Behind the Bastards - Part Four: America's First Fascist Governor

Episode Date: October 17, 2024

Garrison is joined by Robert to conclude the story of Eugene Talmadge and how his campaign for a White Supremacist Georgia lead to his death.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

What's confused my me? Because I just watched a video of the new Tesla event where they are releasing what appears to be an Art Deco brick that is designed this event. That is an insult to Art Deco, careful. It looks like- I would agree. It is an insult to Art Deco, but nonetheless that is what looks like- I would agree, it is an insult to Art Deco, but nonetheless, that is what it looks like.

No, it looks like- The new Tesla van. It looks like a toaster. It does look like a rolling toaster. Yeah, it's, what I don't understand is how it's supposed, like, there's no clearance on it, like zero. Like, it's just flat to the ground. I guess there, he's trying to replace city buses, but I feel like we-

Yeah, it's a bus for rich people. It's a bus for rich people. Yeah, yeah. It's a bus that will exist in San Francisco and nowhere else maybe. It's so that you don't have to ride with the poor's like that's all it is. Yeah, I think I'm guessing this is just a something they're trying to get off the ground with their self-driving shit. It is funny that they've gone from like, everyone's Tesla will be able to work independently as a profit-making cab when they're not driving it to, we have this brick that you can sit in

with 19 other people. I don't know. I don't know why you want this as opposed to any other kind of bus, but I don't, they also had all of the Tesla robots out, and apparently these $20,000 robots that can hand you bags of goodies at a party are going to solve poverty.

So I'm excited to see how that works out. Revolutionary. Yeah. This is the biggest step forward for mankind since we invented. I don't know hitting kids Garrison speaking of children speaking of hitting kids. Yeah, actually Yeah, you're good. I'm edge. I'm glad we're getting to that yeah Me too. Yeah me too. Also, this is behind the bastards. You know that, you listen to this show.

This is part four, you're not jumping in on part four. Yeah, yeah, start back with part one, if you haven't seen the other parts. Or do a reverse listen. If you have come unstuck in time and can only process human lives going backwards to forwards, like a Benjamin Button kind of deal, you know?

Then maybe it makes sense. Sometimes where a crime took place leads you to answer why the crime happened in the first place. Hi, I'm Sloane Glass, host of the new True Crime podcast, American Homicide. In this series, we'll examine some of the country's most infamous and mysterious murders and learn how the location of

the crime becomes a character in the story. Listen to American Homicide on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty and I'm the host of On Purpose. My latest episode is with Jelly Roll. or wherever you get your podcasts. today's biggest artists. I was a desperate delusional dreamer. Be a delusional dreamer. Just don't be a desperate delusional dreamer. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Trust me, you won't want to miss this one. Hey, Beau.

Hey, Matt. Are you ready to tell the readers about the extra special episode we have coming up? I think we have to let them in on our little surprise. Yeah, if you haven't already figured it out, the queen of Christmas herself, can't believe this, Mariah Carey, will be joining us this week. Wow. Readers, publishers, caties, and finalists, tune in to maybe the most unforgettable episode

of Lost Culture Eastus yet. Listen to Lost Culture Eastus on Will Ferrell's Big Money Players Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Julian Edelman. I'm Rob Gronkowski. And we are super excited to tell you about our new show Dudes on Dudes. We're spilling all the behind-the-scenes stories, crazy details, and honestly just having a blast talking football. Every week we're discussing our favorite players of all times, from legends to our buddies, to current stars. We're finally answering the age old question. What kind of dudes are these dudes?

We're going to find out, Jules. New episodes drop every Thursday during the NFL season. Listen to Dudes on Dudes on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. On Thanksgiving Day 1999, five-year-old Cuban boy Elian Gonzalez was found off the coast of Florida. And the question was, should the boy go back to his father in Cuba? Mr. Gonzalez wanted to go home and he wanted to take his son with him.

Or stay with his relatives in Miami. Imagine that your mother died trying to get you to freedom. Listen to Chess Peace, the Elian Gonzalez story on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. So last episode, the people of Georgia rejected Eugene Talmadge as the representative in the U.S. Senate. But as World War II loomed over the country, they welcomed him back to the governor's office as Jean signified the comfort of the past. So we're now in the early 1940s

and the first cracks in the Jim Crow South are starting to appear. Since Jean lost his battle against the New Deal, all that was left of the Old South for Jean to defend was its white supremacy. As Southerners grew to accept and enjoy New Deal liberalism, the incongruity of the racial divisions began to manifest itself. And now just like how the manufactured uproar over like critical race theory a few years ago kind of put racism back into our like political conversation, the education system would be the target for Jean's new distinct focus on racism and white supremacy. This is because this is going to be one of these other like overlaps between what Jean pioneered and how this kind of carries over to like this this modern like dictatorial conservative strategy. I'm going to quote from William Anderson,

Jean's biographer quote, Georgia remained a segregationist society in 1941. And Jean Talmadge remained its greatest advocate. Prior to 1941, he had not made racism a major part of his politics because he had no reason to. Practically every white Georgian was racist to some degree. Every candidate could be expected to treat the black about the same, which was poorly. And any issue of race had been previously overwritten

by the New Deal or personality. Racism had been a part of his career, but it was far from crucial until the 1940s. So during this time, schools in Georgia were undergoing badly needed reforms, and the University of Georgia hired an admin named Walter D. Cocking to improve the College of Education. So there you go.

Yes, get a vote now, Dr. Cocking. I'm gonna say it a lot. I'm gonna say it a lot. Dr. Wall-Cocking. Wall-Cocking. Dr. Walter De-Cocking, we're gonna say it a lot. You can get it out now. You had to put the D. Does he go by that? The D in there is, ah.

The D feels like you put that in there, Gar. The D's in there. The D is in. But you did. What can I say? The D's always there. It's all about that D to me. Well, that's information for our audience. What can I say?

I don't know. I don't know. But I feel like you 100% could have omitted the D. The D is- No, no, no. I would have fired them on the spot. The D is in the historical record. I have the duty to include the D. Yeah, no, that would have, I would have fired them on the spot. The D is in the historical record. I have the duty to include the D.

Yeah, Sophie, this is journalistic ethics 101. Always include the D. I guess the D is in, I guess. The D is in. I guess. That's why I'm coming out with a blockbuster piece of journalism in the next couple of weeks that's just every photo I found of Hunter Biden's cock.

No text at all. Just, just text. Many sketch case. Over and over again. The New York Times is putting it up front page. Very excited. Robert, no, Garrison, please. Please.

The, please. The Georgia Board of Regents commissioned multiple studies from Dr. Calking and his faculty on how to fix the education system, the results of which recommended more funding for black schools and partial integration of certain facilities. Graduate students were informing Talmage that there were rumors of integration, and a disgruntled former high school teacher at a school ran by the university blamed Dr. Calking for her

firing, so she sent Talmadge reports on the Black Studies programs. A Talmadge supporter in Athens spread a rumor about Dr. Cocking having an affair with a Black cook that grew to such prominence that the university president investigated and disproved the claim. Things all came to a head in a May 1942 Board of Regents meeting where Talmadge singled out another progressive educator for removal, the president of the Georgia Teachers College, Dr. Marvin Pittman. Gene accused him of being engaged in local partisan politics. Gene then attacked Dr. Cocking, calling him to be fired

as dean, saying that Dr. Cocking, quote, made a statement that he wanted to see the time when a school for Negroes would be established at Athens so that Negroes and white boys could associate together. Unquote. Okay. Jean then promised to remove any person in the university system advocating communism or racial equality.

Oh, good. Okay. In this motion passed. So we see very classic tactics here. Yeah, that is an important thing to understand American politics is that up to the present day racial equality and communism are synonyms for about a third of the country.

Well, I mean, we even see this with like the whole critical race theory thing. Yeah, no, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, like they're trying to inject cultural Marxism and they're like, blah, blah, blah, blah blah blah blah all this stuff that we talked about for years It's been going on for longer than either of us has been alive. But yeah, that's that's important to know now the president of the University of Georgia Herman Caldwell was furious about his staff being fired and Submitted his own resignation in protest of Coching's termination.

