service professionals deserve fairness. Bereaved families deserve compassion, not quiet taxation at the moment of loss.

That is why this issue matters.

That is why Sherard’s letter matters.

And that is why the Southern Justice Archive will continue to examine the laws, rules, systems, and policies that shape Black life, Black business, and Black survival in Alabama and beyond.

The Southern Justice Archive
Presented By: Charlotte A. Clark-Frieson aka
“Wilkie Clark’s Daughter”

Documenting what happened, Preserving what matters, Protecting what must endure!

Regulation is often defended as neutral — a simple matter of rules, standards, and compliance. On paper, the rules apply equally to everyone. In theory, oversight protects the public.

But history teaches a harder lesson:
Rules do not operate in a vacuum.

They operate through people.
Through discretion.
Through interpretation.
Through enforcement.

And when power is applied without context, neutrality becomes illusion.

The Problem with “One-Size-Fits-All”

Black funeral homes in Alabama did not begin on equal footing with their white counterparts. They did not inherit generational wealth, political insulation, or institutional protection. Many were founded by people denied access to banks, barred from professional networks, and excluded from policymaking tables.

To pretend that identical rules produce identical outcomes is to ignore reality.

A requirement that is inconvenient for a large, well-capitalized firm can be existential for a small, family-owned operation. A fine that is absorbable for one business can be devastating for another. A sudden mandate, imposed without transition or study, can erase decades of stability overnight.

Neutral language does not equal neutral impact.

Discretion Is Where Inequality Lives

Regulatory systems rely heavily on discretion — what to inspect, when to inspect, how often to inspect, how to interpret violations, and how harshly to penalize them.

Discretion is not inherently wrong.
But discretion without guardrails is dangerous.

When enforcement decisions are opaque, inconsistent, or unreviewable, they create conditions ripe for unequal treatment. And when those conditions intersect with long-standing racial and economic disparities, the outcome is predictable.

The problem is not regulation itself.
The problem is unaccountable discretion.

When Compliance Doesn’t Protect You

One of the most damaging myths surrounding regulatory systems is the idea that “doing everything right” guarantees safety.

For many Black funeral directors, experience taught a different lesson.

Compliance did not always bring relief.
Silence did not always bring peace.
Good faith did not always bring fairness.

Instead, some found that the more visible and established they became, the more scrutiny followed. Stability did not insulate them — it exposed them.

And challenging enforcement decisions often felt riskier than accepting them.

The Cost of Speaking Up

Why didn’t more people object publicly?
Why didn’t they challenge penalties, mandates, or processes more aggressively?

Because history answered that question long ago.

Black business owners have learned — through experience, not theory — that resistance can invite retaliation, that questioning authority can escalate problems, and that survival sometimes depends on keeping one’s head down.

Silence, in this context, was not consent.
It was calculation.

Accountability Requires More Than Rules

True accountability is not achieved through checklists alone.

It requires:

• Transparency in enforcement

• Proportionality in penalties

• Historical awareness in policymaking

• And meaningful avenues for redress

Without these, regulation ceases to be a safeguard and becomes a blunt instrument — one that disproportionately burdens those least able to absorb its force.

Why This Conversation Can’t Be Avoided

The history explored in Part One explains why Black funeral homes mattered.
This chapter explains why so many feel vulnerable today.

Oversight that ignores history does not correct injustice — it reproduces it.

And systems that refuse to examine their own patterns cannot credibly claim neutrality.

This is not about avoiding standards.
It is about ensuring that standards do not become tools of erasure.

The Southern Justice Archive
Presented By: Charlotte A. Clark-Frieson aka
Wilkie Clark’s Daughter”

“Documenting what happened, Preserving what matters, Protecting what must endure!

Long before Alabama established boards, licensing schemes, inspection regimes, and enforcement authorities, Black funeral directors were already doing the work — quietly, faithfully, and under conditions most people today would find unimaginable.

