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"The Sad Duty of Politics": Jimmy Carter and the Issue of Race in His 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign Author(s): Randy Sanders Reviewed work(s): Source: The Georgia Historical Quarterly, Vol. 76, No. 3 (Fall 1992), pp. 612-638 Published by: Georgia Historical Society Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40582593 . Accessed: 05/07/2012 11:39

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http://www.jstor.org "The Sad Dutyof Politics": JimmyCarter and theIssue of Race in His 1970 GubernatorialCampaign By Randy Sanders

Carter'scampaign for Georgia's governorshiphas Jimmyremained virtually from its inception more than a littlepuzzl- ing, and even somewhatmysterious. The puzzlementfelt by Carter'spolitical opponents and by astuteobservers from the beginningof the campaignspread to the widerGeorgia and nationalpublic at his inauguration."I say to you quite frankly thatthe time for racial discrimination is over," he declared."Our people have alreadymade thismajor and difficultdecision. No poor, rural,weak or black person should ever have to bear theadditional burden of beingdeprived of theopportunity for an education,a job, or simplejustice."1 In itselfsuch a pronouncementwas notextraordinary, even when made by a southernpolitician. Similar statements were beingmade bya numberof southerngovernors elected around the same time.Many had even campaignedon thatnote. But JimmyCarter had not.To manyit seemedthat, at best,he had equivocatedon theracial issue, and at worst,he had pandered outrightto racism.Little wonder that manyof the 339,000 Georgianswho had votedfor him listened to his words in amaze- ment.2

■JimmyCarter, A Governmentas Good as Its People (New York, 1977), 14. 2There are several good accounts of Carters 1970 campaign. JimmyCarters au- tobiographicalWhy Not theBest? (Nashville, 1975), containsa shortbut revealingchapter on 1970. The most detailed accounts of the 1970 campaign are from the following works: Leslie Wheeler,Jimmy Who? An Examinationof Presidential Candidate Jimmy Carter: The Man, His Career,His Standson theIssues (New York, 1976), 45-61; Reg Murphy and Hal Gulliver, The SouthernStrategy (New York, 1971), 173-97; and Betty Glad, Jimmy Carter:In Searchof the Great White House (New York, 1980), 123-40. Bill Shipp, political editor of the AtlantaConstitution in 1970, had contactswithin the Carter campaign and wrote a revealing account which ran in the AtlantaConstitution as a four-partseries, November 8-11, 1970, entitled "How He Won It." For an illuminatinginsight into

Mr. Sanders is a doctoral candidate in historyat Louisiana State University.

The Georgia Historical Quarterly Vol. LXXVI, No. 3, Fall 1992 JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 613

The manyquestions that immediately arose concerningthe inconsistency,Jimmy Carter adroitly sidestepped. And he has continuedto sidestepever since.Aside froma fewreferences in his 1975 autobiography,he has made no mentionof the campaignin hiswritings, and he has been reluctantto talkabout the race. When pressed to repudiatehis tacticsin thatrace, Carterhas respondedby attackingthe Atlantanewspapers for distortedcoverage on his campaign.Moreover, he has seques- teredhis 1970gubernatorial campaign papers in his presidential libraryin Atlanta,where they remain unprocessed, unscheduled forprocessing, and henceunavailable for examination.3 Some- thingabout the 1970 campaignbothered James Earl Carter,Jr. deeply. The 1970 racewas notJimmy Carter's first try for Georgia's governorship.He had run fouryears earlier, in 1966. Carter did notlike being positioned on theleft or rightof thepolitical spectrum,saying "I believethat I'm a morecomplicated person thanthat." But in 1966 Carterappealed to themoderate-liberal voter,and conducteda gentlemanlyand non-racistcampaign. BruceGalphine of theAtlanta Constitution wrote at thetime that it was hard to meetJimmy Carter and hear him talkwithout "admiringhis integrity."Here, Galphinwent on to say,was a breed of politiciannew to Georgia,subdued, frank even about his deficiencies,and "refusingto torturethe traditionalwhip- pingboys."4 In 1966, race was stillGeorgia's most readilyexploitable politicalissue. ButJimmy Carter refused to use it. He was not

Carter'sstrategy, see JamesClotfelter and WilliamR. Hamilton(Carter's pollster), "Electinga Governorin the Seventies,"in Thad Beyleand J. OliverWilliams, eds., AmericanGovernors in BehavioralPerspective (New York, 1972), 32-39. Two campaign aides fromthe Sanderscampaign provide an insider'saccount in RobertCoram and RemerTyson, "The LoserWho Won,"Atlanta Magazine (November 1970), 41-99. See alsoMargaret Spears Lyons, "A Comparisonof Carl Sanders' Gubernatorial Campaigns: 1962 and 1970" (M.A. thesis,University of Georgia,1971). Also veryhelpful were interviewswith participants and observersof the 1970campaign by the Georgia Gov- ernmentDocumentation Project, Special Collections, Georgia State University. 3Thisguarding of documentsis uncharacteristicof Carter.On the lastday of his gubernatorialterm he allowedthe GeorgiaDepartment of Archivesand Historyto pickup his paperswith an agreementthat archive officials would "make the papers availableto thepublic as quicklyas possiblewith no restrictionson access."Gary Fink, Preludeto thePresidency: The PoliticalCharacter and LegislativeLeadership Style of Governor JimmyCarter (Westport, Conn., 1980),xvii. 4BruceGalphin, Jimmy Carter - A Newbreed, AtlantaConstitution, July 2, lyoö. 614 Georgia Historical Quarterly a racist,and hisintegrity precluded opportunism. Years earlier in his hometownof Plains,Carter had refused,in the face of considerablepressure, to join the WhiteCitizens Council, and in a heated congregationalsquabble he made an impassioned speechin favorof allowingblacks to worshipin his church.As a statesenator, he made one of his firstspeeches in opposition to Georgia'sinfamous "thirty questions" law used to disqualify blackvoters.5 Though he finisheda surprisinglyclose thirdin the 1966 race,the outcome convinced Jimmy Carter that the racial issue, likeit or not,could not be ignored.The winnerand new gov- ernorwas Lester Maddox, who had garnerednational notoriety by threateningto use an ax-handleon any blackwho entered the Atlantarestaurant he owned. Afterhis 1966 loss, Carterbegan some hard thinkingand decided two things.One, he would run again in 1970. That surprisedno one who knewhim or had observedhim closely. As one journalistobserved, "to go out and makenice speeches and lose is notJimmy Carter's style." The otherthing Jimmy Carterdecided was, as he laterwrote in hisautobiography, that he "did not intendto lose again."That meanthe was goingto have to makea thirddecision.6 Eightyears earlier, George Wallace, like Jimmy Carter, had lost his 1958 bid forAlabama's governorship because he was perceivedas more moderatethan his race-baitingopponent, JohnPatterson. As a result,Wallace had decided,and declared, thathe would neverbe "out-nigguhedagain." Jimmy Carter was goingto haveto decideif he wouldgo in thesame direction, and ifso, howfar. Before he made thatdecision, he wouldhave to waitand see howthe Georgia political situation would shape up in 1970.7 In the meantimehe kept himselfin the public eye. He traveledthe stateon thecivic club speech-makingcircuit, kept active in the Baptist church, farm organizations,business groups,and the Lions Club,and had himselfmade statechair-

