© This work is the property of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text.
MP3 file derived from WAV preservation master, which was derived from original analog cassettes.
The electronic edition is a part of the UNC-Chapel Hill digital library, Documenting the American South.
An audio file with the interview complements this electronic edition.
The text has been entered using double-keying and verified against the original.
The text has been encoded using the recommendations for Level 4 of the TEI in Libraries Guidelines.
Original grammar and spelling have been preserved.
All quotation marks, em dashes and ampersand have been transcribed as entity references.
All double right and left quotation marks are encoded as "
All em dashes are encoded as —
Transcript on deposit at The Southern Historical Collection, The Louis Round Wilson Library
Citation of this interview should be as follows:
“Interview
A-0331-3, in the Southern Oral History Program Collection #4007,
Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library,
University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill”
This is the third interview in a three-part series with Senator Herman Talmadge
of Georgia. In this interview, Talmadge offers his reaction to issues in America
during the 1970s. He offers his thoughts on the then recent disclosures
regarding J. Edgar Hoover's abuse of power and those of the CIA and
the FBI. Other topics include President Gerald Ford's pardoning of
Richard Nixon, lessons to be learned from the failures of the Vietnam War, and
the issue of race in American politics. The remainder of the interview is
devoted to looking back on his and his father's political legacies in
Georgia. In particular, he discusses why he considered leaving the Senate and
running for Governor in 1966; the building of a political coalition from former
political rivals and Georgia businessmen; his publication on segregation, You and Segregation; and the lack of personal and professional
papers for both him and his father. He concludes the interview with some brief
remarks regarding the importance of objectivity in historical analysis.
Senator Herman Talmadge of Georgia offers concluding remarks in this final interview of a three-part series. He reflects on contemporary political issues of the mid-1970s, including civil rights, Vietnam, and abuses of power on the part of the CIA and the FBI. Finally, he reflects on his political legacy in the state of Georgia.
[START OF TAPE 1, SIDE A]
Today is December 18, 1975 and I think that at long last, Senator, we are going to conclude this Southern Oral History project and since you and I last talked in Lovejoy, there have been a lot of disclosures about various institutions in this country and various individuals and one of them, of course, is J. Edgar Hoover. I think that Hoover is a man that has enjoyed tremendous respect over the years.
In his lifetime, I suspect that he was one of the most admired Americans.
Was he also one of the most powerful?
Yes, he was.
And do you think that would . . . did he have too much power?
Possibly did have. I believe that it is one of the English lords who said, "Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely." There is some truth in that.
You know, I incidentally filed earlier this year and got my own FBI file under the Freedom of Information Act, and found that they had kept a file because I had written various articles that Hoover didn't like or that the FBI didn't like. They've also found that a number of political figures and civil rights figures and so forth had files. Did you ever have any idea that they kept a file on you?
I supposed that they did have. I visited Japan in 1939 as a guest of the
Japanese government and when Ellis Arnall was
You know, I was probably . . . like an awful lot of people say at my age, when I was a kid, I not only looked up to the FBI but I even applied for a job with them when I got out of high school and was accepted for a clerical job. I went into newspapering instead and I know that you had tremendous respect, and so did everyone else, for the Bureau. What do you think about disclosures of both the FBI and the CIA, what they did? For example, the plots to assassinate foreign leaders and the information that has come out on that?
It undoubtedly has adversely affected the morale of both agencies, the CIA and the FBI. Senators who have been overseas during the past year tell me that the CIA's sources of information are drying up. All these disclosures have undoubtedly affected the efficiency of both departments, in my judgement. Particularly the CIA, whose primary sources of intelligence, of course, are foreigners.
Do you think that the disclosures have been good overall?
Overall, in the end, I think that it will have a salutary effect. These things have a way of cleansing themselves and I don't think that you will ever see circumstances occur like that again in your lifetime.
Would you ever have had any idea at all, for example, going back to J.Edgar Hoover, that he would have been supplying presidents from Franklin D. Roosevelt on up with political information on various people?
Oh, I had assumed they had done that. I remember back during my father's lifetime, he was probably the first Democrat to get at odds with President Roosevelt. They set the tax people on him and investigated him for ten years, going into all of his farms and counting chickens and hogs and cows and searching for concealed bank accounts in Cuba, Mexico and Canada. They completed their investigation about the time that I returned from the Navy. One of them came up and presented him with a bill, I think, of something like two thousand plus dollars and he used some profanity and told them that if they thought he owed any income tax to go over to the courthouse and get him indicted and he would meet them there. That was the end of it and when he died, they never even presented the bill.
And he never paid the bill?
He never paid it.
Well, was that accepted then as just sort of hard boiled politics?
