George Corley Wallace Jr. (August 25, 1919 – September 13, 1998) was an American politician who served as the 45th governor of Alabama for four terms. A member of the Democratic Party, he is best remembered for his staunch segregationist and populist views. During his tenure, he promoted "industrial development, low taxes, and trade schools." Wallace sought the United States presidency as a Democrat three times, and once as an American Independent Party candidate, unsuccessfully each time. Wallace opposed desegregation and supported the policies of " Jim Crow" during the

Civil Rights Movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement throughout the Unite ...

, declaring in his 1963 inaugural address that he stood for "segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever". Born in

Clio, Alabama Clio is a city
in University of Alabama School of Law, and served in United States Army Air Corps during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. After the war, he won election to the Alabama House of Representatives, and served as a state judge. Wallace first sought the Democratic nomination in the 1958 Alabama gubernatorial election. Initially a moderate on racial issues, Wallace adopted a hard-line segregationist stance after losing the 1958 nomination. Wallace ran for governor again in 1962, and won the race. Seeking to stop the racial integration of the

University of Alabama The University of Alabama (informally known as Alabama, UA, or Bama) is a public research university in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Established in 1820 and opened to students in 1831, the University of Alabama is the oldest and largest of the publ ...

, Wallace earned national notoriety by standing in front of the entrance of the University of Alabama, blocking the path of black students. Wallace left office when his first term expired in 1967 due to term limits, but his wife, Lurleen Wallace, won the next election and succeeded him, with him as the ''de facto'' governor. Lurleen died of cancer in May 1968, ending Wallace's period of influence; her doctor had informed him of the cancer’s diagnosis in 1961, but Wallace did not tell his wife. Wallace challenged sitting president Lyndon B. Johnson in the 1964 Democratic presidential primaries, but Johnson prevailed in the race. In the 1968 presidential election, Wallace ran a third-party campaign in an attempt to force a contingent election in the

United States House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they ...

, thereby enhancing the political clout of segregationist Southern leaders. Wallace won five Southern states but failed to force a contingent election. he remains the most recent third-party candidate to receive pledged electoral college votes from any state. Wallace won election to the governorship again in 1970, and ran in the 1972 Democratic presidential primaries, having moderated his stance on segregation. His campaign effectively ended when he was shot in

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean t ...

by Arthur Bremer, and Wallace remained paralyzed below the waist for the rest of his life. Wallace won re-election as governor in 1974, and he once again unsuccessfully sought the Democratic presidential nomination in the 1976 Democratic presidential primaries. In the late 1970s, Wallace announced that he became a born-again Christian, and moderated his views on race, renouncing his past support for segregation. Wallace left office in 1979, but re-entered politics and won

election An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has operat ...

to a fourth, and final, term as governor in 1982. Wallace is the third longest-serving governor in U.S. history, having served 5,848 days in office.

Early life

Wallace, the first of four children, was born in

Clio In Greek mythology, Clio ( , ; el, Κλειώ), also spelled Kleio, is the muse of history, or in a few mythological accounts, the muse of lyre playing. Etymology Clio's name is etymologically derived from the Greek root κλέω/κλε ...

in Barbour County in southeastern Alabama, to George Corley Wallace and his wife, Mozelle (Smith). He was the third of five generations to bear the name "George Wallace". Since his parents disliked the designation "Junior", he was called "George C.", to distinguish him from his father, George, and his grandfather, a physician. Wallace's father left college to pursue a life of farming when

food prices Food prices refer to the average price level for food across countries, regions and on a global scale. Food prices have an impact on producers and consumers of food. Price levels depend on the food production process, including food marketing ...

were high during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

. When his father died in 1937, his mother had to sell their farmland to pay existing mortgages. Wallace was raised as a

Methodist Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's ...

. From age ten, Wallace was fascinated with politics. In 1935, he won a contest to serve as a page in the Alabama Senate, and confidently predicted that he would one day be governor. Wallace became a regionally successful boxer in high school, then went directly to law school in 1937 at the University of Alabama School of Law in Tuscaloosa. He was a member of the

Delta Chi Delta Chi () is an international Greek letter collegiate social fraternity formed on October 13, 1890, at Cornell University, initially as a professional fraternity for law students. On April 30, 1922, Delta Chi became a general membership soc ...

fraternity. It was at the University of Alabama that he crossed paths with Frank M. Johnson Jr., who was a much more liberal politician in relation to social issues and issues of race. Wallace also knew Chauncey Sparks, who became a conservative governor. These men had an effect on his personal politics reflecting ideologies of both leaders later during his time in office. He received a

Bachelor of Laws Bachelor of Laws ( la, Legum Baccalaureus; LL.B.) is an undergraduate law degree in the United Kingdom and most common law jurisdictions. Bachelor of Laws is also the name of the law degree awarded by universities in the People's Republic of Ch ...

degree in 1942. Early in 1943, Wallace was accepted for pilot training by the

United States Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

(USAAF). Soon afterwards Wallace contracted life-threatening

spinal meningitis Meningitis is acute or chronic inflammation of the protective membranes covering the brain and spinal cord, collectively called the meninges. The most common symptoms are fever, headache, and neck stiffness. Other symptoms include confusi ...

, but prompt medical attention with

sulfa drugs Sulfonamide is a functional group (a part of a molecule) that is the basis of several groups of drugs, which are called sulphonamides, sulfa drugs or sulpha drugs. The original antibacterial sulfonamides are synthetic (nonantibiotic) ant ...

saved his life. Left with partial hearing loss and permanent nerve damage, he was instead trained as a flight engineer. During 1945, as a member of a B-29 crew with 468th Bombardment Group, stationed in the Mariana Islands as part of the Twentieth Air Force, Wallace took part in

air raids on Japan Air raids conducted by Allied forces on Japan during World War II caused extensive destruction to the country's cities and killed between 241,000 and 900,000 people. During the first years of the Pacific War these attacks were limited to the ...

and reached the rank of staff sergeant. In mid-1945, Wallace received an early discharge on medical grounds, due to "severe anxiety", and a 10% disability pension for "psychoneurosis".Frederick, ''Stand Up for Alabama: Governor George Wallace'', 2007, p. 12. (The Twentieth Air Force was commanded by General Curtis LeMay, who was his running mate in the 1968 presidential race).