5Wheeler,Jimmy Who? 35. 6WilliamLee Miller, Yankeefrom Georgia (New York, 1978), 109; Carter, WhyNot theBest? 112. 'Marshall Frady, Wallace (New York, 1968), 127. JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 615

In Georgia's 1966 gubernatorialelection, Jimmy Carter refused to exploit racisttactics and lost to Lester Maddox (above), who ran a very effectiveracist campaign using ax-handles as a symbolof his defiance of integration.Photograph courtesy of RichardB. RussellMemorial Library, University of Georgia. man of the March of Dimes. By the timehe announced his candidacyJimmy Carter had visitedmore than 400 towns,made morethan 1,800 speeches,and met600,000 Georgians.8 By 1968 certainprominent features of the 1970 political landscapewere becoming clear. On theone hand,Georgia was goingto have the first black candidate for governor in its history, and black votersconstituted 20 percentof the electorate.On the otherhand, 1970 wouldbe the firstgubernatorial election since George Wallace carriedGeorgia in his 1968 bid forthe presidency,and thestate's electorate remained highly receptive to his brand of anti-establishment,anti-integration rhetoric. And to complicatematters further, the Republicanparty, for thefirst time since Reconstruction, had a good chanceto capture Georgia'sgovernorship. In 1966 theRepublican candidate had actuallyreceived a pluralityof thevotes in thegeneral election, but had lostout whenthe lack of a majorityfor any candidate threwthe election into the heavily Democratic state legislature. 8Neal R. Peirce, TheDeep SouthStates of America: People, Politics, and Powerin theSeven Deep SouthStates (New York, 1974), 320. 616 Georgia Historical Quarterly

In otherwords, Georgia would be standingat a crossroads in 1970. In whichdirection would it go? Did LesterMaddox's electionin 1966 indicatea direction,or was itjust a fluke?If one lookedat theGeorgia political scene just priorto Maddox's election,and comparedit to othersouthern states, one would be prone to dismissthe whole Maddox affairas an anomaly. The state'sgovernor from 1962 to 1966, Carl Sanders,had been one of thefirst southern politicians to stakeout, and hold, a moderateposition on racialmatters. According to the Christian ScienceMonitor, Sanders was "one ofthe South's most moderate, progressivechief executives."9 He ran promisingto keep public schoolsopen evenif it meant integrating them, and as governor, he stuckto his promise.Moreover, he kepta tightreign on the legislatureand neverallowed it to influencepublic opinion with anythinglike the seriesof anti-integrationenactments passed by manysouthern state legislatures of the time.At the end of his termSanders was stillimmensely popular, and had Georgia law not preventedsuccessive gubernatorial terms, he would almostcertainly have been reelectedin 1966. Duringhis four yearsout of officeSanders continued to have strongpolitical and financialsupport and wasconsidered by virtually all political observersas theodds-on favorite to winin 1970.Sanders' popu- larityand strongsupport militated in favorof believingthat Georgia in 1970 would resume her moderate-liberalcourse, aftera four-yearMaddox aberration. But the enormouspopularity Maddox had builtup during his four years in officecould not be ignored.The Georgia electoratehad wildlyapplauded his brandingof integrationas "un-American,un-Godly and even criminal"and had re- sponded to his call to keep whitechildren out of integrated schoolswith a zeal notseen in thestate since the days of Eugene Talmadge in the 1930s.10Maddox's popularity,taken in con- junctionwith the 1968 Wallace-for-presidentvote in the state, could well be read as an indicationthat in 1970, Georgiawas destinedfor anotherMaddox-like Democrat, or even a like- mindedRepublican.

^ChristianScience Monitor, January 16, 1970, 15. 10HaroldP. Henderson and Gary L. Roberts, eds., GeorgiaGovernors in an Age of Change(Athens, 1988), 295. JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 617

JimmyCarter depicted the popularCarl Sanders(left), his principalopponent in the 1970 governor'srace, as a "brash, young,eager man who doesn't deserve to be governor."Photograph courtesy of Richard B. Russell MemorialLibrary, University of Georgia.

Withall of thatin mindCarter began planningfor his 1970 campaignin 1968. His instinctstold him that,with Maddox preventedby constitutionalprovision from succeeding himself and withno Maddox-likefigure in prominence,Carl Sanders was the man he was going to have to beat. Accordingly,that yearCarter scribbled a memoto an aide: "Some imagesto be projectedregarding Carl Sanders . . . refusesto let Georgia Democratshave a voice in the Democraticparty . . . Atlanta- oriented. . . prettyboy . . . nouveauriche . . . excludedGeorge Wallacefrom state . . . rightnow we just need to collectall these roughideas we can. Laterwe can startdriving a wedgebetween me and him."11 But Carterdid not relyon his instinctsalone. He hired Washingtonpollster William Hamilton, who made fivesurveys betweenSeptember of 1969 and October 1970. The firstof thesesurveys confirmed Carter's original feelings. Eighty-four percentof Georgia votershad a favorableview of Sanders' governorship,and 20 percentrated him "excellent." Hamilton noted in his reportto Carterthat "this is one of the bestjob ratingsI have ever seen givena formergovernor after three years out of office."If the electionwere held immediately, Hamilton'spoll indicated,Sanders would get 53 percentof the vote and Carteronly 21 percent.But the reportalso pointed

nGlad, In Searchof theGreat White House, 127. 618 Georgia Historical Quarterly

out thatno one had started"shooting at" Sandersyet and that Carterhad plentyof timeto build a "favorableimage" among voterswho did not yetknow him.12 Moreover,Hamilton's report stressed, there were a few chinksin Sanders'armor. From 20 to 25 percentof Sanders' supportwas "soft,"meaning there was somethingabout him his supportersdid notlike: his affluencesince leaving the governor'soffice; his tiesto the"Atlanta bigwigs"; or his closeness to Washington.That convincedJimmy Carter. He wouldmake Carl Sandersinto a rich"brash, young, eager manwho doesn't deserveto be governor,"and portrayhimself as a humblecoun- tryboy who was "notgoing to let himbe."13 The othercontender in the Democraticprimary to signifi- cantlyaffect Carter's strategy was the black candidate,C. B. King.King was an Albanylawyer (one ofonly three black lawyers in thestate outside of Atlanta in the early 1960s) who had played a prominentrole in theSouthern Christian Leadership Confer- ence's Albanymovement in 1962.14Despite a solid recordof achievementas a civilrights attorney, black support for King was divided.Some blackleaders and politicalorganizations endorsed King,but mostof the others,believing that he could notwin, even ifhe made theDemocratic run-off election, sup- portedSanders. Few, at thatpoint, supported Carter. But for Carterthat was a blessing.King could not possiblymake the run-off,but he woulddraw enough black votes to keepSanders fromwinning on the firstballot, giving Carter a good chance of beingin a run-offwith Sanders. But wherewould Carter get enough votes to makeit intoa run-off?With his naturalconstituency of moderates,liberals, and blackspreempted by Sanders and King,Carter's only hope lay withthe Maddox-Wallace camp. Aside fromthe moraldilemma such an associationimplied for Carterpersonally, its accomplishmentin practicalterms would be tricky.He would need to make himselfattractive to Georgia's "lower status whites"as Numan Bartleycalled themin hisFrom Thurmond to

