James Jackson was a pugnacious politician with a fiery temper. Born in England in 1756, he came to Savannah as a teen and fought in the American Revolution. Jackson served in the first Congress under the new U.S. Constitution, and supported Thomas Jefferson’s fledgling Democratic-Republicans against Alexander Hamilton’s Federalists. Jackson was in the U.S. Senate […]
Marvin Griffin ran for governor as a staunch segregationist, but when it came to actually defying federal orders, as he said, “being in jail kind of crimps a governor’s style.” Griffin was born in 1907 in Bainbridge and was elected governor in 1954, six months after the Supreme Court’s decision that outlawed segregated schools. Griffin […]
He may be best remembered as Jimmy Carter’s Attorney General, but Griffin Bell was a giant in the legal profession long before that. Born in rural Sumter County in 1918, Bell went to law school at Mercer University. In 1958, he was working for the Atlanta firm that became King & Spalding when he was […]
Eugene Talmadge ran for Georgia governor five times. He won four. He served three and was, to put it mildly, quite a character. Born near Forsyth in 1884, he was known as the farmer’s champion. “I can carry any county,” he boasted, “that ain’t got street cars.” Talmadge fired elected officials who resisted his authority. […]
He stood for saving the Union and he later zealously argued for secession, Robert Toombs was one of the most influential Georgians of the 19th century. Born in Wilkes County in 1810, Toombs served in the Georgia Legislature before being elected to four terms in the U.S. House and then the U.S. Senate. He was […]
Samuel Elbert had every reason to support the British during the American Revolution. A successful and conservative Savannah businessman, he might favor security over revolution, but Elbert, like many Americans, chose a different path. His business made him a colonial leader in the colony, and his revolutionary fervor made him a captain in the militia. […]
The U.S. Constitution has always been contentious. Our sacred charter was born in controversy and remains so to this day. Georgia elected six delegates to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787. Only four went. And only two—Abraham Baldwin and William Few—signed the final document. The convention, chaired by George Washington, had […]
It cost three men their lives and provided the legal basis for the Trail of Tears, the forcible removal of the Cherokee Nation from Georgia. The Treaty of New Echota was signed on this day in 1835, ceding Cherokee land to the U.S. in exchange for compensation. The treaty had been negotiated by a Cherokee […]
The first Southerner in the White House after the Civil War grew up in Georgia, and knew the war firsthand. Thomas Woodrow Wilson was born in Virginia in 1856. Not long after, his family moved to Augusta, where his father pastored the First Presbyterian Church for 12 years. Young Tommy Wilson grew up in a […]
The second Georgian to serve as Secretary of State was a prime architect of the Vietnam War. Dean Rusk was born in Cherokee County in 1909. A Rhodes Scholar at Oxford prior to World War II, Rusk strongly opposed appeasement of Hitler, a position towards tyranny that would shape his worldview all his life. Rusk […]