In response, on June 16th, the board held a hearing in Gene's office reassessing the firing of Dr. Coching. The office was packed with faculty in support of Coching. The only ones there against him were Talmage and this former high school teacher that Gene brought to complain that Dr. Coching was trying to integrate Georgia. Coching was reinstated in a 7-8 vote. Jean whined about this affair in The Statesman, writing, quote, I'm not going to put up with social equality. We don't need no N words and white people taught together, unquote.

A hearing for Dr. Pittman was scheduled for July 14th, but this time in public at the General Assembly instead of the privacy of the governor's office. Talmadge instructed Dr. Cocking to for July 14th, but this time in public at the General Assembly instead of the privacy of the governor's office. Talmadge instructed Dr. Cocking to attend this hearing as well, promising to present new evidence. This evidence focused on the Rosenwald Fund, which financed one of Cocking's studies. You can see where this is going, right?

I think I know where we're headed here. The word Rosenwald is really all the hints I needed. So this was a philanthropy foundation from the North that sought to improve the conditions of Southern schools. Gene referred to this fund as, quote, Jew money for N words. Hey, you know what? At least he picked the J word and not the K word, right? He could have doubled down on the slurs.

And he did. That makes him woke by that decade's standards. Woke Talmich. No, you can see Gene's kind of previous decades long attacks on bankers is kind of, is coded in antisemitism, certainly. And his main political inspiration in Tom Watson was rabidly anti-Semitic. And we start to see more of that anti-Semitism come out during Gene's kind of last brush with politics, because Gene just got increasingly

like openly racist because he had like nothing else to like base his politics on as liberalism progressed in the South. So Talmadge also ordered the Statesboro College Library to search for books containing, quote, communism or anything except Americanism, unquote, to use as evidence against the men in the hearings. Again, very similar to all of like the attacks on school and education that we've seen the past few years here in the United States. Before the hearing, Gene pressured two oppositional members of the Board of Regents to resign. One was a lifelong friend and classmate. The other was an editor at the Constitution, the newspaper. Now, friends and political advisors

to Gene strongly discouraged him from doing this, as he didn't need to make more enemies at the Constitution. But more importantly, this whole affair and Jean's increased meddling in Georgia's education system was actually gonna threaten the accreditation of Georgia's universities. Now I'm gonna quote from William Anderson as he discusses the hearing, quote, "'Prior to the hearing,

"'Jean began mounting a public campaign "'that painted the two men as communists "'financed by Jews, and bent on destroying George's culture. The public hearing was a public spectacle. The hall was packed, mostly with Talmadge people, and down front center stage, white suited, smoking a huge cigar, and wearing a 10 gallon hat, sat Gene. It was all show. Flash bulbs sparked the air, people cheered, police swarmed, and the show opened by reading excerpts from Brown America. The book, written by Rosenwald chief Edwin

Embry, had been found in the Statesboro College Library. Board regent member James S. Peters said, Throughout this book, the thought runs. Erase the feeling of superiority of the white man. They want them to put the white man down and draw the races together. They want them to use the same schools, right? The same trains. It means they want intermarriage.

That's what it means. Oh man, yeah, there we go, there we go. Yeah, so some good old, I mean, this does show you slightly where some of the progress has been because you're still angry about the same things today But you can't say that your issue is intermarriage We're still it's still bad to complain about race mixing. Although they're they're working on that one So they sure they sure are working to bring that back

Yeah, we'll see if we'll see how far they get The fact that like this like great replacement stuff was like a cringe Lauren Southern posting in 2017. Yeah. It's now like a mainstream Republican talking point. I'm not optimistic. Yeah. Very worrying. Yeah. So as as as James Peters talked about how they want intermarriage, Jean Jean Jean shouted in response, they won't do it. And the galley and the galleys rocked with laughter and applause. Now you can you can see these tactics are the exact same that people are using now,

like reading books found in school libraries to like paint the to paint these people as like radical and like trying to destroy America or trying to destroy Georgia. This is the same stuff that's happening now. To continue from Anderson, quote, the purpose of reading the book was to find Dr. Cocking and Pittman guilty by association with the Rosenwald Fund. Cocking arose, gave a brief denial of the charges and noted his shock at the circus hearing, saying that such tactics should be employed in any country on earth is hard to believe that they are employed in Georgia

has all the earmarks of a terrific nightmare. The galley shouted, Yankee teacher unquote. Yeah, that makes that, that's, I mean, that's what I would shout at any of my teachers who were born north of the Mason Dixon. So I get it. The new Talmadge approved board of regents voted 10 to five to fire Dr. Cocking once again.

President Pittman was next on the chopping block. They read from another book on race titled Calling America, and a disgruntled professor testified that five black men from the Tuskegee Institute toured Statesboro College and ate in the cafeteria while no white people were on campus. This was Gene's single witness against the educator. Meanwhile, Pittman had 36 witnesses, but the board voted once again 10 to 5 to terminate

Dr. Pittman. This whole incident caused a degree of uproar, and Gene responded by writing, quote, Dr. Cocking favored the teaching of white and Negro children in the same classrooms. My God, I am opposed to social equality. And as long as I am the governor of Georgia, no such teaching will be permitted in our school system. Dr. Cocking, as you know, was reared in Iowa, where white and colored are taught in the same classroom. His conduct, His conduct since being in Georgia is proof of the fact

that he retains the views and ideas gained to him in the state of Iowa. I am not in favor of such foreign ideas being taught in our university system." You know, there's no nice way to say this. So I'm just going to say it straight out because I just read an article this morning about like all the death threats meteorologists are getting because Republicans have decided

that like, you can just threaten to kill people if they say that there's going to be a hurricane. That's you know, and that's inconvenient to your belief system because hurricanes are clearly getting worse and you've denied climate change for years. Like all of this shit, you know, the current push against any kind of like integration, all of the fucking white genocide panics, like back in the day and Talmadge's day, when you had all of these fucking freaks complaining about the idea of black and white kids

going to school together, the only thing that overcame their disinformation and paranoia and bigotry was sending men with machine guns in and saying we will fucking kill you if you don't integrate these schools. That's what the government had to do. Anyway, food for thought. So after this second hearing, the Southern accrediting commission on institutions of higher education announced that it was investigating the governor's interference in the state's education system. Gene responded to panicked parents concerned that the universities might lose their accreditation

by saying, we credit our own schools down here. Which is also similar to some of Trump's Agenda 47 plans to improve the university system. He's just offering them what they've wanted forever, yeah. Now, this apparently didn't help calm things down. Shaggy. As Gene was forced to give a radio address defending his racist actions, which he signed off by saying,

the good Negroes don't want any co-mixing of the races. Not great. Again, when Eugene Talmadge is forced to defend his own racism on radio in 1942. Sure. That that shows how bad he is, because at this point, everyone is racist. Like people in the university in the university system aren't actually calling for like mass integration like that. That's not what they're doing. Gene is just so like fucked up and racist that he thinks any small step that might eventually

lead to that outcome has to be like fundamentally opposed. But like Dr. Cocking isn't actually calling for all the schools to be integrated. Like that's like, he's like, that's simply not what's happening right now. Yeah. Now the attorney general, a guy named Ellis Arnold, who was previously a long time Talmadge supporter,

he was worried that Gene's forced resignation of the Board of Regents was actually just illegal. Gene knew that the AG was concerned, so when Arnold was out of town for a few days, Gene instructed the AG's office to write an opinion affirming the governor's actions. And then when the AG returned, he had to countermand this opinion and announced that he would be running for governor against Gene to secure academic freedom. Henry Sperlin, one of

Gene's like longest friends, did claim that Gene actually tried to have the AG arrested while he was vacationing in Florida just to bring him back to Atlanta during the legislative session to affirm his actions. Although I think Arnold denies this. There's some conflicting reports over whether Gene tried to have the AG arrested. Yeah, great. Now, in September, the Southern Accrediting Commission

suspended 10 of Georgia's white schools for quote, unprecedented and unjustifiable political interference unquote. The next month, the Southern University Conference dropped the University of Georgia from its membership. Gene told the Board of Regents that they could undo some of his meddling to protect the system. However, he was canceling meetings to ratify an agreement between the regents and the accreditation committee. Gene also refused to sign a letter stating that he did not have complete control over

the entire university system, saying, quote, I think it's a mistake for the governor to write any letter which might limit his authority as the governor, unquote. One of Gene's allies on the board begged him to reconsider, warning that if the accreditation issue did not get resolved soon, it could turn thousands of families and students against Gene. His wife and his advisors also wanted him to back down. But fan mail from racist supporters told him otherwise. Not fan mail. Gene received so much fan mail from like racist, like, I'm sure supporters and he listened to that way more than he listened to any of his like actual political advisors, because like this was this is this is what this is what the people were actually wanting.