"AtlantaConstitution, November 8, 1970, 2A. 13Clotfelterand Hamilton,"Electing a Governor,"35; AtlantaJournal, April 7, 1970, 2A. 14Thebest account of C. B. King'srole in theAlbany movement is foundin Taylor Branch,Parting the Waters: America in theKing Years,1 954-63 (New York, 1988) , 524-3 1. JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 619

Wallace,the state's"most politically conservative people . . . racistsin socialattitudes, fundamentalist in religion,provincial in outlook."15At the same time,Carter could notmake himself so attractiveto the Maddox and Wallace people as to perma- nentlyalienate Georgia's moderate, liberal and blackvoters. If he managedto winthe Democratic nomination, he wouldneed theirsupport in the generalelection, in whichhe would facea Republican. His plan to paintSanders as a smug,citified dandy would sell well in poor rural Georgia. It alwayshad. And Sanders would be an easy target,for afterhis termexpired he had remainedin Atlantato becomea richlawyer. Caricaturing San- ders, however,would not be enough. Carterwould also have to appeal to theMaddox- Wallace people on issues.In thememo he dictatedin 1966, Carterhad noted thathe mightneed to portraySanders as too liberalfor Georgia voters, "more liberal" was hisexact phrase. And WilliamHamilton's poll of 1969 had confirmedthat hunch. Hamiltonnoted that Sanders had "a slightproblem with his liberalimage."16 Carterdecided thatto winthe supportof Maddox-Wallace followers,he was goingto have to place himselfto the rightof Sanders.Although Carter was, in fact,the moreliberal of the two,his recordwas not as well knownas Sanders'.That fact made the schemeworkable. As a firststep in placinghimself to the rightof Sanders,Carter made his cousin,Hugh Carter, hiscampaign manager. Hugh Carterwas a good-old-boypoliti- cian withsolid conservative credentials. His job was to reassure conservativesin the statethat "Jimmy Carter was a safe man." JimmyCarter could easilycombine his planned portrayalof Sandersas too richto understandthe average man, too citified, too sophisticatedand too liberalfor Georgians, with attacks on his tiesto "big government,"to "the powerelite," and to "the Washingtonestablishment," all phrases George Wallace had made popular. In short,Carter would make Sanders into a "limousineliberal."17

15NumanV. Bartley,From Thurmond to Wallace: PoliticalTendencies in Georgia,1948- 1968 (Baltimore, 1970), 140. 16BillShipp, AtlantaConstitution, November 8, 1970, 2 A. 17Glad,In Searchof theGreat White House, 126; Clotfelterand Hamilton, "Electing a Governor," 35. 620 Georgia Historical Quarterly

But again thatwould not be enough.While it was true,a Reg Murphyand Hal Gulliverpointed out in TheSouthern Strai egy,that "liberal" and "conservative"were racial code wordsii the South,"liberal" meaning integrationist and "conservative meaningsegregationist, such code wordsalone wouldnot con vince the Maddox-Wallacecamp. As much as he may hav< wished,Jimmy Carter could not escape dealing with the integra tionissue. According to one poll,public sentiment that integra tionwas movingtoo fastrose from35 percentin March 196É to 54 percentin April1970. And anti-blackfeeling among Geor- gia votersjumped from10 to 49 percentin the same period. As JimGillis, Jr., a countycommissioner and son of Georgia's powerfulhighway department director said at the time:"The schoolthing is likea funeral.The familyknows you can't bring the body back to life,but theywant you thereholding their hands."Although Jimmy Carter never heard Gillis' analogy, he understoodit well,and he determinedto be there,holding the hands of Georgia'ssegregationists.18 At the same timehe was holdinghands withconservatives and segregationists,Jimmy Carter had to reach out to liberal and blackvoters. An awkwardposture, to saythe least, but one necessaryboth to assuage his conscienceas wellas insuretheir supportagainst the Republicannominee in the latergeneral election.In effect,Carter's campaign plan called fora two-faceted- his criticswould say a two-faced- campaign:one facet designedto appeal to segregationistsand theother to giveheart to liberalsand blacks. To obscurethe inconsistenciesin his two-facetedstrategy and to excuse his personalattacks on Sanders,Carter cloaked thewhole of his campaign in theguise of "populism." According to one of the earlypolls Hamiltondid forCarter, 8 1 percent of the Georgia electoratefelt alienated from government. In additionto integrationcoming too fast,they were mostcon- cernedabout hightaxes and thewelfare system, "the issues of Nixon'sforgotten man, middle America." Political pragmatism dictatedthat Carter must appeal to racistelements in Georgia's electorate,but he wouldrun a "redneck"campaign, emphasiz-

18Murphyand Gulliver, SouthernStrategy, 182-83; Coram and Tyson, "Loser," 66 and 43. JimmyCarter's 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 621

Ticket for &**¿¡EEEBttíS2fflk Four Years of Good ^ÊKrTÊtmÊÊIH J Governmentby all Georgians f JIMMYCARTER FORGOVERNOR Jj fund ¿ï "Jm raisingbarbecue supper ^ ^mk^r^Sr ^ve **ar^ baseball Fi«l

WhileCarter appealed at timesto bothblacks and segregationists,he glossedover the inconsistencieswith a populistapproach, as suggestedby thisticket to a barbeque fundraiser."My campaign is basedon peanuts,pennies, and people,"he insisted.Ticket appearedas illustrationinHugh Carter, Cousin Beedie and CousinHot: MyLife with the CarterFamily of Plains,Georgia (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1978).

ing class ratherthan race distinctions.He would embraceall workersin the rhetoricof populism,while carefully avoiding anyovert appeal to racism.That wayhe could perhapsdeflate the race issues.19 "Jimmycan and does appeal to the Wallacevoter, but not on the racial thing,"said Charles Kirbo,a long-timeCarter friendand politicaladvisor. "Wallace has got a lot of support frompeople . . . [who]are just downon thegovernment. And he's got a lot of populistsupport. Jimmy is a populist."20 There was nothingunusual, much less unique, about Jimmy Carter'sappeal to "populism."What James Perry of the National Observercalled a "new populism"was sweepingthe South in 1970.New facesin theDemocratic party were winning elections to governors'and senators'seats by refocusing their party objec- tivesin termsof the commonman. "More importantfor the Democratsthan specific issues was the successfulselling of the populistsymbols," wrote James Clotfelter and WilliamHamilton (Carter'spollster) in SouthToday. "The commoningredient was voter'sbelieving the candidatecared about what theycared 19Clotfelterand Hamilton,"Electing a Governor,"34-36. 20Alexander P. Lamis,The Two Party South (New York,1984), y». 622 Georgia Historical Quarterly