Yes. Roosevelt was a hard boiled politician and probably one of the hardest boiled in the history of the country and I think that he thought deep down that all politicians were crooks. Of course, they had moved in on the Long dynasty, as you remember, in Louisiana and sent several of them to the penitentiary, but they never did find anything wrong with my father.
Have there ever been any investigations aimed at you that you know of? I mean, were they out in the open?
Not that I know of. They have denied some depreciation on our ham plant
down there many years ago. I think that I could have
I think that President Nixon learned that, didn't he?
That's right.
Let me ask you, going back to Nixon, and I guess that we can skip around on some of these subjects, we never talked about the Ford pardon of Nixon.
I think that all Americans had somewhat of an ambivalent feeling on that and that was my own reaction. I don't think many, if any, Americans wanted to see a former President of the United States serving in the penitentiary, but they were indignant that Ford pardoned Nixon before an indictment or trial. From his standpoint, it was a grave political error. From the standpoint of the country at large, getting that issue behind us probably was a good thing.
And you still think that? Even the timing of the pardon?
Yes.
You don't think that there was a deal or anything?
No. I think that Gerald Ford is a completely honorable man.
Another issue that I think we didn't touch before, Senator, were your feelings on the Vietnam war.
Well, from the very outset I thought that we were making a mistake getting in there. My own patriotism is somewhat like Stephen Decatur's, I believe it was, who said, "My country, in her intercourse with a foreign country, may she always be in the right, but my country right or wrong." My loyalty follows the flag and troops wherever they may be.
Well, did you think when we did get out that we got out as
We got out about the only way that we could. It was a no win proposition. The country was not behind the war effort. The President was not behind the war effort. When you get involved in a war, the only way to fight it is with every resource that the country possesses and go for the jugular vein. We didn't do that. We had our troops over there fighting with one or both hands tied behind them, the country badly divided and generally nonsupportive of the war.
You think that we should have moved in earlier, then, and won the war?
Once we committed troops there, we should have gone all out to win and in my judgement, if we had utilized the full resources of the country at that time, we probably could have won it in ninety days to six months.
Currently, there is a discussion going on about how much aid or whether there should be any aid at all of the United States put into Angola, the feeling being that it could be another Vietnam. Did you see it not only there, but a possibility of our getting into other Vietnams?
I don't think that there is a possibility of us committing troops there.
I think that we learned too great a lesson from Vietnam on that ground.
I do think it is a mistake for this country to get involved in these
tribal wars and when Russia moves in, we move in and vice-versa, because
in the long run, I don't think that any white power can gain any
advantage in Africa under present conditions. They are intensely
nationalistic and I think that those countries will either go
Well, do you see the possibility of our ever getting involved in any other Vietnams or do you think that the country has really learned that lesson? Not just Africa, but . . .
I think that we have learned that lesson. I can only speak for myself and I am not in favor of getting involved anywhere with any power at any time anywhere in the world, unless our own national security is involved.
Senator, we talked quite a bit over these previous interviews about your past stand on racial issues and so forth. Is race dead as a political issue in this country?
Well, it depends on how you mean "race as a political issue." If you resort to compulsion to move people around to try to get some sort of mythical racial balance, it is the most volatile issue there is in America today. Race as such, arraying blacks against whites or whites against blacks is, I think, relatively dead, unless you resort to this business of compulsion which all people resent, black and white.
But that's not an issue today in Georgia, your own state?
No, it's not an issue in Georgia except that the overwhelming majority of people in Georgia and everywhere else in the nation, both black and white, are violently opposed to this forced busing. They think that it is a denial of their basic freedoms and I certainly think so.
Are there any other areas at all where you see that as an issue?
No.
One thing that we did talk about quite a bit before was when you, in 1966 I believe it was, considered returning to Georgia to run for governor. I've had some people tell me that that was the one political mistake that you made, getting involved in that whole exercise of thinking you were going to run and then deciding that you weren't going to run. Do you agree with that assessment, that it was a big political mistake?
Well, I don't know what you mean by "mistake." I didn't
run. In fact, it would have been a mistake if I had run. Here's what
happened in that regard. Vandiver, who had been governor and was
expected to run again, was an odds on favorite to win overwhelmingly and
he had no great substantial opposition, as a matter of fact. He called
me one day and said, "Senator, I need to see you and I am
coming up to Washington tomorrow morning, arriving at Dulles Airport at
such-and-such a time . . . " It was five or six o'clock in the
morning as I recall. I said, "Well, Ernie, I'll meet you out
there and bring you in for breakfast at the house." So, he told
me coming in that his doctor told him that he had serious heart trouble
and if he ran for governor, he would be taking his life in his hands and
he had some young children that he had to educate and couldn't afford to
sacrifice his family and that he thought I ought to come home and run
for governor. He knew that I had been somewhat unhappy in the Senate.