Racial attitude

Sources are mixed on Wallace's attitudes towards race, particularly African Americans. For instance, one source on Wallace's career as a judge reports: "every black attorney who argued a case in Wallace's ... courtroom was struck by his fairness .... But no one who knew Wallace well ever took seriously his earnest profession – uttered a thousand times after 1963 – that he was a segregationist, not a racist." A reporter covering state politics in 1961 observed that, while other Alabama politicians conversed primarily about women and Alabama football, for Wallace "it was race – race, race, race – and every time that I was closeted alone with him, that's all we talked about." Wallace's preoccupation with race was based on his belief that black Americans comprised a separate and inferior race. In a 1963 letter to a social studies teacher, Wallace stated they were inclined to criminality – especially "atrocious acts ... such as rape, assault and murder" – because of a high incidence of venereal disease. Desegregation, he wrote, would lead to "intermarriage ... and eventually our race will be deteriated (sic) to that of the mongrel complexity."

Early career

In 1938, at age 19, Wallace contributed to his grandfather's successful campaign for probate judge. Late in 1945, he was appointed as one of the assistant attorneys general of Alabama, and, in May 1946, he won his first election as a member to the Alabama House of Representatives. At the time, he was considered a moderate on racial issues. As a delegate to the 1948 Democratic National Convention, he did not join the Dixiecrat walkout at the convention, despite his opposition to U.S. President Harry S. Truman's proposed

civil rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life ...

program. Wallace considered it an infringement on states' rights. The Dixiecrats carried Alabama in the 1948 general election, having rallied behind Governor Strom Thurmond of South Carolina. In his 1963 inaugural speech as governor, Wallace excused his failure to walk out of the 1948 convention on political grounds. In 1952, he became the Circuit Judge of the Third Judicial Circuit in Alabama. Here he became known as "the fighting little judge", a nod to his past boxing association. He gained a reputation for fairness regardless of the race of the plaintiff. It was common practice at the time for judges in the area to refer to black lawyers by their first names, while their white colleagues were addressed formally as "Mister"; black lawyer J. L. Chestnut later said that "Judge George Wallace was the most liberal judge that I had ever practiced law in front of. He was the first judge in Alabama to call me 'Mister' in a courtroom." On the other hand, Wallace issued injunctions to prevent the removal of segregation signs in rail terminals, becoming the first Southern judge to do so. referencing Similarly, during efforts by civil rights organizations to expand voter registration of blacks, Wallace blocked federal efforts to review Barbour County voting lists. He was cited for criminal contempt of court in 1959. As judge, Wallace granted probation to some blacks, which may have cost him the 1958 gubernatorial election.

Failed run for governor

In 1958, Wallace ran in the Democratic primary for governor. Since the 1901 constitution's effective disfranchisement of the state's blacks, and most poor whites as well, the Democratic Party had been virtually the only party in Alabama. For all intents and purposes, the Democratic primary was the real contest at the state level. This was a political crossroads for Wallace. State Representative George C. Hawkins of Gadsden ran, but Wallace's main opponent was state attorney general John Malcolm Patterson, who ran with the support of the Ku Klux Klan, an organization Wallace had spoken against. Wallace was endorsed by the NAACP. Wallace lost the nomination by over 34,400 votes. After the election, aide Seymore Trammell recalled Wallace saying, "Seymore, you know why I lost that governor's race? ... I was outniggered by John Patterson. And I'll tell you here and now, I will never be outniggered again."Carter (1996, p. 2) notes that Wallace later denied a similar quotation that appeared in a 1968 biography by Marshall Frady: Well boys,' he said tightly as he snuffed out his cigar, 'no other son-of-a-bitch will ever out-nigger me again. The exact wording is a matter of historical dispute. Some sources quote Wallace as using the word "outsegged". In an extended note in "The Politics of Rage" (1995), p. 96 & 96fn, Carter notes the denial, but says two witnesses confirm the use of the racist language on Election Night, in addition to Seymore Trammell's recollection of Wallace using similar phrasing the next day in his presence. In the wake of his defeat, Wallace adopted a hard-line segregationist stance and used this stance to court the white vote in the next gubernatorial election in 1962. When a supporter asked why he started using racist messages, Wallace replied, "You know, I tried to talk about good roads and good schools and all these things that have been part of my career, and nobody listened. And then I began talking about niggers, and they stomped the floor."

Governor of Alabama

Segregation

In the 1962 Democratic primary, Wallace finished first, ahead of State Senator Ryan DeGraffenried Sr., and taking 35 percent of the vote. In the runoff, Wallace won the nomination with 55 percent of the vote. As no Republican filed to run, this all but assured Wallace of becoming the next governor. He won a crushing victory in the November general election, taking 96 percent of the vote. As noted above, Democratic dominance had been achieved by disenfranchising most blacks and many poor whites in the state for decades, which lasted until years after federal civil rights legislation was passed in 1964 and 1965. Wallace took the oath of office on January 14, 1963, standing on the gold star marking the spot where, nearly 102 years earlier, Jefferson Davis was sworn in as provisional president of the

Confederate States of America The Confederate States of America (CSA), commonly referred to as the Confederate States or the Confederacy was an unrecognized breakaway republic in the Southern United States that existed from February 8, 1861, to May 9, 1865. The Confeder ...

. In his inaugural speech, Wallace said: This sentence had been written by Wallace's new speechwriter, Ku Klux Klan leader Asa Earl Carter. In 1963, President John F. Kennedy's

administration Administration may refer to: Management of organizations * Management, the act of directing people towards accomplishing a goal ** Administrative Assistant, traditionally known as a Secretary, or also known as an administrative officer, admini ...

ordered the U.S. Army's 2nd Infantry Division from Fort Benning, Georgia to be prepared to enforce the racial integration of the

in Tuscaloosa. In a vain attempt to halt the enrollment of black students Vivian Malone and James Hood, Governor Wallace stood in front of

Foster Auditorium Foster Auditorium is a multi-purpose facility at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. It was built in 1939 as a Works Progress Administration project and has been used for Alabama basketball, women's sports (in the 1970s and 1980s) ...

at the

on June 11, 1963. This became known as the " Stand in the Schoolhouse Door". In September 1963, Wallace attempted to stop four black students from enrolling in four separate elementary schools in

Huntsville Huntsville is a city in Madison County, Limestone County, and Morgan County, Alabama, United States. It is the county seat of Madison County. Located in the Appalachian region of northern Alabama, Huntsville is the most populous city in th ...