He really, he really enjoyed reading through his fan mail. This is like a really, this was really important to the way Gene operated as a governor. that's evidence that you're unhinged. Because as someone who gets a lot of fan mail, I appreciate all of the fans. But reading through fan mail is at best a mixed experience. Because for every person who is really nice and giving you honest, it's like, oh, this is great. I'm glad I've had a positive impact on this person. There's someone who will message you with something

that is evidence that like, they're having a problem, right? Like that happens a lot when you're a contactable person with any level of fame and it's deeply upsetting. It's not, I'm not complaining. It's just like, oh, you are messaging me because you think that I have some sort of special infrom, like knowledge that can help you

when you're like very serious problem. And that is like every fifth letter you get when you're famous. And it's not fun. It doesn't, I mean, I don't think that matters to Gene because Gene doesn't actually care about helping people. What Gene cares about is- No, he just likes that they're reaching out.

Ways to maximize his racism. That's his primary motivation. And a lot of this Ways to maximize his racism. That's his primary motivation. And a lot of this fan mail affirms his racism. So he greatly enjoys it. To quote Anderson, quote, "'He did not believe that the voters wanted integration. "'He did not believe that they gave a damn "'about the accreditation association.

"'He believed that their opposition to racial equality "'was so strong that they would risk almost any loss. Gene felt the implications and the threat were of a far greater magnitude than even the New Deal, though he saw them both as a common conspiracy by outsiders to take over the lives of Georgians, unquote. After attempts at an agreement between the regents and the accreditation committee failed,

finally in December, they voted to end the accreditation of all of Georgia's state schools. The St. Louis Dispatch wrote, quote, here in the heart of Dixie has developed a prize specimen of full-blown American fascism. The dictatorship is just as effective and just as vicious as the Huey long dictatorship unquote Okay

Very very brave. You don't have the New York Times saying saying such stuff now Full full-blown American fascism. Yeah. Well, what other kind of American fascism you're gonna have garrison? You don't you know, you don't want half-blown American fascism So this this whole incident is called the Cocking Affair. I just think that's a really good name. Wow. You just said half-blown and that reminded me. Anyway, we should take a dad break.

Speaking of ads. Yeah, we really should. Yeah. Anyway, here you go. Awful. Whenever a homicide happens, two questions immediately come to mind. Who did this and why? And sometimes the answer to those questions can be found in the where.

Where the crime happened. I'm journalist Sloane Glass and I host the new podcast, American Homicide. Each week, we'll explore some of this country's most infamous and mysterious murders. And you'll learn how the location of the crime became a character in the story. On American Homicide, we'll go coast to coast and visit places like the wide open New Mexico Desert, the swampy Louisiana Bayou, and the frozen

Alaska wilderness. And we'll learn how each region of the country holds deadly secrets. So join me, Sloane Glass, on the new true crime podcast, American Homicide. Listen to American Homicide on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Yes. Oh. I see so, but you can do that kind of spooky scary. Well, yeah, but it's also because it's a ride. Yeah, I can just open down on it. But you're in it, you know? Yeah, exactly.

You're in the spook. I think we have to let them in on our little surprise. Yeah, if you haven't already figured it out, can't believe this, Mariah Carey will be joining us this week. I say, oh, I wanna go work with such and such from across town. Yeah, from across town. My girl across town. Yeah, from across town.

My girl across town. Yeah, across town. I know a guy across town. I know a guy. Readers, publicists, Katie's, and finalists, tune in to maybe the most unforgettable episode of Lost Cultures this year. There's one more question, which I promised myself I would ask.

Can you drop that grunge album? I'm so mad that I haven't done that yet. But you don't have to be mad because you're in control. I am, but who do I drop it with? Should we start a label? Maybe. Wow. Listen to Las Culturistas on the iHeartRadio app, Apple

Podcasts, or whatever you get your podcasts. I'm Julian Edelman. I'm Rob Gronkowski. Guess what, folks? We're teammates again, and we're going to welcome you guys all to Dudes on Dudes. I'm a dude, you're a dude, and Dudes on Dudes is our brand new show. We're going to highlight players, peers, guys that we played against, legends from the past, and we're just going to sit here and talk about them.

And we'll get into the types of dudes. What kind of types of dudes are there, Grumps? We got studs, wizards, we got freaks, or dudes dude. We got dogs. Dog! We'll break down their games, we'll share some insider stories, and determine what kind of dude each of these dudes are. Is Randy Moss a stud or a freak? Is Tom Brady a dog or a dude's dude? We're gonna find out, Jules. New episodes drop every Thursday during the NFL season. Listen to Dudes on Dudes on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty and I'm the host of On Purpose. My latest episode is with Jelly Roll. This episode is one of the most honest and raw interviews I've ever had. We go deep into Jelly Roll's life story from being in and out of prison from the age of 13 to being one of today's biggest artists. We talk about guilt, shame, body image

and huge life transformations. I was a desperate delusional dreamer and the desperate part got me in a lot of trouble. I encourage delusional dreamers. Be a delusional dreamer. Just don't be a desperate delusional dreamer. the desperate part got me in a lot of trouble. I encourage delusional dreamers. Be a delusional dreamer. Just don't be a desperate delusional dreamer. I just had such an anger. I was just so mad at life.

Everything that wasn't right was everybody's fault but mine. I had such a victim mentality. I took zero accountability for anything in my life. I was the kid that if you asked what happened, I immediately started with everything but me. It took years for me to break that. Like years of work. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Trust me, you won't want to miss this one. On Thanksgiving Day, 1999, a five-year-old boy floated alone in the ocean. He had lost his mother trying to reach Florida from Cuba. He looked like a little angel. I mean, he looked so fresh.

And his name, Elian Gonzalez, will make headlines everywhere. Elian Gonzalez. Elian, Elian. Elian, Elian. Elian Gonzalez. At the heart of the story is a young boy and the question of who he belongs with.

His father in Cuba. Mr. Gonzalez wanted to go home and he wanted to take his son with him. Or his relatives in Miami. Imagine that your mother died trying to get you to freedom. At the heart of it all is still this painful family separation. Something that as a Cuban, I know all too well. Listen to Chess Piece, the Elian Gonzalez story as part of the MyCultura podcast network

available on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Ah, we're back. Ah, good stuff. And what a cocking affair it was. What a cocking affair it was. So the next election would be framed as choosing education or racism, though this wasn't like really truly the case because again, both candidates, Talmadge and Ar, were segregationists. One just preferred to not

shut down the entire school system to exert personal power over two academics who he personally disliked. Right? Like that is the difference between Talmadge's racism and Arnell's racism. Sure. Anderson notes, Arnell, emerging as Jean's only opponent, said that the issue was not the black man, not the mixing of races, but whether George's only opponent, said that the issue was not the black man, not the mixing of races, but whether George's children would be denied quality education." Crucial to Arnell's success was that this election only be a two-man race, and he successfully convinced others not to run as it would split the county unit vote, giving Gene an almost automatic victory.

Arnell knew that a large number of people would vote for racism and that he was not equipped to beat Jean in a quote-unquote n-word hating contest. Education remained the only remaining vector of attack against Jean. Now, on top of fixing the school crisis, Arnel also called to put more limits on the governor's individual power. In campaign speeches, Arnell called Talmage George's own version of Hitler. And he called for Georgians to quote, "'Awaken to the dangerous trend in our state government'."

