Memorial Hall at Stone Mountain Park (photo credit: Rebecca Grapevine)
ATLANTA – The board of the Stone Mountain Memorial Association Monday selected Birmingham- and Nashville-based Warner Museums to design new history exhibits for Memorial Hall at Stone Mountain Park.
Warner has experience designing exhibits that address the South’s complex history of racism, including at Birmingham’s Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, the Negro Southern League Museum and the Montgomery Bus Station Freedom Riders Museum.
“This park, and the new exhibits, offer a unique opportunity for presenting history in a way that informs, educates, and challenges people to learn about their shared history,” said the Rev. Abraham Mosley, chairman of the board. “After having seen their work up close, we have no doubt that the fine folks at Warner Museums can do that.”
The board selected Warner Museums from a list of six applicants after visiting some of the company’s sites in person. Board members were impressed with exhibits they saw from Warner at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church site, where four Black girls were killed in a bombing in 1963, and the National Medal of Honor Heritage Center in Chattanooga, Tenn.
“The exhibit galleries will explore the complete and complex history of Stone Mountain, and I would point out this is only the beginning of a longer process of getting input from all parties and working with the community to put together a project the state of Georgia can be proud of,” said Bill Stephens, Stone Mountain Memorial Association CEO.
The process is expected to take one to two years to complete, said Stephens, and so far, no decisions about exhibit content have been finalized.
The exhibit designers and the board will consult with historians as well as members of the public about their thoughts on the exhibit, Stephens said.
“A lot of this project is about memory and about how people remember things from the Civil War,” Stephens said. “We need to talk to experts, historians and others about how that memory comes about.”
The decision to award the new contract comes on the heels of major changes in the park’s management. In July, a new company, Thrive Attractions, took over management of the park from a former park manager that had been in place for 30 years. And the board adopted a new logo for the association last year that leaves out the Confederate symbols contained in the old logo.
In preparing the new exhibit, Warner Museums will need to navigate controversies over the park’s past and present. Many have been critical of the park’s close association with Georgia’s Confederate past, calling for a plan to cover up or minimize the large carving of three Confederate political and military leaders on the granite outcropping’s northeastern face.
But the carving cannot be removed because the General Assembly passed legislation in 2019 prohibiting removing historic monuments from public property. And park management has been reluctant to change other reminders of the Confederate past, such as streets named after Confederate leaders.
Stephens said that listening would be key to navigating potential controversies over the museum content.
“If some people on both sides are a little uncomfortable, then you’re probably doing something right,” he said.
The exhibit is slated to be completed in one-and-a-half to two years, said Stephens.
The Stone Mountain Memorial Association is the park’s chief governing authority. Its members are appointed by the governor.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Georgia House Republicans nominated Majority Leader Jon Burns Monday to become the next House speaker.
Burns, R-Newington, defeated Rep. Barry Fleming, R-Harlem, by secret ballot in a vote by the 97 House GOP lawmakers who attended Monday’s Republican Caucus meeting at the state Capitol.
If Burns is elected speaker by the full House on the first day of the 2023 legislative session in January, he would succeed Speaker David Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, who is stepping down from leadership because of health concerns.
Before Monday’s vote, Burns pledged to build on Ralston’s successes leading House Republicans during the last two-year term protecting the rights of gun owners and the unborn, making elections “more accessible and secure,” increasing funding for law enforcement and public safety and cutting taxes.
“All of these were House priorities I worked on as a member of your leadership team,” Burns told his GOP colleagues.
Fleming, a lawyer and former chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, led the House in the fight over a controversial election-reform bill the General Assembly passed last year in the wake of the 2020 elections. The legislation passed over complaints of voter suppression from minority Democrats.
“We had to make some changes in our election law because of abuses that took place during the pandemic,” Fleming said.
Both Burns and Fleming paid tribute to Ralston, who has served as speaker since 2010.
“He was a mentor to me,” Fleming said.
“We owe him a debt of gratitude for his leadership and service,” Burns added.
Burns, a retired educator and farmer, was elected to the House in 2004 after a brief stint as a member of the State Transportation Board. He was elected majority leader in 2015.
Burns represents the 159th House District, which includes all of Screven County and parts of Bulloch and Effingham counties.
House Republicans also re-nominated Speaker Pro Tempore Jan Jones, R-Milton, to return to the post. The full House also will elect its speaker pro tempore in January.