. After intervention by a federal court in

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the We ...

, the four children were allowed to enter on September 9, becoming the first to integrate a primary or secondary school in Alabama. Wallace desperately wanted to preserve segregation. In his own words: "The President ohn F. Kennedywants us to surrender this state to

Martin Luther King Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...

and his group of pro-communists who have instituted these demonstrations." Wallace predicted, during a

Milwaukee, Wisconsin Milwaukee ( ), officially the City of Milwaukee, is both the most populous and most densely populated city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Milwaukee County. With a population of 577,222 at the 2020 census, Milwaukee i ...

speech on September 17, 1964, that the office-holding supporters of a civil rights bill would politically " bite the dust" by 1966 and 1968. The '' Encyclopædia Britannica'' characterized him not so much as a segregationist but more as a "populist" who pandered to the white majority of Alabama voters. It notes that his failed attempt at presidential politics created lessons that later influenced the populist candidacies of

Jimmy Carter James Earl Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he previously served as th ...

and Ronald Reagan. Jack Newfield wrote in 1971 that Wallace "recently has been sounding like

William Jennings Bryan William Jennings Bryan (March 19, 1860 – July 26, 1925) was an American lawyer, orator and politician. Beginning in 1896, he emerged as a dominant force in the History of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, running ...

as he attacked concentrated wealth in his speeches".

Economics and education

The principal achievement of Wallace's first term was an innovation in Alabama industrial development that several other states later copied: he was the first Southern governor to travel to corporate headquarters in northern states to offer tax abatements and other incentives to companies willing to locate plants in Alabama. He also initiated a

community college A community college is a type of educational institution. The term can have different meanings in different countries: many community colleges have an "open enrollment" for students who have graduated from high school (also known as senior s ...

system that has now spread throughout the state, preparing many students to complete four-year degrees at Auburn University, UAB, or the

. Wallace Community College ( Dothan), is named for his father. Wallace Community College Selma ( Selma), and Wallace State Community College ( Hanceville) are named for him. Lurleen B. Wallace Community College in

Andalusia Andalusia (, ; es, Andalucía ) is the southernmost autonomous community in Peninsular Spain. It is the most populous and the second-largest autonomous community in the country. It is officially recognised as a "historical nationality". The ...

is named for Wallace's first wife,

Lurleen Burns Wallace Lurleen Burns Wallace (born Lurleen Brigham Burns; September 19, 1926 – May 7, 1968) was the 46th governor of Alabama for 15 months from January 1967 until her death. She was the first wife of Alabama governor George Wallace, whom she succeeded ...

. The University of South Alabama, a new state university in Mobile, was chartered in 1963 during Wallace's first year in office as governor.

1964 Democratic presidential primaries

On November 15–20, 1963, in

Dallas Dallas () is the third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 million people. It is the largest city in and seat of Dallas County ...

, Wallace announced his intention to oppose the incumbent president, John F. Kennedy, for the 1964 Democratic presidential nomination. Days later, also in Dallas, Kennedy was assassinated, and Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson succeeded him as president. Building upon his notoriety after the University of Alabama controversy, Wallace entered the Democratic primaries in 1964 on the advice of a public relations expert from Wisconsin. Wallace campaigned strongly by expressing his opposition to integration and a tough approach on crime. In Democratic

primaries Primary elections, or direct primary are a voting process by which voters can indicate their preference for their party's candidate, or a candidate in general, in an upcoming general election, local election, or by-election. Depending on the c ...

in Wisconsin, Indiana, and Maryland, Wallace garnered at least a third of the vote running against three Johnson-designated surrogates. Wallace was known for stirring crowds with his oratory. '' The Huntsville Times'' interviewed Bill Jones, Wallace's first press secretary, who recounted "a particularly fiery speech in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1964 that scared even Wallace, here heangrily shouted to a crowd of 1,000 people that 'little Pinkos' were 'running around outside' protesting his visit, and continued, after thunderous applause, saying, 'When you and I start marching and demonstrating and carrying signs, we will close every highway in the country.' The audience leaped to its feet and headed for the exit", Jones said, "It shook Wallace. He quickly moved to calm them down." At graduation exercises in the spring of 1964 at Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina, Wallace received an honorary doctorate. At the commencement, Bob Jones Jr., read the following citation as a tribute to Wallace:

1964 unpledged elector slate

In 1964, Alabama Republicans stood to benefit from the unintended consequences of two developments: (1) Governor Wallace vacating the race for the Democratic presidential nomination against President Johnson, and (2) the designation of unpledged Democratic electors in Alabama, in effect removing President Johnson from the general election ballot. Prior to the

1964 Republican National Convention The 1964 Republican National Convention took place in the Cow Palace, Daly City, California, from July 13 to July 16, 1964. Before 1964, there had been only one national Republican convention on the West Coast, the 1956 Republican National Convent ...

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17t ...

, Wallace and his aides Bill Jones and Seymore Trammell met in the Jefferson Davis Hotel in Montgomery with Alabama Republican leader

James D. Martin James Douglas Martin (September 1, 1918 – October 30, 2017) was an American politician. Martin was born in Tarrant, Alabama. He served as a member for the 7th district of Alabama of the United States House of Representatives from 1965 to ...

, who had narrowly lost the U.S. Senate election in 1962 to

J. Lister Hill Joseph Lister Hill (December 29, 1894 – December 20, 1984) was an American politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he represented Alabama in the U.S. Congress for more than forty-five years, as both a U.S. Representative (1923–1938) ...

. Wallace and his aides sought to determine if

Barry M. Goldwater Barry Morris Goldwater (January 2, 1909 – May 29, 1998) was an American politician and United States Air Force officer who was a five-term U.S. Senator from Arizona (1953–1965, 1969–1987) and the Republican Party nominee for preside ...