Unquote. Yeah, that would be nice. That would be nice if people- I think George is gonna turn it around now. I don't know where this story ends, Garrison, but I got a good feeling. This story has a mixed ending, but yeah. Now, Gene's 1942 reelection campaign

was riddled with unforced errors and self-sabotaging betrayals. He turned his old friend and political ally, Tom Linder, against him by refusing to return political favors. Once again, this is a continued trend throughout his career. And he even sabotaged Linder's post as agricultural commissioner, which pissed off Linder so much that he began campaigning against Gene. To quote Anderson,

the Atlanta Journal noted that Gene's candidacy had soured because of too much racism. Old friends seemed to be leaving him in droves, and it became a part of every Arnold speech to have ex-Talmage people turn in their red suspenders. Students protested rallies chanting, to hell with Talmage, unquote. Dick Cheney has come out against Eugene Talmage. All of Talmage's former cabinet has come out against Eugene Talmadge. Great. All these guys that also suck are like, yeah, Gene just sucks a little too much.

Also, it's not entirely like inconceivable that Dick Cheney would have been around needing to give a comment back then. Yeah, little like five-year year old Dick Cheney. Yeah, yeah, little five year old Dick Cheney just shoots a man in the face and then gives a quote on Eugene Talmadge.

Scary, scary thoughts. Yeah, yeah, he was a hard drinker at five too. So yeah, you got a different kind of dick. I believe that, that is 100% believable So was Talbott? Talmadge was drinking a lot later in his life and throughout this whole race. It's good He's helped was his health was plummeting. Yeah, that's that's probably for the best. No University of Georgia students for putting on anti Talmadge skits at football games and Canvassed for the Arnold campaign in large numbers.

Because like this guy just like taking away their education. And at this point in like Georgia history, this kind of marked the turning point where education wasn't just like a luxury for the super rich. It was finally becoming like something that regular people could afford to enjoy. And like specifically, it marked a path to escape from this like endless cycle of like crop farming that your family and your parents, your grandparents, their grandparents had all been doing for their entire lives. Like education was their way out of this system and Gene was stealing it from them. So massive student organizing happened against Gene Talmadge during this race.

So much so that Talmadge supporters in Athens, where the University of Georgia is, thought it would be too dangerous for Gene to speak in town while school was still in session. And instead he was advised to hold rallies in surrounding towns. At Statesboro College, Gene's driver and sometimes bodyguard tear gassed a group of student protesters while Jean spoke. Incidents like this bolstered Arnold's attacks on Jean as a dictatorial strongman, saying that Governor Talmadge was, quote, carrying a bunch of strong-arm runts and plug uglies ready to use a mustard gas on children.

Plug, well, we all do like mustard gas on children. I am glad I do not associate with machine gun operators. Yeah. I am glad I do not live in fear of friends I have double crossed, unquote. Again, I think there actually is a way for Arnell to solve some of these problems by getting a little friendly

with some machine gun operators. Hey, historically it's the only thing that works. So violence continued at Talmadge rallies. He's now tear gassing students. The Atlantic journal commented on why violence seems to often accompany Gene's campaign. Quoting from the Atlantic Journal, quote, Talmadgism by its very nature tends to produce this sort of thing. It means bullying,

browbeating, dictatorship. Its resilience is not on reason, but on arbitrary force. Its appropriate emblems are a gas attack and a blackjack,. Now this was either slang, meaning a police baton or just or like coercion via threats. Now on his way to his traditional Fourth of July speech, Gene had his driver stop at a farm just outside of town to use the outhouse. This was an old gene tactic just to win another rural voter. Now this was a rainy and overcast day, a first in his series of 4th of July speeches. Gene returned from the outhouse in pain, rubbing his butt and exclaimed to the driver, a god damn black widow spider bit me on the ass. Oh no. They found a doctor in town. Gene was given medication and told to cancel the speech, which of course he refused to

do. So he began his hour long speech suffering from great pain and not long into the speech, torrential downpour caused most of the audience to abandon Gene, leaving only a handful of attendees in the rain, and a few others listening from their cars. I'm gonna read from Anderson quote, the rain pelted Jean's lonely figure slightly bent with pain but he kept talking hard and loud so those in their cars could hear. The water pounded in the paper bunting washing its fragile red white and blues all over the pine planking in gashes

of color. It drenched Gene's suit and plastered his hair against his head, but he still went on, wet to the bone, alone and hurting badly from the bite. After twenty-five minutes, he could give no more. He hobbled dejectedly from the platform to the applause of honking car horns. Only one prompter had remained with them. And when he asked, what about the Negroes going to our schools, Gene? Talmadge responded, before God, friend, the N words will never go to a school, which is white while I am governor.

Good Lord. He blamed the whole mess on carpet baggers, communists, and the newspapers. And that's the one similarity is that I also do blame all of my problems on carpet baggers You you live in Oregon, what are you? Yeah? I know I know they're all carpet baggers here garrison That's what you got to really watch out You're the carpet breaker you're No, no, no, no, I'm the reverse of a carpet bagger

I'm pulling up carpets and throwing them in the trash, baby. I got a wood floor. Uh-huh. So I called you a carpet bagger the other day because I had to wake up at 1130. I'm OK with that. I'll take that out. Yeah, that's right. Jean was right in the way that, like the extremely isolated

rural Georgians didn't much care for the educational issue as it hardly affected them, and instead they saw the vague specter of racial integration as a much more frightening threat. And to his credit, William Anderson does discuss the hypocritical nature of this election, how Talmadge was widely framed as the racist candidate, while his pro-education liberal opponents could get away with making very similar statements. For example, at one of his rallies, Ellis Arnold stated, quote, Why if a Negro ever tried to get into a white school in the section where I live, the sun would not set on his

head unquote. Good Lord, Jesus Christ. So yeah, like everyone's bad. During a radio appearance, while Arnell thought he was off mic, he was accidentally broadcast saying quote, any N word who tried to enter the university would not be in existence the next day. Jesus.

We don't need a governor or a sheriff to take care of that situation, unquote. And like, that's the difference, right? Is that like Talmage wants this to be like like a part of like state law. He wants this to be like he wants to be like preeminently making sure this this this never happens. Well, Arnell is just comfortable in like the racism of his general constituency will be like, no, like we don't need the government to do that. We'll have like regular white people kill the like it's we'll just have the regular white people like kill black people if they try to get into the schools like that. Like that's that's that's where that that's

where the line comes down. It's like it's the it's the specific it's the specific focus that the racial issue is framed in their politics that shows the difference between the two candidates, even though both are like kind of raging, murderous, racist Georgians in the 1940s. Well, that's just who's that. Yeah, I mean, that's always going to be the case. Now, like everyone rallying against Gene were very racist and pro-segregation. They just didn't want to sacrifice privileges enjoyed by white Georgians for Gene's quest

for personal power and his idealistic commitment to white supremacy even when it was politically inconvenient. Ultimately, Arnell beat Gene by 50,000 in the popular vote and by over 100 points in the county unit vote. This year, there was low voter turnout with over 100,000 less votes than just a few years ago. The new deal elections just drew out much more enthusiasm and a greater number of votes. World War II was certainly a contributing factor to there being less votes this year.

Unlike his last defeat, this time there was no stop this deal and Jean admitted that the university accreditation issue lost him the election. Still, the vast, vast majority of Georgians were still incredibly racist, Ellis, Arnell among them, but all he had to do was present his prejudice in a more responsible way. I'm going to quote from Anderson, quote, Jean's defeat did not mean that Georgians were ready to embrace black people or allow integrated schools, but the vote was a significant statement which testified to the profound changes that had occurred in the white Georgians mind. They had faced the racial issue, and for the first time in history, they had blinked, thereby showing a flexibility, not much,

but some. The voters did show that they valued something more than white supremacy. Probably few other issues would have caused such a vote, but the fact that one issue did cause the white reaction was historically significant. Gene had misread Georgian's willingness to reject the old way for a second time. He had shown again how his personality politics could not withstand confrontation with great issues. Reality had again defeated idealism." So that's the situation in 1942. After the election, Gene's race controversies continued.

In the last month of office, it was learned that for two years Gene had been receiving monthly food deliveries of vegetables and meat grown and processed by inmates at the state prison farm. The slave labor deliveries were sent both to his house in Atlanta and his farm in McRae. When questioned about this, Gene seemed proud, saying, I didn't pay for a penny of it. I'd advise the next governor to try the same plan. It helps keep expenses down. Rumors also circulated that Mitt, Jean's wife, was using prison labor to help keep the farm up and running. With an old neighbor saying, quote, Mitt worked the cheapest N words she could find.