The GOP caucus then elected Rep. Chuck Efstration, R-Dacula, to succeed Burns as House majority leader over three other candidates; unanimously elected Rep. James Burchett, R-Waycross, majority whip; elected Rep. Bruce Williamson, R-Monroe, over one opponent to serve as caucus chair; chose Rep. Houston Gaines, R-Athens, as caucus vice chair; and elected Rep. Ginny Ehrhart, R-Marietta, as secretary/treasurer.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Georgia Senate Republicans kicked off a series of post-election leadership meetings in the General Assembly Friday, nominating a new Senate president pro tempore and electing new caucus leaders.
Senate Republicans, who lost one seat to the Democrats in Tuesday’s election but still hold a 33-23 majority, nominated Sen. John Kennedy of Macon president pro tempore. If elected by the full Senate on the first day of the 2023 session in January, Kennedy would succeed Sen. Butch Miller of Gainesville, who left the Senate in an unsuccessful bid for lieutenant governor.
The GOP Caucus also elected Sen. Steve Gooch of Dahlonega majority leader, Sen. Jason Anavitarte of Dallas caucus chairman, Sen. Randy Robertson of Cataula caucus whip, Sen. Matt Brass of Newnan caucus vice whip, and Sen. Dean Burke of Bainbridge caucus treasurer.
Kennedy – subject to January’s Senate vote – and Gooch are getting promotions. Kennedy has been serving as Republican Caucus chairman, while Gooch has been the GOP whip.
But the biggest promotion goes to Sen. Burt Jones, R-Jackson, who was elected lieutenant governor on Tuesday after defeating Miller in the Republican primary last May. Georgia’s lieutenant governors preside over the state Senate, overseeing the flow of legislation and making committee assignments.
Despite rumors that disgruntled senators might try to take away some of the lieutenant governor’s powers, the Republican Caucus voted Friday to leave the status quo in place as Jones assumes the position.
“I am proud that our caucus acted quickly after Tuesday’s election to handle our internal business and move forward together,” Kennedy said Friday. “State Senate Republicans will begin our preparations for the 2023 legislative session with common purpose and a renewed sense of optimism for the results we can deliver on behalf of the people of Georgia.”
There is precedent in the Georgia Senate for stripping lieutenant governors of their powers. When Republicans took control of the Senate in a flurry of party switching immediately following the 2002 elections, the new GOP majority voted to reduce the authority enjoyed by then-Lt. Gov. Mark Taylor, a Democrat.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – When Georgians go to the polls – again – next month to vote in the U.S. Senate runoff, they’ll be participating in a unique – and complicated – state tradition.
That’s because Georgia is the sole state to require runoffs in both primary and general elections. In Georgia, candidates must earn at least 50% of the vote to avoid a runoff.
Some other Southern states have a runoff rule in primary elections – but not for general elections like the one Georgia held this month. (Mississippi recently adopted a measure that requires general runoffs for statewide races that will start with next year’s elections.)
In Georgia, although Democratic U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock earned about 35,000 more votes than Republican challenger Herschel Walker, neither candidate crossed the 50% threshold because Libertarian Chase Oliver drew 2% of the vote. Walker and Warnock now face a runoff for the Senate seat on Dec. 6.
It won’t be Warnock’s first: He won his Senate seat in 2021 by defeating then-incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler in a runoff.
Georgia’s modern era of runoffs began when the legislature adopted a new election code in 1964, explained University of Georgia political scientist Charles Bullock. The legislature put the runoff system in place – but excluded the governor’s race.
That presented a problem in 1966, when neither Democrat Lester Maddox nor Republican Bo Callaway could pass the 50% mark in the general election due to a write-in candidate. After court challenges, the state legislature – controlled by Democrats – was allowed to choose the governor. Lawmakers chose party-fellow and staunch segregationist Maddox.
In response, and with Maddox’s support, Georgia voters adopted a 1968 constitutional amendment requiring the governor’s race to go to a runoff in the absence of a clear-majority winner.
The state’s runoff law has not been immune to legislative tinkering since then. Back in 1992, Democrat Wyche Fowler lost his Senate reelection bid to Republican Paul Coverdell in a runoff.