about, that he was one of theirown and would not forget them."21 WhenCarter announced his candidacyin earlyApril 1970, he mapped out his strategyfor Steve Ball, politicaleditor of the AtlantaJournal. He would aim his campaignat a coalition of Georgiansin the middleand low-incomebrackets. This in- cluded Nixon'ssilent majority, the poor,both black and white, and theconservative Georgians who had votedfor Lester Mad- dox in 1966 and forGeorge Wallace in 1968. His appeal, he went on to say, would be to "average workingpeople" who wanted"someone in the governor's office who understands their problems."22 Lookingback on thecampaign twenty years later, Carl San- dersadmitted that Carter suceeded in drawing"more of a class distinctionthan a race distinction.I thinkhe posturedhimself as a peanutfarmer from outside of Atlantaand ... he pictured me as a corporatelawyer in Atlantawho had capitalizedon beinggovernor and who was now representingthe fat cats and he wasout there representing the average citizen. That's a pretty toughthing to overcome."23 JimmyCarter succeeded, to be sure.But his successproved to be bothgruesomely hard and soul-taxing.The onlyeasy part was adopting, adapting, and inventinghis own brand of "populism."In theminds of rural and urbanblue-collar Georgia voters,nothing better represented the wealth and powerof the establishmentthan the Atlanta press. "The people in thestate," said one long-timepolitico, "whatever the Atlantanewspapers are for,they're against." Successful Georgia politicians had been haranguing"those lyingAtlanta newspapers" since the cam- paignsof Eugene Talmadge in the 1930s.24 JimmyCarter simply continued the tradition.He did not want,he insisted,the supportof "the big-shotsthat own the Atlantanewspapers." He chargedthat the AtlantaConstitution madea "majoreditorial commitment" to smear him, particularly

21JamesPerry, National Observer, April 7, 1971, 5; JamesClotfelter and William Hamilton,"But WhichSouthern Strategy?" South Today 2 (April1971): 7. 22 AtlantaJournal, April 7, 1970,2 A. 23CarlSanders, taped interviewwith author, March 28, 1989,Atlanta. 24Peirce,The Deep South,3W; William C. Harvard, ed., The ChangingPolitics of the South(Baton Rouge, 1972),303. JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 623 in itspolitical cartoons. Carter's press aide, Bill Pope, said after the campaign:"We loved all thosescurrilous cartoons. We just didn'twant it to stop."Bill Shippwas rightwhen he laterwrote thatCarter had "calculatedlyincurred the wrath of thebig city dailypress."25 At thesame time,Jimmy Carter made himselflook as ordi- naryand colorlessas he could, or at least his politicalimage packager,Gerald Rafshoon, did. Billboardsand brochurescar- ried the ugliestphotograph of Carterhis staffcould find."It madeJimmy look likean averageworking man," a Cartercam- paignaide said. The picturemade himlook like"he had a little fearin him... a littlewary perhaps."26 That Cartermade sure he looked likea populistwas significantbecause, in the words of his own pollster,William Hamilton, Carter was a "stylistic populist"whose success derived not fromchanging specific policies,but from"personal campaign style."27 Moreuniquely his own was Jimmy Carter's ability at personal campaigning.Over the monthshe shook thousandsof hands in factoryshift lines at 5 a.m. and againat midnight.And eight- een-hourdays of non-stopcampaigning were typical. In many smallcounties a visitfrom someone running for governor was rare.Carter visited most of thesmall counties not once buttwo or threetimes, and shookevery hand he could find.Numerous observersnoted the effectiveness of thisperson-to-person campaigning:"It is a peculiarthing, involving human warmth, and not relatingat all to issues,"wrote the AtlantaJournal's Steve Ball. "It worksfor him everywhere." Even Reg Murphy,editor of the AtlantaConstitution and one of Carter'sseverest critics, admittedthat "one-on-one, he's probablyas convincingas any- bodyI've everseen."28 Carter found the personalcampaigning natural, did not mindthe toningdown of his looks,and managedthe populist rhetoriceasily because, in hisheart, he believedit. But discredit-

25AtlantaConstitution, September 4, 1970, 1 and 22A; ibid.,August 26, 1971, 18A; Bill Pope quotationin ibid.,November 11, 1970, 14A. 26Ibid.,November 11, 1970, 14A. 27Clotfelterand Hamilton,"Electing a Governor,"34. 2% AtlantaConstitution, November 8, 1970, 2 A; Steve Ball, AtlantaJournal-Constitution, August23, 1970,7 A; Reg Murphyquote in BruceMazlish and EdwinDiamond, Jimmy Carter:An InterpretativeBiography (New York, 1979), 181. 624 Georgia Historical Quarterly ing Sandersproved much harder for Carter as a man,for the processhad tobe pushedmuch further than he initiallythought. In theend itamounted to blackeningSanders' character, some- thingthat Carter must have foundhard tojustify to himself. Carter'spolls indicatedthat average voters watched televi- sionbut did notread newspapers,which dictated a TV crusade againstSanders. That crusade focusedon portrayingJimmy Carteras the candidateof theworking man, and Carl Sanders as thecandidate of theultra-rich. One commercialshowed Car- terharvesting peanuts. The voice-overasked, "can you imagine any of the othercandidates for governorworking in the hot Augustsun? Isn'tit timesomeone spoke up foryou?" Carter's fund-raisingads said othercandidates were supported by "big moneyasking for big favors,"but that"Jimmy Carter made it the hard way."29 What was probablyCarter's most effectivecommercial opened withthe camera panningin on a closed door. Voice- over: "This is thedoor to an exclusivecountry club, where the big-moneyboys play cards, drink cocktails, and raisemoney for theircandidate, Carl Sanders."Country club door swingsopen; close-upof man writing check. Voice-over: "People like us aren't invited.We're too busyworking for a living."Footage of Carter talkingwith an "averageman." Voice-over:"That's whyour votesare goingfor Jimmy Carter. Vote forJimmy Carter, our kindof man,our kindof governor."30 "Carterused televisionvery effectively," remembered Bill Shipp,"with Gerry Rafshoon doing a wholeseries of some of the bestnegative advertising I've ever seen aimed at Sanders. AndSanders' own advertising played right into their hands."31 The Sandersadvertising campaign actually benefited Carter. Sanders'ads wereexpensive, slick, and elitist.Sanders was pic- turedjogging, boating, and flyinghis plane. Sandersavoided appealingto the commonman and portrayedhimself as pros- perousand prestigious.And the Sanderscampaign slogan did not sit well withmany Georgians. "Carl Sanders oughtto be