, the forthcoming Republican presidential nominee who as a senator from

Arizona Arizona ( ; nv, Hoozdo Hahoodzo ; ood, Alĭ ṣonak ) is a state in the Southwestern United States. It is the 6th largest and the 14th most populous of the 50 states. Its capital and largest city is Phoenix. Arizona is part of the Fou ...

had voted against the Civil Rights Act of 1964 on libertarian and constitutional grounds, would advocate repeal of the law, particularly the public accommodations and equal employment sections. Bill Jones indicated that Wallace agreed with Goldwater's anti-communist stance but opposed the Republican's proposal to make Social Security a voluntary program. Jones stressed that Wallace had sacrificed his own presidential aspirations that year to allow a direct Republican challenge to President Johnson. It was later disclosed that Wallace proposed at the meeting with Martin to switch parties if he could be named as Goldwater's running-mate, a designation later given to U.S. Representative

William E. Miller William Edward Miller (March 22, 1914 – June 24, 1983) was an American politician who served in the United States House of Representatives from New York as a Republican. During the 1964 presidential election, he was the Republican nominee fo ...

of New York. Goldwater reportedly rejected the overture because he considered Wallace to be a racist. The unpledged electors in Alabama included the future U.S. senator, James Allen, then the lieutenant governor, and the subsequent Governor

Albert Brewer Albert Preston Brewer (October 26, 1928 – January 2, 2017) was an American politician who was the 47th governor of Alabama from 1968 to 1971. Early life Albert Preston Brewer was born on October 26, 1928, in Bethel Springs, Tennessee, Un ...

, then the state House Speaker. National Democrats balked over Johnson's exclusion from the ballot, but most supported the unpledged slate, which competed directly with the Republican electors. As '' The Tuscaloosa News'' explained, loyalist electors would have offered a clearer choice to voters than did the unpledged slate. The 1964 Republican electors were the first since

Reconstruction Reconstruction may refer to: Politics, history, and sociology * Reconstruction (law), the transfer of a company's (or several companies') business to a new company *''Perestroika'' (Russian for "reconstruction"), a late 20th century Soviet Unio ...

to prevail in Alabama. The Goldwater-Miller slate received 479,085 votes (69.5 percent) to the unpledged electors' 209,848 (30.5 percent). The Republican tide also brought to victory five Republican members of the

, including

William Louis Dickinson William Louis "Bill" Dickinson (June 5, 1925 – March 31, 2008), was an American politician. A member of the Republican Party, Dickinson served in the United States House of Representatives for Alabama's 2nd congressional district from 1965 to ...

, who held the Montgomery-based district seat until 1993, and James D. Martin, the Gadsden oil products dealer who defeated then State Senator George C. Hawkins for the U.S. House seat formerly held by

Carl Elliott Carl Atwood Elliott (December 20, 1913 – January 9, 1999) was a U.S. representative from the U.S. state of Alabama. He was elected to eight consecutive terms, having served from 1949 to 1965. Background Elliott was born in rural Frankl ...

. Hardly yet sworn into the U.S. House, Martin already had his eyes on Wallace's own position as governor.

First Gentleman of Alabama

Term limits in the

Alabama Constitution The Constitution of the State of Alabama is the basic governing document of the U.S. state of Alabama. It was adopted in 2022 and is Alabama's seventh constitution. History Alabama has had seven constitutions to date, all but the current one est ...

prevented Wallace from seeking a second term in 1966. Therefore, Wallace offered his wife, Lurleen Wallace, as a surrogate candidate for governor. In the Democratic primary, she defeated two former governors, Jim Folsom and John M. Patterson, Attorney General Richmond Flowers Sr., and former U.S. Representative

. Largely through the work of Wallace's supporters, the Alabama restriction on gubernatorial succession was later modified to allow two consecutive terms. Wallace defended his wife's proxy candidacy. He felt somewhat vindicated when Republicans in

Idaho Idaho ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Monta ...

denied renomination in 1966 to

Governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

Robert E. Smylie, author of the article entitled "Why I Feel Sorry for Lurleen Wallace". In his memoirs, Wallace recounts his wife's ability to "charm crowds" and cast-off invective: "I was immensely proud of her, and it didn't hurt a bit to take a back seat to her in vote-getting ability." Wallace rebuffed critics who claimed that he had "dragooned" his wife into the race. "She loved every minute of being governor the same way ... that Mrs. (Margaret) Smith loves being senator." During the 1966 campaign, George Wallace signed state legislation to nullify desegregation guidelines between Alabama cities and counties and the former United States Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. Wallace claimed that the law would thwart the national government from intervening in schools. Critics denounced Wallace's "political trickery" and expressed alarm at the potential forfeiture of federal funds. Republican gubernatorial candidate

accused the Democrats of "playing politics with your children" and "neglecting academic excellence". Martin also opposed the desegregation guidelines and had sponsored a U.S. House amendment to forbid the placement of students and teachers on the basis of racial quotas. He predicted that Wallace's legislation would propel the issuance of a court order compelling immediate and total desegregation in all public schools. He also compared the new Alabama law to "another two-and-a-half-minute stand in the schoolhouse door". Lurleen Wallace defeated Martin in the general election on November 8, 1966. She was inaugurated in January 1967, but on May 7, 1968, she died in office of cancer at the age of 41, amid her husband's ongoing second presidential campaign.Carter (1995), pp. 310–312, 317–320. On her death, she was succeeded by Lieutenant Governor

, who had run without Republican opposition amid the Wallace–Martin races. George Wallace's influence in state government thus subsided until his next bid for election in his own right in 1970. He was "first gentleman" for less than a year and a half.

1968 third-party presidential run

Planning for Wallace's 1968 presidential campaign began with a strategy session on the evening of the March 1967 inauguration of Lurleen Wallace. The meeting featured prominent white supremacists and anti-Semites, including: Asa Carter; William Simmons of the White Citizens' Council; Dallas County Sheriff Jim Clark; former Mississippi Gov. Ross Barnett; Leander Perez, a fervent Louisiana segregationist and anti-Semite; Kent Courtney, a John Bircher; and "a representative sent by Willis Carto, head of the Liberty Lobby and publisher of the anti-Semitic magazine '' American Mercury.''" ElectoralCollege1968

Wallace ran for president in the 1968 election as the American Independent Party candidate, with Curtis LeMay as his candidate for vice president. Wallace hoped to force the House of Representatives to decide the election with one vote per state if he could obtain sufficient electoral votes to make him a power broker. Wallace hoped that Southern states could use their clout to end federal efforts at desegregation. His platform contained generous increases for beneficiaries of Social Security and Medicare. Wallace's foreign policy positions set him apart from the other candidates in the field. "If the Vietnam War was not winnable within 90 days of his taking office, Wallace pledged an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops ... Wallace described foreign aid as money 'poured down a rat hole' and demanded that European and Asian allies pay more for their defense." Kauffman, Bill (May 19, 2008
When the Left Was Right
''

The American Conservative ''The American Conservative'' (''TAC'') is a magazine published by the American Ideas Institute which was founded in 2002. Originally published twice a month, it was reduced to monthly publication in August 2009, and since February 2013, it has ...