Fowler had earned more votes in the general election but neither candidate crossed the 50% mark. Fowler fell to Coverdell in the rematch. The Democratic-controlled General Assembly then changed state law to require only 45% of the vote to avoid a runoff.
That paid off in 1996, when Democrat Max Cleland drew more than 45% – but less than 50% – of the vote, skirting a rematch and winning a Senate seat outright.
In 2005, the by-then Republican-controlled state legislature and then-Gov. Sonny Perdue changed the law back to the 50% threshold.
That would later prove fatal for another Perdue-family pol, David. The incumbent Republican senator – cousin of the former governor – won more votes than Democrat Jon Ossoff during the November 2020 elections but fell just short of the 50% mark, pushing the race to a runoff. Ossoff bested Perdue by about 55,000 votes in the Jan. 2021 rematch, winning the Senate seat in a runoff upset.
“It cuts both ways,” said Bullock, the UGA political scientist, about the impact of Georgia’s unique general election runoffs on political outcomes.
Some have criticized the runoff rules for ties to the state’s segregationist past. For example, a 1990 federal court challenge to Georgia’s primary runoff rule argued it was racially discriminatory and violated the U.S. Constitution.
The plaintiffs, a group of Black Georgians, argued primary runoffs are designed to keep white people in office and Black candidates out. As evidence, they pointed to statements by then-state Rep. Denmark Groover and other early supporters of the system who thought runoffs would preserve white political power. White voters could group together in a runoff to defeat a Black candidate, even if the white vote had been split initially and the Black candidate had initially drawn the most votes, the plaintiffs argued.
The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed that Groover had been motivated by “racial animus” – a fact which Groover had, in fact, confirmed in interviews. However, the three-judge panel’s 1998 ruling found the primary election runoff law was not discriminatory in intent or practice.
Despite that court ruling, many still think the runoff rule was racially discriminatory in intent.
“[The Georgia runoff rule] did not remove anyone’s right to cast a ballot, but it was commonly regarded as hampering African Americans … from making their votes count more effectively at the polls,” said a 2009 U.S. Department of Interior report.
From the point of view of political strategy, political scientist Bullock said, runoffs can provide Georgia voters an extra chance to vet candidates. Georgians who vote on Dec. 6 will experience this for themselves, when they get a final chance to weigh in on the Warnock-Walker race.
A new generation of political scientists is analyzing the law’s impact on Georgia. Kerwin Swint, J. Benjamin Taylor, and Ayla McGinnis, all of Kennesaw State University, collected data on runoff turnout, costs and attitudes in more than a third of Georgia’s 159 counties.
Using this data, the team calculated that the 2020 Senate election runoffs cost about $75 million statewide. Smaller counties face the greatest burden, since they tend to have fewer resources than large counties.
And though the Georgia runoffs draw national attention, turnout is lower than in the main elections, suggesting voters lose interest as time goes on.
One option the researchers recommend considering is Instant Runoff Voting, which allows voters to rank candidates on Election Day. The majority winner is identified during tabulation. Georgians could also eliminate runoffs, instead electing the candidate who gets the most votes in the general or primary, said Swint.
All Georgians who were registered to vote by Nov. 7 can vote in the December runoff. Early voting will begin Nov. 28.
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
ATLANTA – Two years ago, Joe Biden became the first Democratic presidential candidate to carry Georgia since 1992, and the Peach State elected two Democrats to the U.S. Senate in runoffs.
Last Tuesday, Republican Gov. Brian Kemp won reelection in a rematch with Democrat Stacey Abrams by a wider margin than in 2018, leading the GOP to a sweep of all eight constitutional offices. Sen. Raphael Warnock is the only statewide Democratic candidate left standing, pending a runoff with Republican challenger Herschel Walker.
Given those results, it might be tempting to conclude Georgia has turned back to solid red again, as it had been since 2006, the last time before 2020 a Democrat won statewide office.
“You might look at the 2020 election and runoffs as an anomaly in a still Republican state,” said Kerwin Swint, a political science professor at Kennesaw State University.
But such an interpretation ignores the gains Democrats have been making in Atlanta’s northern suburbs, where an increasingly diverse electorate added two Democrats to Georgia’s congressional delegation since 2018 and put more Democrats in the General Assembly.
