December 28, 2005
As 2005 comes to an end we will review the top political events of the year in Alabama.
At the beginning of the year it was speculated that four face cards, Republicans Bob Riley and Roy Moore and Democrats Don Siegelman and Lucy Baxley, would be the major players in next year’s Governor’s race. There has been no surprise here. All four have announced that they are candidates and they are all running hard as the new year approaches.
December 21, 2005
While we have been strolling down memory lane for the past four months reliving past Governor’s races, the field has been formulating for next year’s gubernatorial contest. Actually there have been no significant changes since the summer. It was expected at that time that Bob Riley, Roy Moore, Don Siegelman, and Lucy Baxley would be the major players and all that has happened is that they have confirmed the expected, all four have officially announced. It should be a fun and exciting race. All four face cards have statewide name identification prior to the battle. Therefore they will not need to use their resources introducing themselves. The bad part is that these resources could be focused on negative advertising aimed at disassociating you from their opponent.
December 14, 2005
I hope you enjoyed the fourteen-week series on past Governor’s races covering the 40-year span from 1962-2002. Many of you contacted me and shared your memories of these elections. Most of us lived through them and remember them vividly. We all have our favorite gubernatorial contests as well as our favorite Governors. However, considering George Wallace was Governor for most of that 40-year era we do not have as many Governors to choose from as most other states.
December 07, 2005
Don Siegelman defeated Fob James in the 1998 Governor’s race by a landslide 18-point margin. Siegelman ran on an overt platform favoring a state lottery for Alabama. He patterned his campaign and lottery issue after Georgia Governor Zell Miller’s plan. Georgia earmarked their lottery for education and called it the Hope Scholarship Program. Under Miller’s Georgia plan any deserving Georgia high school graduate with at least a “B” average could go to any Georgia college tuition free with proceeds from the Georgia lottery. It was working in Georgia, so Siegelman sold it all over Alabama. He perceived that his lottery issue had propelled him into the Governor’s office. He should have remembered the initial poll he saw in 1996 showing Fob James was so unpopular that anybody could have beaten him. George Wallace had lived by the adage that more people vote against someone that for someone. The people were not as much in favor of Siegelman’s lottery as they were against Fob.
November 30, 2005
Old Fob James had a quixotic political personality. When he was out of the Governor’s office he showed a tremendous yearning to get back. The proof is he sought the office in 1986 and lost in the Democratic primary and lost again in 1990 in the primary. However, he came back and won in 1994 as a Republican, but once he got the job he acted as if he did not want it.
November 23, 2005
When Guy Hunt won the Governor’s race over Bill Baxley in 1986 it was well publicized that he was a part-time Primitive Baptist preacher. He was also billed as a part-time Amway salesman. These common man vocations appealed to the average Alabama voter. It was Hunt’s calling as a Baptist preacher which resonated warmly with his constituency. Alabamians are very religious and very Baptist.
November 16, 2005
When Guy Hunt took office as the first Republican Governor in January of 1987 not much was expected of him. After all, he had been elected only because of the backlash resulting from the handpicking of Bill Baxley over Charlie Graddick by the Democratic Party leadership. Very few people voted for Hunt because they thought he was the better choice or that his credentials rendered him more qualified. He was a simple man, a rural hard shell Baptist preacher. However, the Republican leadership realized they had been given a golden opportunity so they seized the moment and surrounded Hunt with good people. Most Alabamians warmed to him. He worked hard to get to know the legislature and put together a legislative majority comprised of Republicans and conservative Democrats. He had an uncomplicated agenda and worked to get his programs passed.
November 09, 2005
The 1986 Governor’s race will be remembered as amazing a story as the 1978 Fob James miracle run where Fob put away the Three B’s, Brewer, Beasley and Baxley. Brewer and Beasley had been permanently exiled to Bucks Pocket, the mythical destination for defeated Alabama gubernatorial candidates. However, Bill Baxley resurrected his political career by bouncing back to be elected Lt. Governor in 1982, while George Wallace was winning his fifth and final term as Governor. Another player arrived on the state political scene. Charlie Graddick was elected as a fiery tough lock ‘em up and throw away the key Attorney General. Graddick had previously been a tough prosecuting district attorney in Mobile.
November 02, 2005
As George Wallace presumably faded into the sunset, Fob James took the reigns of Alabama state government in January of 1979. Fob’s inauguration was a somewhat strange event as Alabamians were used to a Wallace being sworn in as Governor every fourth January since 1958. It had been 20 years since someone other than George or Lurleen Wallace had taken the oath on the old Capitol steps where Jefferson Davis had been sworn in as President of the Confederacy.
October 26, 2005
The 1978 Governor’s race between the three heavyweights, former Governor Albert Brewer, Attorney General Bill Baxley, and Lt. Governor Jere Beasley, was expected to be titanic. All three men had last names beginning with the letter “B” thus the press coined the phrase “the three B’s.” The Republicans were still satisfied picking their candidates in backroom caucuses and did not field a gubernatorial candidate. Therefore the winner of the Democratic Primary would be Governor.