All former governors are. A governor can make a decision and execute it.
A Senator can make a decision and talk about it. There is a tremendous
difference between the roles of the two. I gave it some thought and
about the next day, I announced the fact that I was considering
Can I go back to one other thing that we talked about, the base of your support in Georgia? You've had such broad support. How have you managed to turn people who are opposed to you politically into your allies?
I think two things, really. You see, when my father died, people were
pretty much polarized in Georgia with about a third of the state going
to Gene Talmadge when he died, about a third of the state hated him with
a passion and about a third of the state was essentially neutral on him
and voted for him when they thought he was
You have had some very powerful friends over the years in the people who have loomed very large, say, in the business or on the financial front. Who would you count among those in Georgia? Bob Woodruff?
Woodruff, of course, has always been my friend.
Harley Branch?
Harley Branch has always been my friend.
That's Georgia Power.
Yes. Contrary to what a lot of people think, they were very minor contributors and sometimes, not at all. In fact, I don't think that Harley Branch contributed more than a token amount to my race for the Senate, as I recall. I don't think that he made any contribution at all when I ran for governor.
But they are influential people?
Yes.
What about other people, Senator, who would be well known and who have been substantial backers of you? I don't mean substantial in that . . .
Virtually all of the business community has supported
Do you recall an incident where you were supposed to speak before the Georgia Teacher's Education Association and Leroy Johnson was supposed to introduce you or something and at the last minute, he didn't do it?
Yes.
Can you tell me what that was about?
I think that I was the first white politician in Georgia to accept an invitation to speak before the black teacher's group.
That was the Georgia Teacher's . . .
Educational Association, as I recall. I was a United States Senator and Leroy Johnson was the first black senator in Georgia and they had Leroy Johnson scheduled to introduce me, as I recall and Leroy didn't show up. I don't know whether he chickened out or had other business.
But he didn't show up?
He didn't show up.
Let me ask you, I don't remember the year, but back at the time of the county unit system, you and Bob Elliot . . . who is what now?
U.S. federal judge.
U.S. District judge, stumped the state at that time pushing for a constitutional amendment that would extend the county unit system to the general election. Can you tell me something about that and how . . .
Well, we lost. We carried most of the counties in the state, as you recall. Fulton County was overwhelmingly against it and that was the difference.
Well . . .
We could anticipate at that time that if we didn't get it written in the constitution that some federal court might dump it, which they ultimately did.
In retrospect, do you look upon the county unit system as an instrument that was not fair?
Well, it depends on what you mean by "fair." I understand the feeling in some of the urban areas that they feel that they are being discriminated against. All republican forms of government traditionally have recognized the fact that you can't have a republic based essentially on numbers. We recognize that in our federal system by the U.S. Senate having two Senators from each state regardless of population. We recognize that in our Presidential elections because it is based on the electoral system. You see, our form of government originally arose in Greece and the Greeks carried it to the Romans and the Romans carried it to the English and ours is derived from that. The county unit system was based on the historical basis that every tribe, no matter how small or how remote, would have representation. You still have that in the British parliament. Of course, their Prime Minister is elected by members of pariliament and not all of their districts are equal in population at all. They are very unequal, as a matter of fact.
What about personal background now, Senator? You had a
I've never had much of a social life. In fact, I don't particularly care for it. I enjoy being with friends, having dinner with them, having a drink with them occasionally, but going to cocktail parties and grining at strangers and hearing the chattering noise doesn't appeal to me at all.
And of course, Washington has a tremendous number of cocktail parties.
I very, very rarely go to any of them. In fact, I don't even go to the White House if I can avoid it. I was invited over there last night to a dance and I rejected it.
Well, I think that you've told me before that what you do like to do when you leave Washington is to go back and hunt and fish and really stay on the telephone with your constituents.
I visit around during the Christmas holidays and I have at least three quail hunting invitations that I've accepted and hunting and fishing is my principal relaxation.
Can you tell me . . . now you and your father together have sort of dominated Georgia politics for almost a half century.
Just about that.
What do you see as the Talmadge impact on the state and can you tell me
something about the difference between your own style and the
My father was constantly involved in controversy. He would have two or three major rows and four or five minor rows going on all the time.
Did he enjoy that?
I think he did. My style is somewhat different from that. If I can avoid a row I do so. I don't back away from them but if you can flank a position rather than storm it, I prefer that.
Your father would rather have stormed it?
He would rather have stormed it, yes.
What do you see as your own imprint?