That's one of the reasons that she made such good money out on the farm, unquote. After the election, our old journalist friend, Ralph McGill, reported that Jean had been spotted at a KKK meeting, a claim that Jean did not dispute, instead writing to McGill, Ralph, I don't hate anyone. I know that hatred dwarves the man who carries it in his soul and does not affect the one whom he hates at all. Everyone had a great time, and I wish Ralph that you could have been there unquote So this is this is what G was getting up to in his semi retirement sure You know he amongst us me. I've never been to a KKK rally. Oh wow okay, okay?

Well, I mean I've been to a KKK rally, but I have eaten at a Sizzler and those are not dissimilar experiences. Gare, have you ever had Sizzler? No. Yeah. Yeah, it's like the KKK rally of restaurants. Yeah.

Sophie, is that true? It's kinda true. My only memory of Sizzler is that my brother really liked the commercials when we were younger and begged my mom to take us there and then he was really disappointed because the food was terrible. It's God awful.

It's a hate crime. I mean, I'm sorry to Sizzler, but I do feel like- I've never been to clan rallies for, like not for work. Yeah. Me and Robert have attended a great number of racist rallies for work. I will say going to like any of the restaurants that exclusively cater to elderly people on

Sundays in like North Texas is a similar experience. You're going to hear slurs. So as Gene was now in semi-retirement, he still ran a law office, but he didn't have like imminent plans to run for election and no longer having to appeal to like voters. Jean moved further to the right and attacked Roosevelt for using the war to globalize the New Deal in further in furtherance of a quote unquote world regimentation. The jeans primary objection to the war was that it would lead to calls for more black civil rights

and compromise the segregationist South. A headline in Jean's newspaper, The Statesman, read, "'Election of Roosevelt means promoting Negroes in Georgia'." I mean, and- Great. So like after the war, certainly there were more calls for black civil rights because a whole bunch of black people had just like fought for the United States

overseas. And it's like Jean knew that that was going to happen. And that was one of his primary objections to the war, as well as this like proto Illuminati conspiracy theory that that that Roosevelt was like specifically getting into the war so that he could spread like a globalized New Deal. That was so like we can see little seeds of again of talking points that that'll become more common. You know, once we once we get to like the John Merck society, like a decade or so later. Now, as I last fuck you from FDR, all the way back in 1935, when Gene was eyeing up

the presidency, Roosevelt sent the IRS to investigate Gene's finances. And after a fruitless 10-year search, the IRS came to Gene's law office and gave him a $3,000 bill for all of the work that they had done. I don't know if that's how the IRS is supposed to work. That doesn't sound like the way it's supposed to work. But critical support to the IRS for for billing Gene for them investigating his finances for 10 years. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, honestly, like I could use a little bit more of

that energy in the modern era. I could use a little bit more of that energy in the modern era. Yes. Now, after World War II, society had essentially progressed past the need for a Eugene Talmadge. The war accelerated liberal progress, and Georgia was dragged into the modern era. But by the end of the war, when the men came home, a reactionary spirit was growing to comfort those who found themselves in an unfamiliar, changing world. Unable to completely undo all the vast reforms that had been done in the FDR years, the last vestige of the past to fall back on was again racism. In spring of 1946,

the Supreme Court ruled that the whites-only primary elections were unconstitutional, and that black citizens must be allowed to vote in primaries. This sent shockwaves through the South. In response to the court ruling, Jean called for the state's primary election laws to be completely abolished, leaving the primary regulations up to the party. Then the Democratic Party could decide on having an all-white primary. Now no serious politician like this plan, as it would mean an end to the county unit system and all the legal safeguards against election fraud.

Basically, Jean's idea would seriously jeopardize Georgia's ability to function as a legitimate state. OK. This is this is in line with like his whole thing during the cocking affair. Right. Like he's able like he is willing to jeopardize the legitimacy of the government and of the state just to ensure white supremacy. And this is what separates him from the other politicians, right?

The other politicians are like, no, we still need to have a working state. We still need to be able to function. And Gene's willing to sabotage the state's own ability to operate just to ensure his white supremacist ideology is going to be intact after his death. So regardless of whatever Gene was up to, Governor Arnold refused to call for a session to alter voting laws, taking the somewhat bold stance of requesting that the good people of Georgia let black people vote in their primary.

This was actually pretty progressive for the time, especially for a governor in the South. For all of Arnold's racism that we've already discussed, this was one of the better things he did. And this kind of helped to improve his legacy as a governor. The fact that he like did not oppose black people voting in party primaries. So unable to abolish or change primary law, Gene decided to give the governor's race one last shot in a campaign to save the white primary. Gene was now 61 and was getting increasingly ill. He drank too much and he barely ate. Friends and family, including his wife Mitt, pleaded with Gene not to run, worried that the campaign might

literally kill him. But Gene thought there was no one else more qualified to run a white supremacist campaign than himself. Anderson says, quote, Gene considered the Negro the vulnerable spot in the liberals armor. His son Herman, now back from the Navy, and a number of other astute advisors were in disagreement with Jean over the degree of emphasis that should be placed on the racial issue. Herman had seen his father riot-race to defeat in 1942, and while Georgia was still very much racist, she had allowed her attitudes towards Black Americans to suffer erosion.

Not by very much, but there had been movement. The Supreme Court decision provided Jean with some badly needed angles on the racial issue, which needed some substantiation. It had generally been felt that the black cause had advanced, but there had been comfort in knowing that the advancement had been more myth than reality. The court ruling changed all that and thrust the Negro into the foreground as an issue. It also sent a shudder through Georgia's liberal establishment for very few of them

favored social integration. It would cost them their progressive credibility to join the chorus against black Americans. But worse than that, they feel that an outburst of white supremacy would obliterate them at the polls." Gene equated this post-war period with the Reconstruction, right? His main campaign platform was to ensure, quote, a democratic white primary unfettered and unhampered by radical communism and alien forces, unquote. Gene's son Herman was heavily involved in the 1946 election campaign and wrote the rest

of his platform. Herman tried to soften some of his father's like harsher ultra conservative edges. The first draft of Herman's platform shocked Gene saying, good God almighty, who wrote this stuff? But Gene eventually agreed. The strategy was to please the predominantly racist white Georgians, as well as attract Talmadge

skeptic liberals with Herman's economics. The results saw Gene call for, quote, social reforms to be protected and maintained, and we must protect the Negro from the communist influence, unquote. That was his basic, like, combined platform. He was kind of embracing some of the more liberal economics that he had spent his whole career deriding while doubling down on the race issue. Gene formally started his campaign in May, foregoing the typical barbecue cookout. His rallies were smaller and more docile than usual.

Crowd sizes across the state, across all campaigns, were smaller than they used to be. This is attributed to a number of factors, like the mass adoption of home radio, less bountiful food post-war, and for this summer especially, people were staying home out of fears of a so-called race riot. Adding to the racist focus in the campaign, in June, Gene announced that if elected, he would cease all interstate bus travel through Georgia in response to a new federal ruling that declared that black people have the right to sit anywhere they wanted on a bus crossing state lines. To maintain segregated seating, Gene proposed a system where to enter or exit the state, passengers would have to leave their bus on the state line and get a special ticket

for travel within Georgia. This was the length he was willing to go. Just a completely ludicrous, a completely ludicrous system. Where you have to get off the bus, get a special ticket, re-enter the bus with segregated seating. Yeah, no, I love that. It's, this is always the way these things go, right? It's like the same with most of the fair evasion things

where it's like, hmm, like what can we do? Like, how do we solve this problem that we have largely created as a problem? Let's just make the whole thing worse for everybody. It's emblematic of what all of his solutions end up being. Yeah. Like, and it's-

I haven't really thought through the problem, let alone like what the solution will do. It's all theater. Like it's all theater. I invented an issue, or at least like my constituents invented an issue. I probably know that it's bullshit, but I'm just gonna make things,

I guess there's some intelligence there, cause like if your response to all my racist voters are angry about integration, and your solution to deal with integration and public transit is to make public transit worse. Everyone will get angrier. And as a general rule, the primary resource you have as a guy like Talmadge

is the anger of like regular dumb people, right? Like that's it. So yeah, I guess it all makes sense in the end. Make everything worse, yeah. That's how the Republican Party works today, sure. In parallels to our current situation, in the past decade, Gene played a sort of cat and mouse game with the big Atlanta newspapers.