29Clotfelter and Hamilton, "Electing a Governor," 36. >°Ibid., 34. 31Interviewwith Bill Shipp by Cliff Kuhn, April 22, 1987, Georgia Government Documentation Project,Special Collections,Georgia State University,43. JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 625 governoragain." Two of Sanders' own campaignaides later admittedthat the slogan sounded like Sandershad a rightto be governor,as if it were "a monarchicalprivilege."32 Cartersaw his opportunityand made the mostof it. He immediatelybegan portrayingSanders as a king who had robbedhis subjects.In one of Carter'stelevised spots Sanders, whomCarter always called "Cuff Links Carl," was shown board- ing a Lear jet; thenthe camera quicklycut to a close-upof a man's hand takinghold of a briefcasefull of money.At the wristswere huge cufflinks.33 Throughoutthe campaign Carter harped on thetheme that Sanders had "used secret-informationto get rich."Over and over, Carterproclaimed that "Georgians never again want a governorwho willuse the tremendouspower and prestigeof officefor his own personal wealth." And once,while campaigning at a bank,Carter stuck his head intoa vaultand quipped: "Looks likeCarl Sanders'basement."34 When Sanders retorted by callingCarter a penny-antepolitician, Carter again bested him.Yes, he said,"my campaign is based on peanuts,pennies, and people. That's betterthan one based on bucks,banks, and boondogles."35 In fact,Carl Sanders'administration had not had a hintof scandalabout it. And Carter's own polling information indicated thatonly 1 percentof theelectorate believed Sanders had used thegovernor's office for personal gain. But Jimmy Carter would makesure that by election day a greatmany more voters believed it. Carterattacked Sanders daily, and promisedthe pressthat he had proofof Sanders'misdeeds that he wouldrelease in due course.At the same time,Carter put Sanderson thedefensive by repeatedlycalling for public disclosureof his personalfi- nances. Sanders could only lamelyprotest that his personal financeswere not partof the campaign.36 Two weeks before the primaryCarter released his long awaited"proof" that Carl Sanders had abused the powersof

32Coramand Tyson,"Loser," 41. ^AtlantaConstitution, July 21, 1970, 6A; AtlantaJournal, July 28, 1970, 1. ^AtlantaConstitution, April 4, 1970,4A; ibid.,April 11, 1970, 15A. »Ibid,.August 28, 1970, 1. MIbid.November 11, 1970, 1 and 11A; Coramand Tyson,"Loser," 96. 626 Georgia Historical Quarterly

BothJimmy Carter and CarlSanders spoke at the1970 meeting of the Georgia Forestry Associationin Tifton,where Carter's emphasis on thecontrast between his rural roots and Sanders'urban elitism probably played well. Photographs from Hargrett Rare Book and ManuscriptLibrary, University of GeorgiaLibraries.

thegovernor's office. He chargedthat Sanders, while governor, had used hisinfluence with the Federal Communications Com- missionto help a friendand businessassociate acquire several televisionand radiostations. Carter handed out copies of papers filedwith the FCC. The documentslisted Sanders as secretary of hisfriend's firm, gave his occupation as governorof Georgia, and listedhis address as thegovernor's mansion. But thedocu- mentsalso showedthat Sanders owned no stockin the com- pany.37 Carter'sbombshell had provena dud, and the newspapers had a fieldday. Carter had, in thewords of the Macon Telegraph, "over-promisedand under-delivered."The MaconNews labeled Carter"a classicexample of a good man whosehigh standards have been underminedby politicalambition." And theAtlanta Constitutionwrote that Carter had gone at Sanderswith a "ven-

3" 'AtlantaConstitution, August 27, 1970, 1. JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 627

gance."The bestJimmy Carter could do was admitthere was no proofof illegality, but insist that the facts showed "a consistent patternof combiningpolitical and businessinterests on behalf of Mr.Sanders." The weaknessof thatresponse did notmatter, forthe damage to Sandershad been done. The dirtytrick had worked.But Carter was beginning to pay the price of conscience. Accordingto PhilGardner, editor of theAtlanta Journal, Jimmy Carter,at the time,agonized over "whetherhe should have used the tacticin the firstplace."38 Butthere were far more and dirtiertricks played on Sanders. Earlyin the summerthe Cartercampaign put out a seriesof anonymouspamphlets and "fact-sheets"that hit Sanders from all sides. One of the mosteffective was a photographof Carl Sandersbeing doused with champagne by a blackAtlanta Hawks basketballplayer during a victorycelebration. The picturebe- came knownas the"champagne shampoo." Copies were mailed to small-townbarbershops, rural churches, service stations, and countrystores, and passedout at Ku Klux Klan rallies.Sanders was partowner of theAtlanta Hawks and thephotograph orig- inallyhad run on the sportspage of the AtlantaConstitution. But as a politicalflyer it reminded people thatSanders was rich and associatedhim with high-livingand alcohol, both still bugaboosin puritanicaland teetotalingrural Georgia.39 Mostimportantly, the photographassociated Sanders, in a close personalway, with blacks. That associationwas carried furtherby "factsheets" that said or impliedthat Sanders was a closeally of thecontroversial black state representative, Julian Bond (actuallythe twodetested each other);that Sanders had

ssMaconTelegraph, August 28, 1970,4A; MaconNews, editorial reprinted in Atlanta Constitution,September 3, 1970, 5A; AtlantaConstitution, August 27, 1970, 1; Atlanta Journal,July 20, 1970,2A. "Bill Shipp reportedon the anonymouspamphlet aimed at Sanders in Atlanta Constitution,June 14, 1970, 1; StephenBrill first produced evidence that Carter cam- paignworkers were responsible for the pamphletsin "JimmyCarter's Pathetic Lies," Harper's(March 1976), 79-80. In earlyFebruary Jody Powell issued a twenty-twopage rebuttalto theBrill article prior to itspublication and severalnewspapers ran excerpts fromboth the article and therebuttal. See "Chargesand ResponsesRelating to Carter," - compiledby Bill Allen, 3/76 - 6/76,[CF,O/A 751], Box 1, PressOffice Powell,Carter- MondaleCampaign Materials file, Jimmy Carter Library; Phil Stanfordassessed the chargesin the Brillarticle and the Cartermedia coveragein generalin "'The most remarkablepiece of fiction'Jimmy Carter ever read," Columbia Journalism Review (July/ August1976), 16. 628 Georgia Historical Quarterly attendedthe funeral of MartinLuther King, Jr., which in fact, he had; and thatas governorSanders had conspiredto keep GeorgeWallace out of Georgia (Sanders had). BillPope, Carter's presssecretary, prepared the leaflets and Carter'stop campaign aide, HamiltonJordan, directed their mailing. Such tactics were all part of an operationCarter campaign workers called the "stinktank."40 In orderto winthe Democraticnomination, Jimmy Carter needed to draw as muchblack support away from Sanders as possible.But at thesame time,he needed to stringblack voters along,for he wouldneed theirsupport in the generalelection in whichhe wouldface a Republican.The two-facetedcampaign was again in play. The "stinktank" was once again put to work.The Carter campaigncreated a fictitious"Black Concern Committee." The "committee"sent pamphlets that charged Sanders had notkept his 1962 campaignpromises to blackvoters, and even implied that Sanders had been responsiblefor the death of a black prisoninmate. These sheetswere mailed to blackbarber shops, funeralhomes, and pool halls. Simultaneously,the Rafshoon agency,in orderto drawblack votes away from Sanders, prepared and paid forradio spots for C. B. King.And at thesame timeCarter consistently asserted that he had "excellentsupport fromthe NAACP and Negrochurchmen across the state," and he told black Atlantaleader VernonJordan: "You won'tlike mycampaign, but you willlike my administration."41 Carteralso wentdirectly to blackvoters. Although Carter's staffadvised against it, he was the onlycandidate to campaign openlyin blackcommunities. "I've beento see 'emin theirfilling stations,in theirchurches," Carter would be able to say. "I've been to see 'em in theirdrugstores and in theirhomes." And on one occasion,for example, Carter walked to the back of a smalltown drugstore to shakehands with a blackjanitor whom he could easilyhave ignored,while three whites he had just been talkingto looked on disapprovingly.Carter promised to appointblack citizensto high-levelstate offices and constitu-

