The Cocking affair was an attempt in 1941 by Georgia governor

Eugene Talmadge Eugene Talmadge (September 23, 1884 – December 21, 1946) was an attorney and American politician who served three terms as the 67th governor of Georgia, from 1933 to 1937, and then again from 1941 to 1943. Elected to a fourth term in November ...

to exert direct control over the state's educational system, particularly through the firing of Professor Walter Cocking because of his support for

racial integration Racial integration, or simply integration, includes desegregation (the process of ending systematic racial segregation). In addition to desegregation, integration includes goals such as leveling barriers to association, creating equal opportun ...

, and the subsequent removal of members of the

Georgia Board of Regents The Georgia Board of Regents oversees the University System of Georgia as part of the state government of Georgia in the United States. The University System of Georgia is composed of all state public institutions of higher education in the state. ...

who disagreed with the decision. It has been made into an opera entitled ''

A Scholar Under Siege ''A Scholar Under Siege'' is an opera in two acts by contemporary American composer Michael Braz. Braz also wrote the English language libretto for the opera which was composed for the centenary of Georgia Southern University. It premiered on April ...

''.

Background

Governor Talmadge's first political interference was in 1935, when he supported a 1935 bill that would have given the governor additional control over funds appropriated to the Georgia Board of Regents, transferred the titles to all Board of Regents property to the state, and absorbed any trust funds or investments held by the university system. McMath, p.193 In addition to the obvious disadvantages for the university system, this would have made it difficult or impossible to fund building projects (such as the construction of a new gym at

Georgia Tech The Georgia Institute of Technology, commonly referred to as Georgia Tech or, in the state of Georgia, as Tech or The Institute, is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia. Established in 1885, it is part o ...

) as the state could not take on

Public Works Administration The Public Works Administration (PWA), part of the New Deal of 1933, was a large-scale public works construction agency in the United States headed by Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes. It was created by the National Industrial Reco ...

(PWA) loans. A compromise deal was reached; if the bill passed with the support of the regents, the state would provide funding to cover projects that would have been supported by PWA loans; however, Talmadge's effort to control the regents and the university system was relatively clear at the time. McMath, p.194

Firing

Talmadge fired Walter Cocking, who was dean of the

College of Education In the United States and Canada, a school of education (or college of education; ed school) is a division within a university that is devoted to scholarship in the field of education, which is an interdisciplinary branch of the social sciences en ...

at the

University of Georgia , mottoeng = "To teach, to serve, and to inquire into the nature of things.""To serve" was later added to the motto without changing the seal; the Latin motto directly translates as "To teach and to inquire into the nature of things." , establ ...

. Talmadge accused Cocking of championing

integration Integration may refer to: Biology * Multisensory integration * Path integration * Pre-integration complex, viral genetic material used to insert a viral genome into a host genome *DNA integration, by means of site-specific recombinase technolo ...

, in this case the admission of

African-American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American ...

students to historically all-white educational institutions. Talmadge declared that he would fire anyone who stood for "communism or racial equality".

Consequences

As a result of the firings, all Georgia universities lost their accreditation. This incident also contributed to Talmadge's loss in the subsequent election to

Ellis Arnall Ellis Gibbs Arnall (March 20, 1907December 13, 1992) was an American politician who served as the 69th Governor of Georgia from 1943 to 1947. A liberal Democrat, he helped lead efforts to abolish the poll tax and to reduce Georgia's voting age ...

References

Works cited

* {{cite book, first=Robert C., last=McMath, author2=Ronald H. Bayor , author3=James E. Brittain , author4=Lawrence Foster , author5=August W. Giebelhaus , author6=Germaine M. Reed , title=Engineering the New South: Georgia Tech 1885-1985, publisher=

University of Georgia Press The University of Georgia Press or UGA Press is the university press of the University of Georgia, a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Athens, Georgia. It is the oldest and largest publishing house in Georgia and ...

, location=Athens, GA, ref=McM

Background

Firing

Consequences

See also

References

Works cited

Further reading