Richard Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a representative and senator from California and was ...

feared that Wallace might split the conservative vote and allow the Democratic nominee, Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey, to prevail. He mostly attracted the

Southern Democrats Southern Democrats, historically sometimes known colloquially as Dixiecrats, are members of the U.S. Democratic Party who reside in the Southern United States. Southern Democrats were generally much more conservative than Northern Democrats wi ...

who were dissatisfied with the

1964 Civil Rights Act The Civil Rights Act of 1964 () is a landmark civil rights and labor law in the United States that outlaws discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. It prohibits unequal application of voter registration requi ...

, and the

1965 Voting Rights Act The suffrage, Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of Federal government of the United States, federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. It was signed into law by President of the United ...

that were signed earlier in the decade by President Lyndon B. Johnson. However, some Democrats feared Wallace's appeal to organized blue-collar workers would damage Humphrey in Northern states such as Ohio, New Jersey and Michigan. Wallace ran a " law and order" campaign similar to Nixon's, further worrying Republicans. In Wallace's 1998 obituary, ''The Huntsville Times'' political editor John Anderson summarized the impact from the 1968 campaign: "His startling appeal to millions of alienated white voters was not lost on Richard Nixon and other Republican strategists. First Nixon, then Ronald Reagan, and finally George Herbert Walker Bush successfully adopted toned-down versions of Wallace's anti-busing, anti-federal government platform to pry low- and middle-income whites from the Democratic New Deal coalition." Dan Carter, a professor of history at

Emory University Emory University is a private research university in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1836 as "Emory College" by the Methodist Episcopal Church and named in honor of Methodist bishop John Emory, Emory is the second-oldest private institution of ...

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,7 ...

, added: "George Wallace laid the foundation for the dominance of the Republican Party in American society through the manipulation of racial and social issues in the 1960s and 1970s. He was the master teacher, and Richard Nixon and the Republican leadership that followed were his students."Carter, Dan, professor of history at Emory University, quoted in Wallace considered Happy Chandler, the former baseball commissioner, two-term former

governor of Kentucky The governor of the Commonwealth of Kentucky is the head of government of Kentucky. Sixty-two men and one woman have served as governor of Kentucky. The governor's term is four years in length; since 1992, incumbents have been able to seek re-e ...

and former Senator from Kentucky, as his running mate in his 1968 campaign as a third-party candidate; as one of Wallace's aides put it, "We have all the nuts in the country; we could get some decent people–-you working one side of the street and he working the other side." Wallace invited Chandler, but when the press published the prospect, Wallace's supporters objected; Chandler had supported the hiring of Jackie Robinson by the Brooklyn Dodgers. Wallace retracted the invitation, and (after considering Kentucky Fried Chicken founder Colonel Harland Sanders) chose former

Air Force An air force – in the broadest sense – is the national military branch that primarily conducts aerial warfare. More specifically, it is the branch of a nation's armed services that is responsible for aerial warfare as distinct from an ...

General Curtis LeMay of

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

. LeMay was considered instrumental in the establishment in 1947 of the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Si ...

and an expert in military affairs. His four-star military rank, experience at

Strategic Air Command Strategic Air Command (SAC) was both a United States Department of Defense Specified Command and a United States Air Force (USAF) Major Command responsible for command and control of the strategic bomber and intercontinental ballistic missile ...

and presence advising President Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis were considered foreign-policy assets to the Wallace campaign. By 1968, LeMay had retired and was serving as chairman of the board of an electronics company, but the company threatened to dismiss him if he took a leave of absence to run for vice president. To keep LeMay on the ticket, Wallace backer and Texas oil tycoon

H. L. Hunt Haroldson Lafayette Hunt Jr. (February 17, 1889 – November 29, 1974) was an American oil tycoon. By trading poker winnings for oil rights according to legend, but more likely through money he gained from successful speculation in oil leases, h ...

set up a million-dollar fund to reimburse LeMay for any income lost in the campaign. Campaign aides tried to persuade LeMay to avoid questions relating to nuclear weapons, but when asked if he thought their use was necessary to win the Vietnam War, he first said that America could win in Vietnam without them. However, he alarmed the audience by further commenting, "we mericanshave a phobia about nuclear weapons. I think there may be times when it would be most efficient to use nuclear weapons." The "politically tone-deaf" LeMay became a drag on Wallace's candidacy for the remainder of the campaign. In 1968, Wallace pledged that "If some anarchist lies down in front of my automobile, it will be the last automobile he will ever lie down in front of" and asserted that the only

four letter words ''Four Letter Words'' (also known as ''Climax'') is a 2000 American comedy film by director Sean Baker, in his directorial debut. Plot A study of the post-adolescent male psyche, the film gives an often humorous but raw unadulterated look at ...

that hippies did not know were "w-o-r-k" and "s-o-a-p." Responding to criticism of the former comment, Wallace later elaborated that he meant such a protester would be punished under the law, not run over. This type of rhetoric became famous. He accused Humphrey and Nixon of wanting to radically desegregate the South. Wallace said, "There's not a dime's worth of difference between the Republicans and Democrats", a campaign slogan that he had first perfected when Lurleen Wallace defeated James D. Martin. Major media outlets observed the support Wallace received from extremist groups such as White Citizens' Councils. It has been noted that members of such groups had permeated the Wallace campaign by 1968 and, while Wallace did not openly seek their support, nor did he refuse it. Indeed, at least one case has been documented of the pro-Nazi and white supremacist Liberty Lobby distributing a pro-Wallace pamphlet entitled "Stand up for America" despite the campaign's denial of such a connection. Unlike Strom Thurmond in 1948, Wallace generally avoided race-related discussions. He mostly criticized hippies and "pointy-headed intellectuals". He denied he was racist, saying once, "I've never made a racist speech in my life." While Wallace carried five Southern states, won almost ten million popular votes and 46 electoral votes, Nixon received 301 electoral votes, more than required to win the election. Wallace remains the last non-Democratic, non-Republican candidate to win any pledged electoral votes. Wallace also received the vote of one

North Carolina North Carolina () is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 28th largest and List of states and territories of the United ...

elector who had been pledged to Nixon. Many found Wallace an entertaining campaigner. To " hippies" who called him a fascist, he replied, "I was killing fascists when you punks were in diapers." Another notable quip: "They're building a bridge over the Potomac for all the white liberals fleeing to

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are ...