Well, my imprint I think, is primarily what I did as governor of Georgia and of course, I've made some contributions since I've been in the Senate, too. I think that most of the real progress that our state has made in recent years began with my administration as governor of the state. I'll give you just one illustration. Timber resources alone. When I took office as governor, most of the counties were burning the woods and driving through the state, you would have to stop during most of the winter and the spring months to let the smoke clear away so you could see the roads. In eighteen months, we adopted a forestry program that brought us from 46th position out of the 48 states to number one. Timber resources brings into Georgia now, including the end products, about three billion dollars a year. When I took office as governor, it was three hundred million dollars a year. That's an increase tenfold. Now, assuming that half of that is attributable to inflation, it is still a fivefold increase. Things like that. That's merely one example.
What about federal judge appointments during your time as Senator? Have you ever had any problem getting people appointed who you were interested in?
No. There was some delay on J. Robert Elliot and Kennedy was Attorney General at that time and one of his flunkies was in my office there and something came up about a federal judgeship . . . I don't think they mentioned Elliot by name, I told them the Constitution of the United States provided that federal judges would be appointed with the advice and consent of the United States Senate, that I had advised and had not yet consented and Elliot's name came before the Senate within forty-eight hours.
Now, there used to be, I know, during the Kennedy Administration, sort of trade-offs between President Kennedy and Senator Eastland. If Kennedy would be willing to appoint a certain federal judge, Eastland would be willing as the chairman of the Judiciary Committee to approve some other appointment that Kennedy was interested in. Would the same have been true, I mean, did politics work that way as far as you were concerned?
He never tried to make any sort of trade or deal with me on any proposition at any time.
You mean that it just wasn't necessary?
Well, it was not only not necessary, but John Kennedy knew me well enough to know that I didn't deal in that manner.
Well, wouldn't that be politics though, sort of as . . .
I have never played politics on that basis.
You know, I asked you before we discontinued the last interview whether
or not you had anything that you thought we ought to put into the
Southern Oral History project, you like your history warts and all. Can
you look back and see any warts that people ought to look for when they
are
Oh, I'm sure that if I had my life to live over again there would be some things that I would do differently. Hopefully, people as they get older and have more experience and have more knowledge, utilize that knowledge to better advantage and I guess that is true not only of Herman Talmadge but of every other individual who ever lived.
Sure. Is there anything, though that you could look back as a matter of public record now and say, "Well, if I was reading a biography of Herman Talmadge, I would like to know more about this particular episode in his life."
Not that I can think of at the moment, Jack. Of course, I don't suppose that any individual can appraise himself with any 100% objectivity.
Well, let me ask you something. Going back once more to the segregation thing, you wrote a small book one time about segregation and apparently, a lot of the copies of the book were picked up and there are few in circulation, although there is a Library of Congress card on the book. I forget the title of the book.
You and Segregation.
Yes, You and Segregation. What was the background of
that and can you tell me why the copies did disappear?
Some publishing house over in Alabama . . .
The Vulcan Press.
. . . asked me to write such a book and I did. I don't know what the sales were or what the circulation was, as a matter of fact.
Do you look back on that, though, as something that you just as soon you hadn't done or does it make any difference?
If they made me the same deal today, I probably would reject it.
You'd probably reject it?
Yes.
Are you going to write a book?
I have no plans to. It's not beyond the realm of possibility. If and when I retire and have some time on my hands, I might. I have no plans to do so. I haven't kept a diary and unfortunately, I didn't even keep the papers for the terms that I served as governor. We had no storage facilities for them and we just took them out, all except the official records, my personal papers, and burned them. Unfortunately, my father did the same thing during his career and the only papers I have are those that I have maintained since I have been in the Senate.
So, if someone were going back over the careers of both Talmadges, the only thing they would have is what is a matter of public record?
That's right. To get a really objective report, they would have to do like Williams did on Huey Long, do an oral interview and of course, most of my father's contemporaries are dead. That's one reason that Anderson's book on my father is not objective.
There's no depository at all in Georgia where you could find Eugene Talmadge papers?
I suppose that you could find some in the official archives of the state,
but that would be only his official acts and there wouldn't be
And you can't think of any other sources where historians or someone who is doing a biography could go?
Of course, they can get the newspaper files, but they are not objective, as you know
Well, you would have to start somewhere, I suppose, as a lead.
There have been two or three theses written about my father, but most of the stuff that has been written about my father was either so partisanly favorable or so partisanly unfavorable that it is not very objective.
What about yourself?
Oh, I've had some both ways. I think that I've been treated with more objectivity than my father was by the press.
Well, he was a more controversial person.
Yes.
Well, Senator, I've enjoyed it very much.
The pleasure has been mine.
END OF INTERVIEW