Reporters would gleefully follow the Talmadge campaign trail and though both parties were critical of each other, they relied on each other, right? Like the Talmadge helped the newspapers because he helped them sell a whole bunch of papers. And Talmadge needed papers to cover himself. But in the 46 race, this dynamic fully tipped over into open hostility, with each side now viewing the other as legitimately dangerous and no longer useful. As the papers attacked Gene, reporters received threats and harassment

from his supporters and had to go undercover at campaign rallies. At one small kind of backwater town, Gene spotted a Talmadge critical reporter whom he banned from visiting his office, hiding in the crowd. And he started ranting about them lying in Atlanta newspapers. And then he pointed to the lone reporter.

VAR he is now. I do love that it is spelled T-H-A-R. The reporter braced for like a gang assault, but Gene ordered his boys to let him up on stage. As he climbed on the platform, Gene whispered in his ear, I know you're a pretty good fella. You just write that way, unquote. Well. So that is the situation in the in the campaign at this point in time.

Great. It's doing well. Do you know what we also think are pretty good fellas? Sometimes. Yeah, I mean, this podcast is sponsored by all of the guys who survived Goodfellas. So thank God we remain free of Leonardo DiCaprio. Spoilers for Goodfellas. Whenever a homicide happens, two questions immediately come to mind.

Who did this and why? And sometimes the answer to those questions can be found in the where. Where the crime happened. I'm journalist Sloane Glass, and I host the new podcast American Homicide. Each week, we'll explore some of this country's most infamous and mysterious murders. And you'll learn how the location of the crime became a character in the story. On American Homicide, we'll go coast to coast

and visit places like the wide open New Mexico desert, the swampy Louisiana bayou, and the frozen Alaska wilderness. And we'll learn how each region of the country holds deadly secrets. So join me, Sloan Glass, on the new true crime podcast, American Homicide. Listen to American Homicide on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Julian Edelman. I'm Rob Gronkowski.

Guess what, folks? We're teammates again, and we're gonna welcome you guys all to Dudes on Dudes. I'm a dude, you're a dude, and Dudes on Dudes is our brand new show. We're gonna highlight players, peers, guys that we played against, legends from the past, and we're just gonna sit here and talk about them.

And we'll get into the types of dudes. What kind of types of dudes are there, Gronk? We got studs, wizards, we got freaks. Or dudes dudes. We got dogs. Dogs! We'll break down their games, we'll share some insider stories,

and determine what kind of dude each of these dudes are. Is Randy Moss a stud or a freak? Is Tom Brady a dog or a dude's dude? We're gonna find out, Jules. New episodes drop every Thursday during the NFL season. Listen to Dudes on Dudes on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, Bo. Hey, Matt.

Are you ready to tell the readers about the extra special episode we have coming up? It's raining. Yes. It's pouring. I see. But you can do that kind of spooky scary. Well, yeah, but it's also because it's a ride.

Yeah, I can't help but down on it. But you're in it, you know? Yeah, exactly. You're in the spook. I think we have to let them in on our little surprise. Yeah, if you haven't already figured it out, can't believe this, Mariah Carey will be joining us this week. I say, oh, I want to go work with such and such

from across town. Yeah, from across town. My girl across town. Yeah, across town. I know a guy across town. I know a guy. Readers, publicists, Katie's, and finalists, tune in to maybe the most unforgettable episode

of Lost Culturistas yet. There's one more question which I promised myself I would ask. Can you drop that grunge album? I'm so mad that I haven't done that yet. But you don't have to be mad because you're in control. I am but who do I drop it with? So should we start a label? Maybe.

Wow. Listen to Lost Culturistas on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty and I'm the host of On Purpose. My latest episode is with Jelly Roll. This episode is one of the most honest and raw interviews I've ever had. We go deep into Jelly Roll's life story from being in and out of prison from the age of 13 to being one of today's biggest artists. We talk about guilt, shame, body image,

and huge life transformations. I was a desperate delusional dreamer and the desperate part got me in a lot of trouble. I encourage delusional dreamers. Be a delusional dreamer. Just don't be a desperate delusional dreamer. I just had such an anger. I was just so mad at life. Everything that wasn't right was everybody's fault but mine. I had such a victim mentality. I took zero accountability for anything in my life. I was the kid that if you asked what happened, I immediately started with everything but me. It took years for me to break that. Like years of work. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. Trust me, you won't want to miss this one. On Thanksgiving Day, 1999, a five-year-old boy floated alone in the ocean. He had lost his mother trying to reach Florida from Cuba. He looked like a little angel. I mean, he looked so fresh. And his name, Elian Gonzalez, will make headlines everywhere.

Elian Gonzalez. Elian, Elian. Elian Gonzalez. Elian. Elian. Elian Gonzalez. At the heart of the story is a young boy and the question of who he belongs with.

His father in Cuba. Mr. Gonzalez wanted to go home and he wanted to take his son with him. Or his relatives in Miami. Imagine that your mother died trying to get you to freedom. At the heart of it all is still this painful family separation. Something that as a Cuban, I know all too well.

Listen to Chess Piece, the Elian Gonzalez story as part of the MyCultura podcast network available on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, we are back for our last section looking at Eugene Talmadge and by God, it gets worse. Oh, good. Now, this entire summer, the campaign was marked by escalating racist violence and intimidation. On May 9th, a massive cross burning and KKK recruitment rally promising a quote unquote rebirth of the Klan was held on Stone Mountain overlooking Atlanta.

The second iteration of the Klan started 30 years prior, was also founded on Stone Mountain. Stone Mountain is currently the largest Confederate monument in the country, and it's still often home to white nationalist rallies. To quote William Anderson, quote, Rumors of the affair swept the state, causing near hysteria, and giving Gene most of the credit for bringing the Klan back to life with his demagoguery. The event itself was a comical ragtag affair which embarrassed its leaders because they

kept running out of sheets to give to new members. Many of them were forced to wrap themselves in paper and handkerchiefs. They were psychologically impoverished of the new age, the cultural laggers, the indebted, the uneducated, the scared, the have-nots in the age of the haves. They grasped the Klan in desperation. It was the only club in town that invited them. Its mysterious sounding rites and verbiage, its hoods and ornaments, and its history of resistance to the Blacks and its dedication to the past gave them a feeling of power and belonging." and its dedication to the past gave them a feeling of power and belonging." Now, I kind of disagree with some of Anderson's characterization of this rally.

Anderson writes that those gathered on Stone Mountain were like a sad, pathetic lot who had been left behind by changing society. And it's not that they were left behind, it's that they were like stubborn, cruel and cowardly. Like they refused to join society. Like Anderson both discounts their agency and the threat of violence they posed, saying it was high irony that society would look at the souls with such fear and dread as though they were a well-disciplined horror that could sweep from the mountain and destroy at will, unquote.

And like I get what Anderson's saying here. I don't want to give them too much credit. I don't want to give like, you know, current day, what's premises, too much credit for being like a well organized faction that can destroy democracy at like at any moment. Right. But on the other hand, it is wrong to downplay the violent potential of racial extremism. Yes. This is evidenced by the Morris Ford lynching that happened later that summer on July 25th outside of Monroe, Georgia. While two black couples were on their way home, a lynch mob forced their car to pull over and the mob dragged them out of the vehicle, broke the girls arms, tied them to a tree and shot all of them until their bodies could no longer be

recognized. Jesus. Over 60 shots. Jesus. One of the victims was seven months pregnant and it's reported that the unborn baby was cut out of the mother's body by the mob. Oh my God. It's it's one of the most brutal lynchings and this is, this is considered the last, quote unquote, like mass lynching. Now I would say there's incidents that have happened since then, which certainly qualifies lynchings.

But this is historically like the final of like the Jim Crow lynchings. I would also add that like in World War I, when the Western powers were trying to build up like hate and a justification to really like, we have to destroy Imperial Germany. They told stories of German soldiers cutting babies out of women's wombs.