40Coramand Tyson, "Loser," 95; Brill, "Carter's Pathetic Lies," 79. 41Bnll, "Carter's Fathetic Lies." 79-80; Atlanta Constitution,June 21, 1970, 14A; VernonJordan quote in WilliamLee Miller,Yankee from Georgia (New York, 1978), 107. JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 629

tionalboards, saying that "the stateought to set the example in itsemployment."42 Far morepainful for Carter than stringing black voters along was appealingto Georgia'ssegregationists. Here he employed dual purpose rhetoricwith acumen. While he neveroutright saidhe wasa segregationist,he managedto leave that impression witha great manyvoters. Hamilton Jordan told the Atlanta Journalthat in some countiesthe Cartercampaign actually set up twoorganizations, one designedto cultivatethe supportof Wallace-Maddoxsupporters, and the otherto appeal to more moderate-mindedvoters. Similarly, Republican candidate Hal Suit said thatCarter had one brochurefor use in extremeseg- regationist-mindedsouth Georgia, and anotherone fordistribu- tionin the restof the state.And duringthe campaignCarter, on severaloccasions, gave differentanswers to the same questions,depending on whereand to whomhe was speaking.43 Throughoutthe primaryCarter sought to identifyhimself withGeorge Wallace,even incorporatingWallace's campaign slogan,"our kindof man,"into his own advertising. He said he expected"to have particularlystrong support from the people who votedfor George Wallace for President and theones who voted for Lester Maddox." And he repeatedlypromised he wouldinvite George Wallace to Georgiato rightthe slight done the Alabama governorby Sanders,who had refusedto allow Wallace to speak to the Georgia statelegislature. ABC-TV's fact-bookon the electionconcluded that Carter largely "con- finedhis campaignpromises to one issue- if electedgovernor he would inviteGeorge Wallace to Georgia."44 On one occasionCarter had said he was againstgiving a "singledime" to privateschools; on anotheroccasion and in a differentplace - thistime at one of the manyprivate schools beingestablished in orderto avoid integration- he toldan au- *2 AtlantaJournal, April 7, 1970,2A; Incidentof Cartershaking hands with black janitorin SteveBall, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, September 27, 1970,7 A; Carterquote on stateemployment in Atlanta Journal, July 28, 1970,1; see also Murphyand Gulliver, 195. 42 AtlantaJournal, July 28, 1970,4A; Hal Suit,taped interviewwith author, March 27, 1989,Atlanta. 44Coramand Tyson,"Loser," 95; Carterquote on his supportin ibid.,June 21, 1970, 14A; ABC-TV's factbook reportedin ibid.,August 26, 1970, 1 and 6A; ibid., November1, 1970,5 A. 630 Georgia Historical Quarterly dience,"you can restassured I'll do everythingI can forprivate schools." More often and more typicallywhen asked about forcedintegration, he sidesteppedthe question with responses such as "I don'tlike being pushed around."45 Five days before the primaryCarter visited the Augusta police stationin order to show support for two policemen chargedwith denying constitutional rights to two blacksshot duringriots in Augusta.There he made a toughlaw-and-order speech."The main thingI wantyou to know,"Carter told the assembledpolice force, "is thatwhen I am governorof Georgia, you need not ever fearI willpull the rug out fromunder you whenyou tryto enforcethe law againstany sortof riotersor lawbreakers.I'll back you up 100 percent."46Press Secretary Bill Pope summedit all up afterthe electionwhen he toldthe WashingtonPost that he had run a "niggercampaign" for Car- ter.47 In the Democraticprimary on September9, Carterwon handily,with 388,280 votes, or 48.6 percentof the total. Sanders came in secondwith 301,179 votes, or 37.7 percent.Carter had missedwinning without a run-offby only 10,000 votes. Carter's strategyhad worked.He had sweptthe ruralareas and small townsand leftSanders onlyurban and black votersto draw from.48 As planned,Carter would facea run-offelection with San- ders.But Carter's unexpectedly large, 87,000-vote margin called fora changein tactics.In the run-offCarter would no longer attackSanders, who, no longerforced to be defensive,would probablytake the offensiveand startattacking. Carter would then play the part of the "littleman" being put upon by the richand powerfulSanders.

^AtlantaJournal, July 27, 1970, 2A; AtlantaConstitution, August 19, 1970, 6A. 46Atlanta Journal, September 4, 1970, 1 and 6A. Lardner, Post,March 7, 1976,C3. 4847George Washington AtlantaConstitution, September 24, 1970, 12A; NumanV. Bartleyand Hugh D. Graham, SouthernElections: County and PrecinctData, 1950-1972 (Baton Rouge, 1978), 94. In the countieswhere Lester Maddox did well,Carter also did well. Maddox, runningfor lieutenant governor, was theonly Democrat in a multi-candidaterace to winwithout a run-off.In 1966Jimmy Carter's liberal image served him well in thecity and in thestate's northern, generally liberal to moderatecounties. In 1970these were Carter'sweakest areas of support.For a fullerdiscussion of countyvoting tendencies in Georgia,see Havard,Changing Politics, 353-57. JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 631

Sandersimmediately snapped up the bait.Two days after the primary,he called a press conferenceand launchedinto the firstof a seriesof attackson Carteras a liar, a "smiling hypocrite,"an oppressorof tenantfarmers, and an ultra-liberal who was tryingto pass himselfoff as a hard-workingfarmer. "The last timeCarter worked in the fieldsin the hot August sun,"Sanders shouted, "was whenhis slickadvertising agency tookthe picturesyou see on televisionevery day." Carterhad workedto delete the word "God" fromthe Georgia constitution, had votedagainst old and disabledpersons, and had sidedwith organizedcrime. Carter was an "unprincipledgrinning chame- leon."49"Apparently Mr. Sanders has become an embittered and desperateman," was Carter's calculated mild response. "He is now waginga smearcampaign."50 In spiteof repeatedchallenges by Sanders, Carter ruled out a debate withsuch a "bad loser." "My strengthis withthe people,"he said, "and I intendto spend mytime with them." In desperationSanders had a televisiondebate anyway, with an emptychair. But Carterone-upped him again. "Some folks," he quipped,"said the chairwas ahead."51 C. B. King, the black candidatewho placed thirdin the Democraticprimary, frequently accused both Sanders and Car- ter of runningracist campaigns. Asked forcomment, Carter repliedin a typicaltwo-faceted statement, that he would ap- preciateany Negro votes,but added, "I can win thiselection withouta singleblack vote."52 One daylater Carter met with Roy Harris, the former chair- manof Georgia's White Citizens Council, George Wallace's 1968 Georgia campaigndirector, and editorof the racistAugusta Courier.At the end of the privatebut much speculatedupon meeting,Carter emerged with an endorsementfrom Harris.53

