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Excerpt from Oral History Interview with Hodding Carter, April 1, 1974. Interview A-0100. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) See Entire Interview >>

Little chance for a GOP governor in Mississippi

Carter does not believe that Mississippians will elect a Republican governor without significant defections from the state's various political camps.

Citing this Excerpt

Oral History Interview with Hodding Carter, April 1, 1974. Interview A-0100. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Full Text of the Excerpt

JACK BASS:
Will you elect a Republican governer?
HODDING CARTER:
A Republican governer isn't going to get elected. But if we did he would just willingly stand there and let it all die. In which case, if we elected a Republican governer, the only way we would do it would be the most persuasive evidence for the regulars—those that were left—that it was time to make a deal unknown anyway. Because as soon as Boudron got beat for [four] elections to the congress out of what's now the fourth congressional district. As soon as Thad Cochran won that because those 10,000 votes were taken out by that white, independent candidate, just that soon the regulars in the fourth congressional district started talking about "We aren't dealing every which way unknown with the loyalists in that district." And if a Republican gets elected next year—and I cannot see who that would be right now—but if such a man got elected, those who are apt to call themselves regulars would fast enough make a deal with the loyalists. Because the only way I can see him get elected is massive defection not only from conversatives but from an awful lot of black votes as well. Because I can't imagine the Republican's process a guy who was going to be less appealing to blacks than the Democrats put up. Only two possibilities I can see for governer on the Republican side, both are sort of moderate, talking people when it comes to that.