They were not simply business owners.

They were the last line of dignity for Black families who could not depend on white institutions to handle their dead with care, respect, or humanity. In segregated Alabama, death did not suspend racism. If anything, it intensified it. Black bodies were refused service, mishandled, delayed, or outright disrespected — even in grief.

So Black funeral homes arose not from convenience or profit, but from necessity.

They became mutual-aid institutions. Burial societies. Informal insurance providers. Community banks. Record keepers. Meeting places. And often, though quietly, centers of civil rights organizing. In towns where Black people were shut out of political power and economic opportunity, the Black funeral home was one of the very few institutions that endured — generation after generation.

That endurance came at a cost.

Before Regulation, There Was Responsibility

Early Black funeral directors were not regulated by the state — they were regulated by the community.

Their accountability was immediate and personal. A mistake was not a citation or a fine; it was the loss of trust from neighbors, church members, and families who would remember forever how their loved one was treated. Reputation was everything. Care was non-negotiable.

These businesses survived the Great Depression, Jim Crow, racial terror, economic exclusion, and political disenfranchisement. They survived because they were needed — and because Black families pooled resources to protect one another in a system that would not.

Burial insurance policies, often small and community-based, ensured that death would not destroy a family financially. Funeral homes extended credit when banks would not. They kept records when courthouses ignored Black lives. They stood with families when no one else would.

This was not accidental success.
It was disciplined, ethical, community-centered work.

When Oversight Became Control

Eventually, the state took notice.

Regulatory boards were formed under the banner of public protection, professionalization, and standardization. On paper, these goals sounded neutral — even beneficial. But neutrality disappears quickly when power is applied unevenly.

Rules written without historical context do not land equally. Discretion exercised without cultural understanding becomes weaponized. And enforcement without transparency invites abuse.

For Black funeral homes — many of them family-owned, modest in scale, and deeply embedded in working-class communities — regulation often arrived not as partnership, but as pressure.

Inspections became more frequent. Penalties became heavier. Requirements multiplied. Discretion expanded — not in favor of fairness, but in favor of enforcement.

What had once been community-anchored institutions increasingly found themselves navigating a system where silence was safer than resistance, and compliance did not guarantee protection.

Economic Stability Draws Scrutiny

There is an uncomfortable truth rarely acknowledged:
Black funeral homes were among the most stable Black-owned businesses in Alabama.

They owned land. They held contracts. They managed trust funds. They operated across generations. They understood finance, law, and logistics long before Black economic development became a talking point.

That stability made them visible.

And in a state with a long history of suppressing Black economic independence, visibility has never been neutral.

Oversight followed success. Enforcement followed endurance. And what was framed as “compliance” often felt like containment.

The Pattern No One Wants to Name

Over time, a quiet pattern emerged — one that many Black funeral directors recognized but few felt safe to articulate.

Penalties that felt disproportionate.
Mandates that arrived suddenly.
Requirements that shifted without explanation.
Processes that punished questions more than mistakes.

Most complied. Some closed. A few resisted — quietly, carefully, and often alone.

And when they remained silent, that silence was misread as agreement.

It was not.

Silence was survival.

Why This History Matters Now

History does not vanish. It mutates.

Institutions remember — even when they claim not to. Patterns repeat — even when they are rebranded. And the past does not loosen its grip simply because time has passed.

To understand present conflicts between Black funeral homes and regulatory authorities, one must understand this history. Not the sanitized version. Not the version that begins with “rules are rules.” But the lived reality of families who built institutions from nothing, protected their communities for decades, and then found themselves navigating systems that seemed designed without them in mind.

This is not ancient history.
This is living memory.

And it deserves to be told — fully, honestly, and without apology.

The Southern Justice Archive
Presented By: Charlotte A. Clark-Frieson aka
Wilkie Clark’s Daughter”

“Documenting what happened, Preserving what matters, Protecting what must endure!

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