." Wallace decried the

United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...

's binding opinion in '' Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education'', which ordered immediate desegregation of Southern schools – he said the new Burger court was "no better than the Warren court" and called the justices "limousine hypocrites".

Second term as governor

In 1970, Wallace sought the Democratic nomination against incumbent Governor

, who was the first gubernatorial candidate since Reconstruction to seek African American voter support. Although in the 1966 gubernatorial election then state Attorney General Richmond Flowers championed civil rights for all and, with the support of most of Alabama's black voters, finished second in the Democratic primary. Brewer unveiled a progressive platform and worked to build an alliance between blacks and the white working class. Of Wallace's out-of-state trips, Brewer said, "Alabama needs a full-time governor!" Flowers, Steve, "Steve Flowers Inside the Statehouse", October 12, 2005. In the primary, Brewer received the most votes but failed to win a majority, which triggered a runoff election. In what later U.S. President

called "one of the most racist campaigns in modern southern political history", Wallace aired television advertising with slogans such as "Do you want the black bloc electing your governor?" and circulated an ad showing a white girl surrounded by seven black boys, with the slogan "Wake Up Alabama! Blacks vow to take over Alabama." Wallace slurred Brewer, whom he called " Sissy Britches", and his family.Rogers, 576. In the runoff, Wallace narrowly won the Democratic nomination and won the general election in a landslide. Though Wallace had promised not to run for president a third time, the day after the election, he flew to Wisconsin to campaign for the upcoming 1972 United States presidential election. Wallace, whose presidential ambitions would have been destroyed by a defeat for governor, has been said to have run "one of the nastiest campaigns in state history", using racist rhetoric while proposing few new ideas.

1972 Democratic presidential primaries and assassination attempt

United States Democratic presidential primaries, 1972 by state

On January 13, 1972, Wallace declared himself a Democratic candidate. The field included Senator George McGovern, 1968 nominee and former U.S. vice president

Hubert Humphrey Hubert Horatio Humphrey Jr. (May 27, 1911 – January 13, 1978) was an American pharmacist and politician who served as the 38th vice president of the United States from 1965 to 1969. He twice served in the United States Senate, representing ...

, and nine other Democratic opponents, including John V. Lindsay, the liberal mayor of New York City, who had

switched Switched may refer to: * Switched (band) Switched (previously depicted as Sw1tched) was a nu metal band from Cleveland, Ohio. History Forming in 1999 as Sw1tch, the band played shows around Ohio and released a demo entitled ''Fuckin' Demo''. T ...

from Republican affiliation to enter the Democratic presidential primaries. Wallace announced that he no longer supported segregation and had always been a "moderate" on racial matters. This position was an echo of Nixon, who in 1969 had instituted the first affirmative action program, the

Philadelphia Plan The Revised Philadelphia Plan, often called the Philadelphia Plan, required government contractors in Philadelphia to hire minority workers, under the authority of Executive Order 11246. Declared illegal in 1968, a revised version was successfull ...

that established goals and timetables. However, Wallace (similarly to Nixon) expressed continued opposition to desegregation busing. For the next four months, Wallace's campaign proceeded well. In

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and ...

's primary, Wallace carried every county to win 42% of the vote. On May 15, 1972, he was shot five times by Arthur Bremer while campaigning at the Laurel Shopping Center in Laurel, Maryland, at a time when he was receiving high ratings in national opinion polls. Bremer was seen at a Wallace rally in Wheaton, Maryland, earlier that day and two days earlier at a rally in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Wallace was hit in the abdomen and chest, and one of the bullets lodged in Wallace's spinal column, leaving him paralyzed from the waist down for the rest of his life. A five-hour operation was needed that evening, and Wallace had to receive several units of blood to survive. Three others who were wounded in the shooting also survived. The shooting and Wallace's subsequent injuries put an effective end to his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. The assassination attempt was caught on film. Bremer's diary, ''

An Assassin's Diary ''An Assassin's Diary'' () is a book written by Arthur Bremer and Harding Lemay and released in 1973. It was based on part of the diary of Bremer, the would-be assassin of Alabama governor George Wallace. Bremer shot Wallace on May 15, 1972, at th ...

'', published after his arrest, shows he was motivated in the assassination attempt by a desire for fame, not by political ideology. He had considered President Nixon an earlier target. He was convicted at trial. On August 4, 1972, Bremer was sentenced to 63 years in prison, later reduced to 53 years. Bremer served 35 years and was released on parole on November 9, 2007. CBS News correspondent David Dick won an Emmy Award for his coverage of the attempt on Wallace's life. Following the assassination attempt, Wallace was visited at the hospital by Democratic Representative and presidential primary rival Shirley Chisholm, a representative from Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. At the time, she was the nation's only African-American female member of Congress. Despite their ideological differences and the opposition of Chisholm's constituents, Chisholm felt visiting Wallace was the humane thing to do. Other people to visit Wallace in hospital were President Nixon, Vice President Spiro Agnew, and presidential primary rivals Hubert Humphrey, George McGovern, and Ted Kennedy. He also received telegrams from former President Lyndon Johnson, California governor Ronald Reagan and Pope Paul VI. After the shooting, Wallace won primaries in Maryland and Michigan, but his near assassination effectively ended his campaign. From his wheelchair, Wallace spoke on July 11, 1972, at the Democratic National Convention in Miami Beach, Florida. Since Wallace was out of Alabama for more than 20 days while he was recovering in Holy Cross Hospital in Silver Spring, Maryland, the state constitution required Lieutenant Governor

