Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-29T00:45:29.721Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Entertaining the Forgotten

Southern Governors and the Performance of Populism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 March 2021

Weston Twardowski  and
Gary Alan Fine
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

During the late 1920s and ’30s, performative populism played a major role in the politics of the American Deep South. In the gubernatorial campaigns of three of the most prominent populist politicians of the era—Huey Long, Theodore Bilbo, and Eugene Talmadge—performance skills and entertainment were key strategies for gaining voter support and crafting personas within a popular imaginary.

Type
Article
Information
TDR , Volume 65 , Issue 1 , March 2021 , pp. 144 - 166
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press for Tisch School of the Arts/NYU

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References

Anderson, William. 1975. The Wild Man from Sugar Creek: The Political Career of Eugene Talmadge. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.Google Scholar
Atlanta Constitution . 1928. “Eugene Talmadge Speaks This Week in Ten Counties.” ProQuest Historical Newspapers, 2 September (500237209).Google Scholar
Atlanta Constitution . 1932. “New U.S. Loan Bank Scored by Talmadge.” ProQuest Historical Newspapers, 21 July (501453978).Google Scholar
Atlanta Constitution . 1946. “Stay Away from White Folks’ Ballot Boxes–Gene to Negroes.” ProQuest Historical Newspapers, 11 July (24731609).Google Scholar
Atlanta History Center. 2009. “Hartsfield Film Collection - Eugene Talmadge.” YouTube, 10 December. Accessed 17 May 2020. www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPXg9Rk4cfI&t=2s.Google Scholar
Baker, Peter C. 2016. “A Lynching in Georgia: The Living Memorial to America’s History of Racist Violence.” The Guardian, 2 November. Accessed 10 October 2018. www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/02/a-lynching-in-georgia-the-living-memorial-to-americas-history-of-racist-violence.Google Scholar
Bakhtin, Mikhail. (1968) 1984. Rabelais and His World. Trans. Hélène Iswolsky. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Bender, Michael C. 2019. “Trump’s Rallies Aren’t a Sideshow. They Are the Campaign.” The Wall Street Journal, 22 October. Accessed 7 May 2020. www.wsj.com/articles/trumps-rallies-arent-just-part-of-his-campaign-they-are-the-campaign-11571753199.Google Scholar
Beyerlein, Kraig, and Andrews, Kenneth T.. 2008. “Black Voting During the Civil Rights Movement: A Micro-level Analysis.” Social Forces 87, 1:65–93. https://doi.org/10.1353/sof.0.0095.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bilbo, Theodore. 1911. Campaign Materials, 18 May. Box 1, Folder 4, Theodore G. Bilbo Papers. McCain Library and Archives, University of Southern Mississippi Libraries.Google Scholar
Bilbo, Theodore. 1926a. Letter to Ed Ott, et. al, 30 June. Box 1, Folder 15, Theodore G. Bilbo Papers. McCain Library and Archives, University of Southern Mississippi Libraries.Google Scholar
Bilbo, Theodore. 1926b. Campaign letter from Theodore Bilbo, 30 June. Box 1, Folder 15, Theodore G. Bilbo Papers. McCain Library and Archives, University of Southern Mississippi Libraries.Google Scholar
Bilbo, Theodore. 1926c. Letter to John Street, 26 June. Box 20, Folder 18, Theodore G. Bilbo Papers. McCain Library and Archives, University of Southern Mississippi Libraries.Google Scholar
Bilbo, Theodore. 1946. Senator Theodore Bilbo Campaign Speech, 7 May, online transcript. Mississippi Department of Archives. Accessed 16 May 2020. www.mdah.ms.gov/arrec/digital_archives/vault/projects/OHtranscripts/AU1008_120959.pdf.Google Scholar
Blain, Keisha N. 2018. Set the World on Fire: Black Nationalist Women and the Global Struggle for Freedom. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Brattain, Michelle. 2001. The Politics of Whiteness: Race, Workers, and Culture in the Modern South. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Brinkley, Alan. 1982. Voices of Protest: Huey Long, Father Coughlin, and the Great Depression. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.Google Scholar
Burns, Ken. 1985. Huey Long. Documentary. New York: Corporation for Public Broadcasting. DVD and streaming video, 88 min.Google Scholar
Cobb, James C. 1975. “Not Gone, But Forgotten: Eugene Talmadge and the 1938 Purge Campaign.” Georgia Historical Quarterly 59, 1 :197–209.Google Scholar
Crawford, J.B. 1911. Letter to J.B. Gardner, 6 April. Box 1, Folder 4, Theodore G. Bilbo Papers. McCain Library and Archives, University of Southern Mississippi Libraries.Google Scholar