Like one of the things that was used as like, this is why the empire of Japan is so evil is stories of them doing that in China. And like, I don't disagree that that's pretty much the ultimate evil, but like that does kind of bring to mind, well then if this was something that a lot of people in the white South were fine with doing,

what should we have done in this period to the white South anyway, whatever. A Monroe local told a reporter, quote, this thing has got to be done to keep Mr. N-word in his place. Since the court said he could vote, there ain't been any holding him back, unquote. President Truman called for an FBI investigation, but the town protected all of the assailants. The FBI also looked into Talmadge's possible involvement, though rumors that he personally

led the mob were certainly untrue. Gene did campaign in town shortly before the lynching, and witnesses reported that Gene spoke with one of the future suspects and offered impunity to anyone quote unquote, taking care of the Negro unquote. An FBI memo suggested that Talmadge may have sanctioned the killings in order to help win the badly needed rural county unit vote. Shortly after, the county did indeed go to Talmadge. At the very least, Jean's 1946 campaign rhetoric was widely blamed for prompting the brutally racist murders. Later that summer, hooded KKK members held rallies

at county courthouses to scare black people away from voting, just like during Reconstruction. Anderson notes, quote, Gene said it would be an accident if he got even one black vote, unquote. The liberal candidate James Carmichael did win the popular vote with 313,000 votes to Jean's 297,000, but Talmadge pulled through in the county unit vote by about 100 points. The campaign of yesteryear's racism had won the state. That summer, the Charlotte News wrote, the South will one day be rid of its Talmadges, but not until we have completed the long and painful process of purging ourselves of the sickness upon which they feed. Yeah, that would have been the call, huh?

That is something we are still working off. Perhaps we should have purged ourselves of the sickness from which they feed. 80 years later, we are still purging ourselves of the sickness. Well, it's more that like 80 years ago, it was very clear to people like this that we were consuming, you know,

we were consuming something rancid that had made us sick. And we just kind of doubled down like Homer Simpson with that old submarine sandwich and just kept on eating it. After the votes were tallied, Gene said that winning the race must have cost him 10 years of his life, which might literally be true

if he was meant to live to 72 instead of 62. May it happen to Trump. He made almost 300 speeches this campaign, and by the end of the race, his health was in a dire state, and after the election, it did not improve. At this point in his marriage, Mitt was refusing to cook him dinner, so he would often have to eat at friends' houses. And while on vacation in Jacksonville, Gene collapsed unconscious onto the dinner table of one of his friends while eating stew.

He was rushed to the hospital and treated for a ruptured vein in his stomach. Stew got him, huh? Comrade Stew. Look, ever since 2020, we've been saying that soup is antifa. And I think this just really proves the case. Gene was getting blood transfusions.

And upon awaking, Gene told a young reporter that snuck into the hospital, quote, it ain't nothing but an old bleed in vain, unquote. Great. The doctors said that Gene wouldn't be able to attend the state convention. So Herman gave the speech in his place. And though Gene had an initial quick recovery, his friends and family started to

doubt that he would survive his four-year term. Then in early December, Gene was rushed to the hospital again due to hemorrhaging. While in the hospital, Talmage's team was still working on plans to save the white primary, this time by disqualifying all of the registered voters in the state. But by mid December. But by mid December, I mean, this is actually also like what the modern right is doing to affect the upcoming election, where they're doing like mass, like on voter registrations. Again, like specifically targeting like black areas, especially in Texas. I know that they have that they have done this,

as well as in Georgia. This tactic of disqualifying registered voters to sway elections is still being used. Now, by mid-December, Gene contracted acute hepatitis, and at this point, he knew he was dying. I'm going to quote from the book Race and Racism in the United States, quote, on his deathbed, he told his Baptist preacher that the black race was created inferior by God. He said the white race was on top, the yellow race next

and then the brown and red races and at the very bottom, the black race who were created to be servants to all other races, unquote. Deathbed remarks. Yeah. Still the standard line on the right, yeah. Anderson notes, quote, during his illness, a rather morbid joke circulated saying that Gene Talmadge was the only man in Georgia

that could have the whole state praying at once. One half that he would die, the other half that he would live. Now, some of his last recorded words are on a phone call to his friend Henry Sperlin, who was out buying cattle for Gene's farm. And with Gene's dying breaths, he whispered over the phone, Spud, that was Sperlin's nickname, Spud, don't buy no more cows, unquote.

Tragic. Eugene Talmage fell into a coma and died that next morning. spud, don't buy no more cows." Tragic. Eugene Talmadge fell into a coma and died that next morning. That was December 21st, 1946. Well, that's my favorite movies made so far. Yeah. May all of his descendants follow him soon. This was just weeks before being sworn in as governor for the fourth time.

As his coffin sat in the state capitol, it was decorated with a Ku Klux Klan wreath. And currently a statue honoring Eugene Talmadge stands in front of the Georgia capitol. That probably shouldn't be there. Might wanna pull that one down. And with that, that should be the end of the dictatorial reign of Eugene Talmadge.

It should. And yet somehow it is not. Cool. There's one more pitch. So with Jean dying before being sworn in as governor, the office should have been passed down to the lieutenant governor-elect Melvin E. Thompson. As Thompson asserted his claim to the governor's office,

Jean's son, Herman Talmadge, announced that he was instead going to take the governor's office. So as Gene was dying, he was calling up political associates to ask to ask that they help Herman pick up the baton from Gene after his death. And Herman himself had actually already prepared for this contingency. Before the before the general election, a friend of Herman uncovered an old clause in the state constitution stipulating that if the governor-elect dies before taking office, the General Assembly could appoint whoever had the second most votes in the general election. Though Jean ran unopposed in the general, Herman suspected that the liberal

candidate might receive write-in protest votes. So for insurance, Herman launched a covert write-in campaign for himself and claimed to receive a thousand votes, beating the other write-in candidates. Governor Arnold rejected Herman's claim to the office and stated that he himself would remain governor indefinitely until the mess was sorted out. So there was now three men claiming to be

the rightful governor of Georgia, all citing different clauses in the state constitution. A joint assembly met on January 14th to decide who was governor. The assembly counted the write-in votes for Herman, and it appeared that there were far less than Talmadge Pro claimed, with the official count losing Herman the write-in race.

This was, however, until a box of 58 additional votes mysteriously arrived from Telfair County, which was Herman's home county, and these spontaneously appearing extra votes gave Talmadge a small lead. Mysteriously appeared? Ah. Well, we'll get to it.

Cool. I'm gonna quote from the AJC, well, we'll get to it. Cool. I'm going to quote from the AJC quote, as the vote neared, one of the weapons of choice was alcohol. Each side hoped the other might be too drunk to vote. I mean, that's that's that's that's what I'm hoping for. Herman Talmadge remembers quote, some of our people were reacting strongly to Melvin Thompson's liquor. A state senator of ours was found in the Capitol grounds passed out. The sheriff of Forsyth County came to our office with a Thompson man and the sheriff

was about to kill him. The sheriff said he caught the Thompson man serving knockout drops. It was sort of like the date rape drug of today apparently. So we had some of our friends organize a rehab hospital down in the Public Service Commission in the Capitol, where they would be where they would try to keep our people functioning unquote. So after a series of fights, offensively deployed alcohol and some sketchy political maneuvers, Herman was voted governor by the legislature and sworn in at 2am. 8 to 10,000 Talmadge supporters broke into the Capitol and joined Herman as he went to take

the governor's office. Governor Arnell refused to leave. He saw Talmadge's ascension as illegitimate and called Herman a pretender. A massive fistfight broke out in the Capitol, furniture was smashed, and Arnell's staffers were assaulted by the mob. Herman climbed onto a desk to tell his supporters to leave. Arnell was escorted out of the governor's office, and Talmadge had the locks changed. Arnell was still asserting that he was acting governor, and instead of leaving the capital, he set up a desk in the rotundunda and tried to conduct business as usual. So we had two men in the capital with separate desks, both claiming to be governor.

Now, the next day, Herman carried a 38 caliber pistol to work, as he did for the remainder of his term, scared that he might have to use it against an Arnold man. So, OK, six weeks after Herman was sworn in, a journalist at the Atlanta Journal named George Goodwin started to look into those mysterious 58 extra votes from Telfair County. He located the list of write-in votes and noticed that 34 of them had apparently voted in alphabetical order, starting with A and stopping with K.

