WI: George Wallace assassinated in 1972

As we all know George Wallace, Governor-for-Life of Alabama and anti-Civil-Rights guy was crippled in an assassination attempt by Arthur Bremer during the 1972 Democratic Primaries. There's been a lot of speculation about what if the attempt had never happened and he becomes President or at least the Democrat nominee. But I don't see anyone asking about what if the attempt had succeeded? Does this affect the delegates in any way?
 
Last edited:
As we all know George Wallace, Governor-for-Life of Georgia and anti-Civil-Rights guy was crippled in an assassination attempt by Arthur Bremer during the 1972 Democratic Primaries. There's been a lot of speculation about what if the attempt had never happened and he becomes President or at least the Democrat nominee. But I don't see anyone asking about what if the attempt had succeeded? Does this affect the delegates in any way?
Ahem.
 
It wouldn't have changed much. Wallace had minimal impact. With RFK and MLK shot down four years earlier, the public was hardened to it.
 
It wouldn't have changed much. Wallace had minimal impact. With RFK and MLK shot down four years earlier, the public was hardened to it.
He was in third place for the nomination, and for the Dixiecrats, this would be the first time one of theirs was the one who was gunned down
 
Last edited:
He was in third place for the nomination after all, and for the Dixiecrats, this would be the first time one of theirs was the one who was gunned down

He probably becomes some kind of twisted martyr. I could picture people holding his picture (Mao style) at alt-rIght rallies
 
And there'd be a lot of conspiracy theories(even though it's no more logical for those to sprout up with a successful rather than an attempted assassination, but something about a full-blown martydom always puts people in that frame of mind). "Here was a politician who was finally going to do what the people wanted, and look what the elites did to him!!"

The fact that Bremer wrote about killing Nixon as well will be dismissed as just a red herring constructed by the Kennedy cabal.
 
I understand that in the later 1970s Wallace actually became a half-way decent governor of Alabama, respecting the interests of both white and black citizens.

(whether this makes up for his earlier meanness and demagoguery, we can of course debate till the cows come home)
 

kernals12

Banned
In 1958, he ran a moderate campaign for governor, getting endorsed by the NAACP. One black lawyer recalled that Wallace was the only judge who referred to him as "sir" rather than "boy". If his racist demagoguery was all an act, it caused real damage, and I don't know if it's possible to apologize for that.
 
In 1958, he ran a moderate campaign for governor, getting endorsed by the NAACP. One black lawyer recalled that Wallace was the only judge who referred to him as "sir" rather than "boy". If his racist demagoguery was all an act, it caused real damage, and I don't know if it's possible to apologize for that.
True, Wallace switched his support from NAACP to KKK to get elected governor in 1962. Today, we remember a retraction of racism in 1979. Had he been killed in 1972, he would have died the eternal racist, segregationist. So, his survival probably improved his legacy image.
 
In 1958, he ran a moderate campaign for governor, getting endorsed by the NAACP. One black lawyer recalled that Wallace was the only judge who referred to him as "sir" rather than "boy". If his racist demagoguery was all an act, it caused real damage, and I don't know if it's possible to apologize for that.
Honestly I feel like that's even worse because Wallace knew that what he was doing was wrong but still did it anyways in order to get elected
 
I understand that in the later 1970s Wallace actually became a half-way decent governor of Alabama, respecting the interests of both white and black citizens.

(whether this makes up for his earlier meanness and demagoguery, we can of course debate till the cows come home)

Yeah, his last election(1982), he ran as a liberal, against a right-wing Republican, and won an overwhelming majority of the black vote. He also apparently made a record number of African-American appointments. (At the national level, he supported the GOP, however.)

As for how bad it was for him to endorse segregation when he knew it to be wrong, well, it should be read into the record that liberal icons like FDR, and for a period Truman and LBJ, also supported segregation in the realms over which they had control. And largely for the same reason that Wallace supported it in Alabama, ie. they did not want to commit electoral suicide.

Granted, FDR etc probably didn't run around yeliing "n****r at every campaign stop, though you can bet that a few of the white southerners who cast ballots for them did so while saying to themselves "This'll keep those n*****s in their place!"
 

kernals12

Banned
Yeah, his last election(1982), he ran as a liberal, against a right-wing Republican, and won an overwhelming majority of the black vote. He also apparently made a record number of African-American appointments. (At the national level, he supported the GOP, however.)

As for how bad it was for him to endorse segregation when he knew it to be wrong, well, it should be read into the record that liberal icons like FDR, and for a period Truman and LBJ, also supported segregation in the realms over which they had control. And largely for the same reason that Wallace supported it in Alabama, ie. they did not want to commit electoral suicide.

Granted, FDR etc probably didn't run around yeliing "n****r at every campaign stop, though you can bet that a few of the white southerners who cast ballots for them did so while saying to themselves "This'll keep those n*****s in their place!"
Truman desegregated the military, LBJ desegregated everything else (besides schools). None of those 3 stood in front of a college shouting "segregation now! segregation forever!".
 
Top