By KIM CHANDLER | The Associated Press

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — The Alabama House of Representatives on Wednesday voted to keep secret the names of execution-drug suppliers and to bring back the electric chair if the state can’t obtain the chemicals for a lethal injection.

Alabama is the latest state to try to shield the identities of execution-drug manufacturers, and to look to other methods of execution, in the face of a drug shortage and court challenges over the humaneness of lethal injection.

House members added the secrecy language to a bill under debate that would resume use of Alabama’s electric chair— nicknamed Yellow Mama— if the state was ever unable to obtain lethal injection drugs or if the execution method was ruled unconstitutional.

“If lethal injection is to continue in this state, the people who manufacture the drugs need privacy because of what they are doing,” Rep. Mac McCutcheon, R-Capshaw, said.

Representatives passed the bill on a 76-26 vote, sending it to the Alabama Senate for consideration.

Bill sponsor Rep. Lynn Greer, R-Rogersville, said Alabama and other death penalty states are having trouble obtaining the drugs because pharmacies fear lawsuits and backlash from death penalty opponents.

The secrecy provision was criticized by some lawmakers.

Rep. Chris England, D-Tuscaloosa, said the drug purchases are “clearly a public record” and the state has no legal basis to try to withhold the names of the drug suppliers from the public.

“There is no other reason to keep that confidential other than to keep the execution train rolling,” England said.

Representatives approved a similar drug-secrecy bill in 2014, but the legislation stalled in the Alabama Senate.

Greer’s bill would also allow the state to resume use of Yellow Mama or another electric chair if lethal injection was ever ruled unconstitutional.

Alabama in 2002 switched to lethal injection as the state’s primary form of execution because of fears that electrocution would soon be outlawed as cruel and unusual punishment.

Lawmakers opposed to the death penalty spoke out against the bill, saying the electric chair was abandoned because of concerns about whether it was humane.

Other lawmakers pointed to how some people have been exonerated after spending years on death row.

“You would change your mind if someone in your family was picked up and accused falsely,” said Rep. Barbara Boyd, D-Anniston.

Rep. Jim Martin, R-Clanton, explaining his support of the bill, cited all of the homicide victims he saw during his years as a county coroner.

“Did they have pity on the people they were killing or maiming?” Martin asked.

Utah lawmakers on Tuesday voted to use the firing squad as a means of execution.

Alabama’s last execution was in 2013 and state officials acknowledged last year that the state had run out of execution drugs.

The state switched to a new three-drug combination in September that will use midazolam as the initial sedative to render an inmate unconscious.

Lethal injection drugs, including midazolam, have come under scrutiny following botched executions in other states. The U.S. Supreme Court in January halted executions in Oklahoma to review concerns raised about the effectiveness of midazolam as a sedative.