Jere Beasley Jere Locke Beasley (born December 12, 1935) is an American attorney and politician; he served as acting governor of Alabama from June 5 to July 7, 1972. His law firm has been noted nationally for winning major awards for its clients; among them ...

to serve as acting governor from June 5 until Wallace's return to

Alabama (We dare defend our rights) , anthem = " Alabama" , image_map = Alabama in United States.svg , seat = Montgomery , LargestCity = Huntsville , LargestCounty = Baldwin County , LargestMetro = Greater Birmingham , area_total_km2 = 135,7 ...

on July 7. Wallace resumed his gubernatorial duties and easily won the 1974 primary and general election, when he defeated Republican State Senator Elvin McCary, a real estate developer from Anniston, who received less than 15% of the ballots cast. In 1992, when asked to comment on the 20th anniversary of his attempted assassination, Wallace replied, "I've had 20 years of pain."

1976 Democratic presidential primaries

Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries_results,_1976

In November 1975, Wallace announced his fourth bid for the presidency, again participating in the Democratic presidential primaries. Wallace's campaign was plagued by voter concern about his health as well as the media use of images that portrayed him as nearly helpless. His supporters complained that such coverage was motivated by bias, citing the discretion used in coverage of Franklin D. Roosevelt's paralysis, before television became commercially available. In the southern primaries and caucuses, Wallace carried only Mississippi, South Carolina and his home state of Alabama. If the popular vote in all primaries and caucuses were combined, Wallace would have placed third behind former Georgia governor

and California governor Jerry Brown. After the primaries were completed, and he had lost several Southern primaries to Carter, Wallace left the race in June 1976. He eventually endorsed Carter, who defeated Republican incumbent Gerald Ford.

Final term as governor

In the late 1970s, Wallace announced that he was a born-again Christian and apologized to black civil rights leaders for his past actions as a segregationist. He said that while he had once sought power and glory, he realized he needed to seek love and forgiveness.According to Carter (1995, pp. 236–37), "But no one who knew Wallace well ever took seriously his earnest profession – uttered a thousand times after 1963 – that he ad beena segregationist, not a racist. ... Wallace, like most white southerners of his generation, adgenuinely believed blacks to be a separate, inferior race." In 1979, Wallace said of his stand in the schoolhouse door: "I was wrong. Those days are over, and they ought to be over."Edwards, George C., ''Government in America: people, politics, and policy''(2009), Pearson Education, 80. He publicly asked for forgiveness from black Americans. In the 1982 Alabama gubernatorial Democratic primary, Wallace's main opponents were Lieutenant Governor George McMillan and Alabama House Speaker

Joe McCorquodale Joseph Charles McCorquodale, Jr. (December 2, 1920 – April 17, 2017) was a United States politician from Alabama, who served as the Speaker of the Alabama House of Representatives and unsuccessfully ran for Governor on the basis of the "McCorq ...

. In the primary, McCorquodale was eliminated, and the vote went to a runoff, with Wallace holding a slight edge over McMillan. Wallace won the Democratic nomination by a margin of 51 to 49 percent. In the general election, his opponent was Montgomery Republican Mayor

Emory Folmar Emory McCord Folmar (June 3, 1930 – November 11, 2011) was an American politician who served as the mayor of Montgomery, Alabama, from 1977 to 1999. Although the mayor's office is nonpartisan, Folmar was known to be a Republican. Back ...

. Polling experts at first thought the 1982 election was the best chance since Reconstruction for a Republican to be elected as governor of Alabama. Ultimately, though, it was Wallace, not Folmar, who claimed victory. During Wallace's final term as governor (1983–1987) he appointed a record number of black Americans to state positions, including, for the first time, two as members in the same cabinet. On April 2, 1986, Wallace announced at a press conference in Montgomery that he would not run for a fifth term as Governor of Alabama, and would retire from public life after leaving the governor's mansion in January 1987. Wallace achieved four gubernatorial terms across three decades, totaling 16 years in office.

Marriages and children

Wallace married Lurleen Brigham Burns on May 22, 1943. The couple had four children together: Bobbi Jo (1944) Parsons, Peggy Sue (1950) Kennedy,

George III George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 173829 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until the union of the two kingdoms on 1 January 1801, after which he was King of the United Kingdom of Great Br ...

, known as George Junior (1951), and Janie Lee (1961) Dye, who was named after

Robert E. Lee Robert Edward Lee (January 19, 1807 – October 12, 1870) was a Confederate general during the American Civil War, towards the end of which he was appointed the overall commander of the Confederate States Army. He led the Army of Nor ...

. Lurleen Wallace was the first woman to be elected governor of Alabama, which she did as a stand-in for her husband, who was barred from serving another term. In 1961, in keeping with the practice of many at the time to shield patients from discussion of cancer, which was greatly feared, Wallace had withheld information from her that a uterine biopsy had found possibly precancerous cells. After Lurleen's death in 1968, the couple's younger children, aged 18, 16, and 6, were sent to live with family members and friends for care (their eldest daughter had already married and left home). Their son, commonly called George Wallace Jr., is a Democrat-turned-Republican formerly active in Alabama politics. He was twice elected state treasurer as a Democrat, and twice elected to the Alabama Public Service Commission. He lost a race in 2006 for the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor. In 2010, Wallace Jr. failed by a wide margin to win the Republican nod to regain his former position as state treasurer. On January 4, 1971, Wallace wed the former Cornelia Ellis Snively (1939–2009), a niece of former Alabama governor Jim Folsom, known as "Big Jim". "C'nelia" had been a performer and was nicknamed "the Jackie Kennedy of the rednecks." The couple had a bitter divorce in 1978. A few months after that divorce, Cornelia told ''Parade'' magazine, "I don't believe George needs a family. He just needs an audience. The family as audience wasn't enough for his ego." Snively died at the age of 69 on January 8, 2009. On September 9, 1981, Wallace married Lisa Taylor, a

country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, ...

singer; they divorced in 1987. Peggy was 12 years old when her father ran successfully for governor. She has shared that she was not treated nicely out in public due to her father's segregationist views. Some people would not shake her hand because of her last name. She would go to school wanting to befriend the black students, but she assumed that they would not like her because of what her father had done.