“The 2020 outcomes were consistent with the trajectory we’ve seen for the last decade,” said Brian Robinson, a former top aide to then-Gov. Nathan Deal and a Republican political commentator. “What we’re seeing now is more of an anomaly.”
This year’s Republican success story starts with Kemp, who bested Abrams last Tuesday by 7.5 percentage points, a significantly larger margin of victory than in 2018, when he won by just 1.4 percentage points.
Robinson said Kemp picked up those points this time around by appealing to the middle. His 2018 campaign was geared more toward the Republican base, as was exemplified dramatically in an ad featuring Kemp pointing a shotgun at a teenager wanting to date his daughter.
Bidding for a second term this year, Kemp had a record to run on. His main theme was that he moved quickly to reopen Georgia businesses during the early months of the pandemic, paving the way to an economic recovery that outpaced other states.
“He took a risk opening first that could have gone sideways on him,” Robinson said. “It allowed him to make significant inroads.”
Robinson said Kemp also gained ground with moderate voters by refusing to go along with then-President Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Georgia, a stand for election integrity that also helped Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger win reelection by more than 9 percentage points.
Trump also was a factor in Abrams’ favor in 2018, Robinson said. Suburban voters unhappy with the lightning rod president in the White House had a reason to vote for Abrams that year, he said.
But this year, Abrams’ candidacy was hurt when moderate voters identified her with the fight against voter suppression, which most Georgia voters weren’t experiencing when they went to the polls, Robinson said.
Also, Kemp took advantage of Abrams’ national celebrity by running ads claiming she was out of touch with Georgians.
“She became more celebrity than local politician,” Robinson said.
The rest of the Republican slate for statewide constitutional offices rode Kemp’s coattails to victory. While Raffensperger’s winning margin over Democratic state Rep. Bee Nguyen was the largest, most of the remainder of the GOP ticket won by almost as large a margin.
Republicans also gained a seat in Georgia’s U.S. House delegation, boosting the GOP majority to 9-5, a result that had been a fait accompli since the GOP-controlled General Assembly redrew Georgia’s congressional map during a special redistricting session late last year.
The new map substantially redrew Democratic Rep. Lucy McBath’s 6th Congressional District to heavily favor Republicans. As a result, she moved into Rep. Carolyn Bourdeaux’s heavily Democratic 7th District and beat Bourdeaux in a primary last May. Republican Rich McCormick then was elected in McBath’s now GOP-friendly former district.
But the redistricting session also allowed Democrats to make gains in the General Assembly, slightly reducing the size of Republican majorities in the state House and Senate. Changing demographics in Cobb and Gwinnett counties that favor Democrats forced Republicans to draw a smattering of new districts likely to go to Democratic candidates.
Democrats gained one seat in the state Senate, bringing the Republican majority down to 33-23, and made a few pickups in the House.
“The investments Democrats have been making all cycle have paid off,” said U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams, D-Atlanta, who chairs the Georgia Democratic Party. “Georgia Democrats gained seats in both chambers even in the face of Republican gerrymandering.”
The only uncertainty remaining is who will represent Georgia in the U.S. Senate going forward. With neither incumbent Democrat Warnock nor Republican challenger Walker clearing the 50%-plus-one margin of victory needed to avoid a runoff, they will clash again on Dec. 6.
Swint said the outcome may have a lot to do with whether Democrats retain their majority in the Senate. If Democrats win tight contests in Arizona and Nevada – the only other Senate contests from Election Day other than Georgia’s still not decided as of Friday – Republicans won’t be able to flip the Senate even if Walker wins next month.
“You may not get the Republican money to come in or the fervor [for Republicans] to go out and vote,” Swint said.
While what happens to the balance of power in the Senate isn’t in Walker’s control, Robinson said there are steps the University of Georgia football legend must take if he wants to overcome his sizable underperformance at the polls last Tuesday compared to the rest of the statewide Republican ticket.
“He’s got to make Raphael Warnock own Biden’s failed recovery,” he said. “Walker [also] needs to show some fluency on policy issues and matters specific to Georgia.”
Regardless of what happens in the runoff, Swint said Democrats should take heart that Georgia is not going back to the days of total Republican domination a decade ago.
“In Cobb and Gwinnett, it’s been real tough for them.” he said. “The days of Republicans winning everything are over.”
This story is available through a news partnership with Capitol Beat News Service, a project of the Georgia Press Educational Foundation.