49Cormanand Tyson,"Loser," 96; AtlantaConstitution, September 12, 1970, 1 and 12A; September13, 1970,2A. 50 AtlantaConstitution, September 13, 1970, 2 A. "Ibid.,September 13, 1970,2A; September23, 1970, 15A. "Ibid.,September 16, 1970, 1 and 15A; September14, 1970,3A. 55Ibid.,September 15, 1970,1 and 6A. Therewas speculation at thetime of Carter s meetingwith Harris that there may have been a quidpro quo discussionconcerning Harris'reappointment to the stateUniversity Board of Regents.During the general electioncampaign, Carter flip-flopped on whetherhe wouldor wouldnot reappoint Harris.As governorCarter refused to reappointHarris, and replacedhim with a black 632 Georgia Historical Quarterly

In seekingto win Maddox's segregationistsupporters, Carter triedto place himselfto the rightof Carl Sanders. His efforts won him the endorsementof the prominentracist Roy Har- ris, which inspired this cartoon, distributedby the Sanders campaign. Cartoonfrom the personal collectionof Hal Suit, Atlanta.

The Sanderscamp was delighted. They immediately distributed a flyerfeaturing a cartoonof Carterclimbing into bed withRoy Harrisand saying:"... move over,Roy. You're right!Who needs blackvotes." And shortlyafterward, the Sanderspeople released anotherflyer that had picturesof run-downtenant houseson Carter'sfarm, captioned with a slightlyaltered version of theCarter campaign slogan: "Isn't it time someone spoke up forthese people?"54 Carterimmediately fired off memos to all his countycam- paign chairmentelling them to get the wordout thatSanders was mailing"smear sheets" that attacked him personallyand stirredup racial hatreds.He was right.During the finaldays man. See AtlantaJournal, October 16, 1970, 2A; AtlantaConstitution, October 22, 1970, 8 A; Henderson and Roberts,Georgia Governors, 15. 54Campaignflyers in Hal Suit's personal papers labeled "Sanders material,"Atlanta (hereinaftercited as Suit Papers). JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 633 of therun-off the Sanders campaign launched what amounted to a massive"smear sheet airlift." But Carteragain outmaneu- veredCarl Sanders.Local Cartercampaign people simplymet the incomingplanes, posed as Sanders' campaign workers, pickedup the "smearsheets," and had bonfires.55 On electionday Sandersgot his old supportersback to the polls,plus mostof C. B. King's,who gave him 93 percentof the blackvote. But Carterwon threeout of everyfour white votesand carried 135 of 159 countiesfor a 60 percentclear win. In ruralcounties he had routinelytriumphed with three to one margins.56 Almostas good newsfor the Cartercamp was thatthe Re- publicannominee was Hal Suit. If Suit'snomination surprised virtuallyeveryone in thestate, it delighted Carter and hispeople. Like everyoneelse, theyhad expectedthe Republicansto run JamesBentley, and theydreaded the prospect. StateComptroller General Jimmy Bentley was the Georgia GOP's mostable politicianand one ofthe most popular political figuresin thestate. Like Carter, he sawthat the Maddox- Wallace votein Georgiawould be thedeciding factor in the 1970 gover- nor's race. Three monthsbefore the Republicanprimary Bill Shipp had writtenthat Bentley was already"taking a campaign cue fromGeorge Wallace's victory in Alabamaand is takinga hard,perhaps even vicious turn to the right." Bentley had begun runninga televisioncommercial that opened withthe camera focusedon an oncomingschool bus. Voice over:"This year this bus and thelaws that drive it threaten to changethe life of your child.. . ." The bus roaredcloser and closerand loomedlarger and largeruntil the screenwas filled,then obliterated, by its frontbumper and radiatorgrill. It had been possible,if painful, forCarter to place himselfto theright of Sanders,but it would be impossibleto "out-nigguh"Jimmy Bentley.57 Hal Suit,on theother hand, an Atlantabroadcaster virtually unknownoutside that urban area, was a politicalnovice. More importantfrom the Cartercamp's point of view,he had no 55 AtlantaConstitution, September 2 1, 1970,1 and 15A; Coramand Tyson, "Loser," 98. 56Atlanta Constitution, September 24, 1970, 1 and 12A. 57Ibid.,November 10, 1970,7A; Bill Shippin ibid.,June 15, 1970, 1; Bentleycom- mercialreported by Bill Shippin ibid.,August 18, 1970,6A; see also ibid.,November 10, 1970,7A. 634 Georgia Historical Quarterly

established,much less well-known,reputation as a hard-liner on segregation.And as U.S. CongressmanNewt Gingrich, then a historyprofessor at WestGeorgia College, wrote: "Suit had only about one-fourthas much moneyas Carter,and about one-tenthas muchorganization."58 Compared to Bentley,Suit wouldbe a pushover.But eventhat would require careful plan- ningand a lotof work. Carter would need tocontinue to portray himselfas a "conservative"and brand Suit a "liberal."That meantcontinued courting of the Maddox-Wallace vote. But at the same time,Carter would also need to appeal to urbanand blackvoters. Suit recognizedthe importanceof a conservativelabel as well as Carterdid but,in fact,there were fewissues on which the twocandidates really differed. The onlytrack was forthe candidatesto hurl accusations of "ultra-liberal" and "counterfeit conservative"at each other."The big issue in the lackluster contest,"the AtlantaJournal observed, "boiled down to who is the liberal.'"59 Evenin theliberal-hurling contest Suit proved no matchfor Carter.For example,although Suit knew of Carter'svoting for the integrationof his own churchin Plains,he consideredit irrelevantto thecampaign, and did notuse it. In retrospecthe realizedhe shouldhave. The problem,as NewtGingrich wrote, was thatSuit "lackedthe experienceto tearaway at the phony image and reveal the liberalheart under the blue collar pic- ture."60 At the same time,Carter began to cut into Suit's urban constituencyby shiftinghis targetfrom the Atlantaestablish- mentto the Washingtonpower structure and the partywhich was, he repeatedlycharged, "controlled by a handfulof big- shots."Instead of goingto theGeorgia voters for support, Suit had, Cartersaid, "snuck off to Washington"for help fromPres- identNixon. But all Suit got,he added, was "a ballpointpen and an autographedgolf ball."61

58NewtGingrich, "Toward A Real Two PartySystem in Georgia,"2, SuitPapers. 59Murphyand Gulliver,Southern Strategy, 183-84; Hal Suit'sdebate notes, Suit Papers. AtlantaJournal, October 26, 1970,1 and 9A; HarryMurphy in ibid.,November 2, 1970, 2A. 60Atlanta 26, 197 1, 19A; "Towarda Two 4-5. 01 Journal,August Gingrich, PartySystem," AtlantaJournal, October /, iy/U,18 A. JimmyCarters 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 635

