Wednesday, Jun. 16, 2010

Twist In Time: Two's company, three's a crowd

In 1946, the people of Georgia went to the polls to elect their governor, and the supporters of Eugene Talmadge prepared for the election with confidence. Little did they know that when the post-election dust settled, Georgia would have three governors and their man would not be one of them.

Eugene Talmadge easily won the top spot as expected, but the people chose Melvin Thompson, an anti-Talmadge man to be their Lieutenant Governor.

Everyone knew at the time that Eugene Talmadge was not in the best of health, so when he died before the January 1947 Inauguration Day, his supporters went to plan B. They convinced the state legislature to pass a bill allowing it to elect the governor in case the office fell vacant. It came as no surprise that they chose Eugene Talmadge's son, Herman Talmadge, to take his father's place.

At that juncture, Melvin Thompson, the duly elected Lieutenant Governor, cried foul. He stepped forth to claim the Governor's office. If Eugene Talmadge had died after Thompson had been sworn in, there would have been no question. He would have taken his place. Since, however, Talmadge died before the inauguration, legal ambiguity created a political vacuum, which was filled by the legislature.

The situation then took a strange turn. The outgoing Governor, Ellis Arnall, announced that until the situation was cleared up, he would not relinquish his office. Now Georgia had three governors.

While Governor Thompson turned to the courts for support, Governor Herman Talmadge and Governor Ellis Arnall conducted a comic opera in the capitol building.

Governor Talmadge ordered state troopers to remove Governor Arnall. When the latter had been safely escorted home, Talmadge seized control of the Governor's office. Meanwhile, Arnall returned and opened up his own Governor's office in exile in a kiosk in the capitol.

For the next two months, Georgia's three governors continued to appoint government officials, and chaos reigned. Finally in a merciful twist in time, in March 1947, the Georgia Supreme Court stepped in and ruled that Melvin Thompson was the rightful governor, but he didn't last long. The court also ordered a special election, and Herman Talmadge won that one hands down.

From that point, things continued as they had for years. The Talmadge machine had beaten back another assault on its political hegemony. The enduring aspect of the entire farce, however, was that the people of Georgia were treated to a political sideshow. They would never, ever forget the time when it took three men to fill the Governor's office in Atlanta.