Final years and death

In a 1995 interview, Wallace said that he planned to vote for Republican Bob Dole in the 1996 presidential election, commenting, "He's a good man. His wife is a born-again Christian woman and I believe he is, too." He also revealed that he had voted for George H. W. Bush, another Republican, in 1992. His son, George Wallace Jr., officially switched from Democrat to Republican that same year. Wallace himself declined to identify as either a Republican or a Democrat. But he added, "The state is slowly going Republican because of Clinton being so liberal." In his later years, Wallace grew deaf and developed

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a long-term degenerative disorder of the central nervous system that mainly affects the motor system. The symptoms usually emerge slowly, and as the disease worsens, non-motor symptoms beco ...

. At a restaurant a few blocks from the State Capitol, Wallace became something of a fixture. In constant pain, he was surrounded by an entourage of old friends and visiting well-wishers and continued this ritual until a few weeks before his death. Wallace died of septic shock from a bacterial infection in Jackson Hospital in Montgomery on September 13, 1998. He had respiratory problems in addition to complications from his gunshot spinal injury. His grave is located at Greenwood Cemetery, in Montgomery.

Legacy and honors

With four failed runs for president, Wallace was unsuccessful in national politics. However, his impact on American politics was enormous and earned him the appellation "the most influential loser" in 20th century American politics, according to biographers

Dan T. Carter Dan T. Carter is an American historian. Life Carter graduated from University of South Carolina, University of Wisconsin, and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, with a Ph.D. in 1967. He taught at the University of Maryland, and the Un ...

and Stephan Lesher. The George Wallace Tunnel on Interstate 10 is named in his honor. In a two-part documentary, Buchanan stated that he had never gotten credit for being the figure he was and having influenced "Nixon and Agnew, the Reagan movement, the Buchanan movement, the Perot movement." Wallace was the subject of a documentary, ''George Wallace: Settin' the Woods on Fire'' (2000), shown by PBS on ''The American Experience''. Web site for the PBS documentary, including a complete transcript, references to other Wallace information, and tools for teachers. It was funded in part by the

National Endowment for the Humanities The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...

. Over 50 songs have been released about or making reference to George Wallace. The TNT cable network produced a movie, '' George Wallace'' (1997), directed by John Frankenheimer and starring Gary Sinise. Sinise received an Emmy Award for his performance during a ceremony held the day Wallace died. In the 2014 film '' Selma'', which was set during the Civil Rights Movement, which then-Governor Wallace publicly opposed, Wallace was portrayed by actor Tim Roth. Three community colleges in Alabama are named for Wallace: Wallace Community College, Wallace Community College Selma, and Wallace State Community College. Lurleen B. Wallace Community College is named for his wife. In 2020, amidst a change in public opinion, many Alabama universities were pushed to rename campus buildings that were originally named after Wallace. This included, but was not limited to, the University of Montevallo and Auburn University. The University of Montevallo has been unsuccessful in renaming the George C. Wallace Speech and Hearing Center because the building was named via Act 110 by the Alabama Legislature in 1975.

Footnotes

Notes

References

Bibliography

External links

Governor Wallace's Schoolhouse Door speech
archived at The University of Alabama
George Wallace article
at the ''Encyclopedia of Alabama''

– ''Daily Telegraph'' obituary

fro
Oral Histories of the American South
* Caught on Tape: The White House Reaction to the Shooting of Alabama Governor and Democratic Presidential Candidate George Wallace from History's News Network: http://hnn.us/articles/45104.html
''George Wallace: Settin' the Woods on Fire''
PBS '' American Experience'' documentary, including complete transcript, teacher tools and links
1963 gubernatorial inauguration address

Cornelia Wallace's Obituary
on ''

Decatur Daily ''The Decatur Daily'' is a daily (five days a week) newspaper serving Decatur, Alabama and the Tennessee Valley in the North Alabama area of the United States. As of September 30, 2006, it had an average daily circulation of 20,824 and a Sunday ...

''
Political Graveyard
* *
"George Wallace, Presidential Contender"
from C-SPAN's ''

The Contenders ''The Contenders'' is a 14-program series that was produced and aired by C-SPAN in the fall of 2011. It looked at the lives and careers of 14 candidates for the presidency of the United States The president of the United States (POTUS) i ...

''
Speech by George Wallace given on March 16, 1970.
Audio recording fro
The University of Alabama's Emphasis Symposium on Contemporary Issues

Footage of campaign speech given by George Wallace
on May 1, 1964 at Ball State Teachers College in Muncie, Indiana
Alabama Needs "The Little Judge" – 1960/1961 Pro-Segregation Comic Book commissioned directly by George Wallace during his campaign for Governor of Alabama.
* * * Meeting

Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977), or simply Elvis, was an American singer and actor. Dubbed the " King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century. His ener ...

with his family backstage before Elvis's concert at the Garrett Coliseum in Montgomery, AL on March 6, 1974. http://www.elvis-collectors.com/candid-central/wallace74.html
Testimony from Hosea Williams, John Lewis, and Amelia Boynton et al. v. Honorable George C. Wallace, Governor of Alabama et al.
from the

National Archives and Records Administration The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an " independent federal agency of the United States government within the executive branch", charged with the preservation and documentation of government and historical records. It ...

, - , - , - , - , - , - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Wallace, George 1919 births 1998 deaths 20th-century American lawyers 20th-century American politicians Alabama lawyers Alabama state court judges American anti-communists American Independent Party presidential nominees American male boxers American politicians with disabilities American segregationists American shooting survivors American United Methodists American white supremacists Candidates in the 1964 United States presidential election Candidates in the 1968 United States presidential election Candidates in the 1972 United States presidential election Candidates in the 1976 United States presidential election Neurological disease deaths in Alabama Deaths from Parkinson's disease Deaths from sepsis Democratic Party governors of Alabama First Ladies and Gentlemen of Alabama Infectious disease deaths in Alabama Democratic Party members of the Alabama House of Representatives Military personnel from Alabama People from Clio, Alabama Politicians with paraplegia Right-wing populism in the United States School segregation in the United States United States Army Air Forces personnel of World War II United States Army Air Forces non-commissioned officers University of Alabama School of Law alumni Wallace family of Alabama