Lester Maddox
Lester Garfield Maddox (
September 30,
1915 â€"
June 25,
2003) was an
American Democratic Party politician who was
governor of the
U.S. state of
Georgia from
1967 to
1971. He initially came to prominence as a staunch
segregationist but, like many Southern Democrats, he moderated his positions somewhat when it became clear that the gains of the civil rights movement were not going to be rolled back by political means, peaceful or otherwise.
Lester Maddox was born in
Atlanta, Georgia, one of seven children of a steelworker. Dropping out of school following his junior year in high school, Maddox earned $4 a week at a local drugstore in order to help the family's finances in the midst of the
Depression. He went on to become an apprentice dental technician before accepting a job in his father's line of work at the steel mills. Starting out at a salary of $10 per week, Maddox eventually was promoted to foreman.
In 1944, Maddox, along with his wife, Virginia Cox, used $400 they had saved to open up a combination grocery store/restaurant. Building on that success, the couple then bought property on Hemphill Avenue off the
Georgia Tech campus to open up the "Pickrick" restaurant.
Maddox made the "Pickrick" a family affair with his wife and children working side-by-side with him. The restaurant became known for its simple, inexpensive food, including its specialty, skillet-fried chicken.
Championing that segregationist philosophy, The "Pickrick" soon became a thriving business. However, Maddox's refusal to adjust to changes following the passage of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964 manifested itself when he filed a lawsuit to continue his policies. He first prevented a trio of African-Americans from entering his restaurant by holding a gun at the entrance, then later defied a court order by proclaiming to another group of African-Americans, "If you live 100 years, you'll never get a piece of fried chicken here."
Unable to win his case, he became a martyr to segregationists by selling the restaurant to employees rather than integrating it. Many of his fellow citizens praised him for doing this.
During his ownership of the "Pickrick", he twice ran for mayor of
Atlanta. In
1957, he lost to incumbent
William B. Hartsfield, who sought a more moderate racial approach, then lost to
Ivan Allen, Jr. four years later, with the two politicians splitting the white vote. Allen's ability to garner virtually all the black votes proved to be the difference.
In
1962, Maddox ran for
Lieutenant Governor against
Peter Zack Geer, a candidate who shared his opponent's strong segregationist views. In an effort to differentiate from each other, both candidates attempted to paint the other as an extremist. Geer won the race, but Maddox gained valuable recognition across the state.
When Maddox sought the
Democratic Party nomination for
Governor of Georgia in 1966, his principal opponent for the nomination was former governor
Ellis Arnall. In the primary election, Arnall won a plurality of the popular vote, but was denied the required majority because a small number of votes went to an obscure state senator named
Jimmy Carter. Arnall barely campaigned in the run-off election, and the result was a surprising victory for Maddox.
Stunned, Arnall announced a write-in candidacy for the general election. In that contest,
Republican nominee
Howard Callaway won a plurality and Maddox finished second; under the election rules then in effect, the state legislature was required to select a governor from the two candidates with the highest number of votes. With the legislature overwhelmingly dominated by Democrats, Maddox became Governor, serving from 1967 to 1971.
Although Maddox campaigned as a segregationist, he governed as a moderate, and appointed more blacks to state government office than any of his predecessors. Despite this, Maddox did manifest anti-black sentiments while in office. Upon the death of
Martin Luther King, Jr. he denied the slain civil rights leader the honor of lying in state in the Georgia state capitol. He reportedly abhorred the idea of flying the state flag at half-staff "in honor of a Negro."
His often self-deprecating humor and off-the-cuff manner stood in contrast to the fiery rhetoric of other Southern politicians such as
George Wallace and
Strom Thurmond: when asked what could be done to improve the abysmal conditions in Georgia prisons, Maddox replied that what was really needed was a better class of prisoner. Maddox's chief of staff was
Zell Miller, who went on to serve two terms as governor in the
1990s.
In
1968, a local Atlanta repertory company produced a satirical play entitled, "
Red, White and Maddox". The play ridicules Maddox and imagines him winning the
1972 U.S. Presidential election, then starting a war with the
Soviet Union.
Under the Georgia constitution of
1945, Maddox was
prohibited from running for a second consecutive term, necessitating a
1970 run for
Lieutenant Governor of Georgia. Despite winning as the
running mate of
Jimmy Carter, the two would find little common ground during their four years of service, often publicly feuding with each other.
Shortly after that election, Maddox appeared as a guest on
The Dick Cavett Show on
December 18,
1970. During a commercial break, fellow guest and former football player
Jim Brown asked Maddox if had "any trouble with the white bigots because of all the things you did for blacks." On the air, Cavett substituted the word "admirers" in place of "bigots", enraging Maddox. After demanding an apology, Maddox walked off the show.
Maddox ran again for governor in
1974 but lost in the Democratic primary to
George Busbee. Maddox's former chief of staff Zell Miller was successful in his own bid to succeed Maddox as lieutenant governor. When Carter ran for President in
1976, Maddox ran against him as the nominee of the
American Independent Party, saying that his former rival was "the most dishonest man I ever met." Maddox only received 50,000 votes in the election, less than one percent of the vote.
With his political career over and with massive debts stemming from his
1974 gubernatorial bid, Maddox began a short-lived nightclub comedy career in
1977 with an
African-American,
Bobby Lee Sears, who had worked as a busboy in his restaurant. Sears had served time in prison for a drug offense before Maddox, as Lieutenant Governor, was able to obtain a pardon. Calling themselves "The Governor and the Dishwasher," the duo performed comedy bits built around musical numbers with Maddox on
harmonica and Sears on
guitar.
On
September 25,
1977, Maddox suffered a heart attack, but recovered and attended a number of appreciation dinners from Georgia Democrats that reduced his debts. In an attempt to raise further money, Maddox auctioned off memorabilia the following year from his days as a restauranteur and a politician. Included in this collection were autographed ax handles. The auction brought only $1,392, but Maddox refused to declare bankruptcy saying, "I'd rather die."
Maddox began a real estate company, but never again enjoyed the financial success he had enjoyed with the "Pickrick". When he was diagnosed with
cancer in
1983, Maddox traveled to the Bahamas for experimental treatment. Two years later, the facility where he received his treatment was closed due to fears of contamination by
AIDS. He never contracted the latter disease and made a successful recovery from his cancer.
He made one final unsuccessful bid for governor in 1990, then underwent heart surgery the following year. He remained a visible figure in his home community of
Cobb County, Georgia for the remainder of his life.
In 2003, after a fall while recuperating from intestinal surgery in an Atlanta
hospice, he died from
pneumonia and
prostate cancer.
Lester Maddox and his wife Virginia were married for sixty one years. At Maddox's home, a prominent landmark was a sign he had made. The first half of the sign read: "Thanks be to God he has given me my precious Virginia for 61 years as of May 9, '97." A second sign was added below it after his wife died shortly after. This sign read: "and God took her from me and carried her home 45 days later." The Interstate Highway 75 crossing of the
Chattahoochee River at the southeastern boundary of Cobb County, Georgia is named the Lester and Virginia Maddox Bridge. His name also appears in the opening lines of
Randy Newman's song
Rednecks, in allusion to his appearance on the
Dick Cavett television program.
*
Lester! from Creative Loafing, March 20, 1999 (with link to his personal rebuttal to the article)