Even thoughHal Suitwas notthe staunch segregationist he had expectedto face in the generalelection, Carter followed his originalplan of tryingto retrievethe black support he had relinquishedto Sandersin the primary.He began to softenhis segregationistimage and talkagain in terms,however vague, of a colorblind"populist" coalition: "I got the vote of a lot of segregationistsand integrationists"in the primary, Carter main- tained,and "I neverdid ask theirphilosophy when I sought theirvote." To a groupof farmersin Abraham,Georgia, as in othertowns around the state, he begansaying that conservatism no longermeant, "hatred of anotherperson because he is dif- ferentfrom us." Nor did itmean "a lackof passionor foresight, but simplyan insistencethat individuals be leftalone as much as possibleto guide theirown destinies."62 In a moredirect appeal, Carterpromised to appointblacks to stateoffices and pledge to eliminatediscrimination in state government."The time'spast for that," he said.In theprimaries Carterhad thunderedthat "there would be no citiesburned or campusesdisrupted" when he was governor.Now he began to say thatthe poor mustcope witha governmentunresponsive totheir needs, and that,faced with the same situation, he himself "mightbreak a car windowor steal."63 JimmyCarter's courtship with segregationists paid offbig in late September.Lester Maddox at thatpoint endorsed him and praisedhim for "running a Maddox-typecampaign." And Maddox keptup hissupport. Two weekslater, at a stateDemo- craticmeeting, he promisedthat as lieutenantgovernor he wouldbe watchingto make sure Carter kept his campaign prom- ises, "When I put my moneyinto a peanut machine,I don't expectto getbubble gum, and neitherdo the people." Carter, at thesame meeting,swallowed his prideand praisedMaddox: "He has broughta standardof forthrightexpression and personal honestyto the governor'soffice and I hope to measure up to thisstandard." And on thelast day of the campaign Carter

65Atlanta Constitution, September 17, 1970, 1 and 13A; AtlantaJournal, October 23, 1970, 1 and 4A. ^AtlantaConstitution, October 21, 1970,1 and 10A; ibid.,August 19, 1970,bA; ibid., October30, 1970, 1 and 14A. 636 Georgia Historical Quarterly

announcedhe was goingto votefor Maddox as lieutenantgovernor.64 In Las Vegas,Jimmy the Greek set the odds forthe Georgia election:Carter to winat two-and-a-halfto one. The Greekwas right.On November3, 1970,Carter won 62 percentof thevote and becamethe seventy-sixthgovernor of Georgia.65 The 1970 electionrepresented a watershedin Georgia'shis- tory,but the factthat Jimmy Carter won it did not. Had Carl Sanderswon instead, it would have been a majorturning point in the state'spolitical history because both he and Carterwere a new breed of politicalleaders emerging in the South at the time.Race as a campaignissue, at least as a publiccampaign issue,would have ended witha Sandersvictory as surelyas it did withCarter's victory. Whatthe 1970 electiontells us about Georgiahistory, and about the Georgiasegment of southernhistory, is notwhy but how race as a campaignissue came to an end there.Because of the state'speculiar political configuration at the time,the chancesof an outsiderappeared remote indeed. In thenormal courseof eventsthe racially moderate, highly respected former governorCarl Sanderswould have been pittedagainst a candidate ofthe Maddox/Wallace segregationist ilk. In sucha contest Sandersmight have won,purely on the strengthof his record of soundand honestgovernance, but it would have been a hard fightand a narrowvictory. Foranyone else, any newcomer, to stand a chanceof winning the race, he would have had to steal Maddox's thunderand makehimself, in factif not in name,the candidate of thestate's segregationistcamp. At thesame time, because Sanders' record was unassailable,any such newcomerwould have had to bring theformer governor down by tarring him with personal attacks. The newcomerin thiscase was, of course,the personally honorable and politicallyliberal and integrationist-minded JimmyCarter. No one butJimmy Carter knew then, or knows now,how hard it was forhim to decide to do whathe had to

64 First Maddox quote in AtlantaConstitution, September 24, 1970, 1; Maddox and Carter quotes at same meeting in AtlantaJournal, October 7, 1970, 1 and 18A; Carter will vote for Maddox in AtlantaConstitution, November 3, 1970, 6 A. ^AtlantaConstitution, November 3, 1970, 6A, November 4, 1970. JimmyCarter's 1970 Gubernatorial Campaign 637 do towin. But what is clear is thatactually doing what he decided to do caused himgreat personal suffering. Thus, the mostim- portantthing the 1970 campaignreveals is an aspectof Jimmy Carterthe man. It was immediatelyobvious to othersthat Jimmy Carter had not run a campaignhe could be proud of. Shortlyafter the election,state senator Leroy Johnson, Sanders' black campaign leader for the Atlantaarea, made a poignantobservation: "I understandwhy he ranthat kind of ultra-conservative campaign . . . you have to do thatto win. And that'sthe main thing.I don'tbelieve you can win in this state without being a racist."66 But Carterhad far more troublejustifying his actionsto himself.After the election,Carter was distraught.He im- mediatelytelephoned Carl Sanders to apologize for the personal attacks,and began confidingto close friendsthat he "feltbad" about some of the thingshe had said and done. He confessed "to theLord" and "prayedfor forgiveness," and told Rosalynn thathe would nevergo throughsuch a campaignagain. Six yearslater he opened his presidentialcampaign in 1976 with the slogan,"I'll neverlie to you."67 In his now famousPlayboy interview Carter said thatwhen he looked on womenwith lust he was committingadultery in hisheart. For born-againJimmy Carter, the thought was equiv- alentto theaction. Playboy interviewer Robert Sheer, comment- ing on the interview,noted that"Carter was addictedto the theorythat we progressby stressingour virtuesrather than dwellingon failures."68 In lightof that,the questionbecomes, has JimmyCarter admittedhis failureand gone on beyondit? His continuing reluctanceto discussthe 1970 campaignor to answerquestions aboutit and hissequestering of hiscampaign papers all suggest thathe has not.Judging from what few clues we have,Jimmy Carterprobably has eased his moraldilemma by takingrefuge in ReinholdNiebuhr's argument that in democraciesperfection

™Ibid.,January 7, 1971, 10A. 67HowardNorton and Bob Slosser,The Miracle of Jimmy Carter (Plainfield, N.J., 1976),74; JamesWooten, Dasher: The Roots and theRising of Jimmy Carter (New York, 1978),295-96. 68RobertScheer, "Jimmy We HardlyKnow Y'all," Playboy (November 1976), 190; see also Carterinterview by Scheer, in ibid.,63-86. 638 Georgia Historical Quarterly

is neverpossible and thatthe moral,i.e., Christian,man must contenthimself with accepting a necessaryamount of com- promise.Carter opened his autobiography,Why Not theBest? withthe Niebuhrquotation: "The sad duty of politicsis to establishjustice in a sinfulworld."69

69HarryR. Davisand RobertC. Good, eds.,Reinhold Niebuhr on Politics (New York, 1960), 180-81.