Finding this highly improbable, Goodwin tried to track down these individual voters, only to discover that some of these people did not exist. Others had died before the election and more had either moved away prior to the election or abstained from voting. Goodwin won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on this. And 17 days after his expose, the Georgia Supreme Court ruled that the General Assembly exceeded their jurisdiction by electing Herman Talmadge. And that the Lieutenant Governor-elect from the time of Gene's death, Melvin Thompson,

would indeed serve as governor. So that's how Gene tried to actually extend his power past his death in the so-called three governor's controversy. It's one of the craziest things. It's definitely like Trump, he could, he might try something like that. I don't think Trump will for the reason that I don't think Trump cares enough about either of his oldest sons to ever do this. No. Well, yeah, maybe maybe maybe Barrett, maybe Barrett. If he tries to put like 17 year old Barrett into office, maybe I don't know. I I don't know how that'll work.

But I think the only thing stopping Trump from trying like a similar like forced political dynasty is the fact that he just does not like either of his oldest sons nearly as much as Jean liked Herman. But no, this is one of the crazier moments in Georgia history. When you have three people claiming to be governor, one of them, Herman, has never been elected. His only claim to fame is that he's the son of Eugene Talmadge. Now, I have one final kind of closing note on Talmadge's reign over Georgia. So Talmadge's intermittent reign over the state arose during

the start of substantial progress in the South and Jean was the reactionary embodiment of resistance to change. He was the vessel for his Confederate ancestors as the modern world invaded Georgia. Jean mastered the politics of theater and white Georgia was enthralled with his performance for He was the vessel for his confederate ancestors as the modern world invaded Georgia. Gene mastered the politics of theater and white Georgia was enthralled with his performance for two decades. People either loved or hated Gene. There was very little in between. His core supporters were the rich businessman and the dirt poor little guy.

Gene's economics paved the way for the intense corporate control over Georgia that continues to this day. Yep. And I will finally close with some of the words of the last page of Gene's biography. Quote, if the businessman supplied the money, the poor farmer supplied the court vote that gave Talmadge his power.

He had no real solutions for these people. His solutions had all been proven wrong by the very past he revered. He served them as an emotional crutch when their consciousness was being shattered by the catastrophic depression and the subsequent radicalism of the New Deal. As long as he played by their rules, they supported him. But when he tried to take the new fruits away from them or sought real power by running for the Senate, they denied him. They wanted him basically powerless, though they reveled in his power plays. Talmadge was a prisoner of history, a cultural isolationist lost in a time frame that he was unable to leave on his own, and that his supporters finally refused to help

him leave. Jean Talmadge strode the decade when Georgia got up and went along, when she began to pull up stakes, learned to say yes, and became less preoccupied with self. In looking beyond, she lost something and gained something. Her people had looked beyond the tall pines at the end of the field and realized for the first time that something better must be out there. And in doing so, they admitted defeat, admitted they could no longer go it at their own. In 1910, 61% of all Georgians were rural farm dwellers. By 1940, the figure had hit 44%.

There is drama here, there is preparation for profound change. And the drama of Eugene Talmadge is that he arrived in the dead middle of this great physical and mental shift. The fact that he was elected to state office four times during this period does not indicate that the shifts were meaningless. To the contrary, they illustrate the agony and passion of the move. These were people briefly awash, having pushed off from a safe shore and uncertain of the new ground they were testing.

Eyes darted quickly back to the old place. Hearts were touched instantly by its recollections. Hands formed on the plow handles unconsciously grasped for worn grain. Gene was the short that they had left and that was his ultimate loss." What do you think, Robert? I'm thinking actually of his ultimate victory, which is the Georgia environmental official in Atlanta who was like investigating the bio lab fire, which is the Georgia environmental official in Atlanta, who was like investigating the bio lab fire, which was a result of private, of this corporatism,

a private equity hollowing out a company that operated this chemical facility. And so they didn't have proper safeguards and used water to put out a fire that water should not have been used on. And it blanketed the entire city or at least a large portion of it in fucking chlorine gas fumes. The guy who was investigating it for the state collapsed like while giving a state or giving testimony about the fire. Right after giving testimony?

Yeah, and people online, a whole bunch of them with thousands of likes per person are suggesting that he was attacked by a CIA heart attack gun. Because obviously that's the only thing that could have done this. I see that as the real triumph of Talmach's legacy. His that shit like that is not only the norm in Georgia, but it's becoming the norm everywhere in this great country.

Because ultimately he and the people like him tend to win because again, we could talk about the men with machine guns, but yeah. Yeah, I mean, and specifically the corporate control over Georgia that he helped established is like one of the prime reasons why we now have Cop City. The way that Atlanta is completely controlled by like five corporations, the way that they completely exert power

over city council, the Atlanta Police Foundation. Like all of that can be traced back to Eugene Talmadge. And yeah, in some ways, although he lost the battle for segregation in the next like 10, 20 years, he really did kind of win in the end in some ways. I mean, especially if you look at how we've talked about these last four episodes, how the template that he laid out is now being followed by DeSantis, by Trump, by all by all by all of these guys seeking power. And it works. And I think it's not again like it is a travesty

that Jean died before being sworn into office for a fourth time The fact that he died of like liver failure Instead of many other means or the fact that he died on his way to taking office once again on a on an explicit platform Of what of of whites supremacy shows that maybe he actually did kind of win in the end And I think I am looking at him as like, like he is like the last real like Southern Democrat, right? He is the last guy before the South moves to being racist Republicans. And that is his legacy.

Is that this Democrat Party man actually paved the way for Republicans to completely ruin the country and the states for the next like 80 years. And that's why he's my hero. Anyway, good work, Harrison. Well, there you go. That is the story of Eugene Talmadge and his dictatorial reign over the state of Georgia. Well, you know, everyone,

all I gotta say is keep your fingers crossed. Soon we'll have a better dictator in charge of Georgia. That's what I believe. soon we'll have a better dictator in charge of Georgia. That's what I believe. Behind the Bastards is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more from Cool Zone Media, visit our website, coolzonemedia.com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Behind the Bastards is now available on YouTube. New episodes every Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe to our channel, youtube.com slash at Behind the Bastards. Sometimes where a crime took place leads you to answer why the crime happened in the first place. Hi, I'm Sloane Glass, host of the new true crime podcast, American Homicide. In this series, we'll examine some of the country's most infamous and mysterious murders and learn how the location of the crime becomes a character in the story.

Listen to American Homicide on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, Beau Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, Beau. Hey, Matt. Are you ready to tell the readers about the extra special episode we have coming up? I think we have to let them in on our little surprise. Yeah, if you haven't already figured it out, the queen of Christmas herself, can't believe this, Mariah Carey, will be joining us this week. Wow. Readers, publishers, Katie's and finalists tune in to maybe the most unforgettable episode

of Las Culturas This Yet. Listen to Las Culturas This on Will Ferrell's Big Money Players Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. On Thanksgiving Day 1999, five-year-old Cuban boy Elian Gonzalez was found off the coast of Florida. And the question was, should the boy go back to his father in Cuba? Mr. Gonzalez wanted to go home and he wanted to take his son with him. Or stay with his relatives in Miami? Imagine that your mother died trying to get you to freedom.

Listen to Chess Piece, the Elian Gonzalez story on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Julian Edelman. I'm Rob Gronkowski. And we are super excited to tell you about our new show, Dudes on Dudes. We're spilling all the behind-the-scenes stories, crazy details, and honestly,

just having a blast talking football. Every week, we're discussing our favorite players of all times, from legends to our buddies to current stars. We're finally answering the age-old question, what kind of dudes are these dudes? We're gonna find out, Jules. New episodes drop every Thursday during the NFL season. Listen to Dudes on Dudes on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty and I'm the host of On Purpose. My latest episode is with Jelly Roll. This episode is one of the most honest and raw interviews I've ever had. We go deep into Jelly Roll's life story from being in and out of prison from the age of 13 to being one of today's biggest artists. I was a desperate delusional dreamer. Be a delusional dreamer.

Just don't be a desperate delusional dreamer. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Trust me, you won't want to miss this one.