Davenport, Walter. 1935. “Brethren and Sisters.” Colliers, 16 March:19, 53–55.Google Scholar
Dolan, Jill. 2005. Utopia in Performance: Finding Hope at the Theater. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fenno, Richard F. 1978. Home Style: House Members in Their Districts. New York: HarperCollins.Google Scholar
Fitzgerald, Michael W. 1997. “ ‘We Have Found a Moses’: Theodore Bilbo, Black Nationalism, and the Greater Liberia Bill of 1939.” Journal of Southern History 63, 2:293–320.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Flowers, Paul. 1956. Interview with T. Harry Williams, 29 October, Memphis. Range 34, Box 19, Folder 63. Hill Memorial Library, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge.Google Scholar
Free Press . 1926. “Homecoming Day Big Success.” 22 July:1.Google Scholar
Galloway, Tammy Harden. 1995. “ ‘Tribune of the Masses and a Champion of the People’: Eugene Talmadge and the Three-Dollar Tag.” Georgia Historical Quarterly 79, 3:673–84.Google Scholar
Gary, Leon. 1960. Interview with T. Harry Williams, 10 December, Baton Rouge. Range 34, Box 19, Folder 74. Hill Memorial Library, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge.Google Scholar
Giroux, Vincent Arthur Jr., 1984. “Theodore G. Bilbo: Progressive to Public Racist.” PhD diss., Indiana University, Bloomington.Google Scholar
Gleason, Ira. 1956. Interview with T. Harry Williams, 26 December. Range 34, Box 19, Folder 77. Hill Memorial Library, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge.Google Scholar
Gonyea, Don. 2020. “Bernie Sanders’ Hallmark Rally Strategy.” NPR, 25 January. Accessed 20 May 2020. www.npr.org/2020/01/25/799470782/bernie-sanderss-hallmark-rally-strategy.Google Scholar
Green, A. Wigfall. 1963. The Man Bilbo. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.Google Scholar
Haas, Edward F. 1994. “Huey Pierce Long and Historical Speculation.” History Teacher 27, 2:125–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hair, William Ivy. 1991. The Kingfish and His Realm: The Life and Times of Huey P. Long. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.Google Scholar
Harold, Claudrena N. 2016. New Negro Politics in the Jim Crow South. Athens: University of Georgia Press.Google Scholar
Hendrix, Jerry A. 1981. “Theodore G. Bilbo: Evangelist of Racial Purity.” In The Oratory of Southern Demagogues, ed. Logue, Cal M. and Dorgan, Howard, 151–74. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.Google Scholar
Hogan, J. Michael, and Williams, Glen. 2004. “The Rusticity and Religiosity of Huey P. Long.” Rhetoric and Public Affairs 7, 2:149–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hughes, Langston. 1947. “Here to Yonder: The Death of Bilbo.” Chicago Defender, 30 August:14.Google Scholar
Jeansonne, Glen. 1992. “Huey Long and Racism.” Louisiana History: The Journal of the Louisiana Historical Association 33, 3 (Summer):265–82.Google Scholar
Kaltwasser, Cristóbal Rovira, Taggart, Paul, Espejo, Paulina Ochoa, and Ostiguy, Pierre. 2017. “Populism: An Overview of the Concept and the State of the Art.” In The Oxford Handbook of Populism, ed. Kaltwasser, Cristóbal Rovira, Taggart, Paul, Espejo, Paulina Ochoa, and Ostiguy, Pierre, 2–24. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Key, V.O., with Heard, Alexander. 1949. Southern Politics in State and Nation. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press.Google Scholar
Kim, Suk-Young. 2010. Illusive Utopia: Theater, Film, and Everyday Performance in North Korea. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Laclau, Ernesto. 2005. On Populist Reason. London: Verso.Google Scholar
Lee, Michael J. 2006. “The Populist Chameleon: The People’s Party, Huey Long, George Wallace, and the Populist Argumentative Frame.” Quarterly Journal of Speech 92, 4:355–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lemmon, Sarah McCulloh. 1954. “The Ideology of Eugene Talmadge.” Georgia Historical Quarterly 38, 3 (September):226–48.Google Scholar
Logue, Cal M. 1981. “The Coercive Campaign Prophecy of Gene Talmadge, 1926–1946.” In The Oratory of Southern Demagogues, ed. Logue, Cal M. and Dorgan, Howard, 205–30. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.Google Scholar
Logue, Cal M. 1987. “Eugene Talmadge (1884–1946), four-time governor of Georgia.” In American Orators of the Twentieth Century: Critical Studies and Sources, ed. Duffy, Bernard K. and Ryan, Halford R., 205–08. New York: Greenwood Press.Google Scholar
Logue, Cal M. 1989. Eugene Talmadge: Rhetoric and Response. New York: Greenwood Press.Google Scholar
Long, Huey P. 1928a. Scrapbooks. July 1927–December 1928, 17:18 #1666. Hill Memorial Library, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge.Google Scholar
Long, Huey P. 1928b. Long Songs. Second Gubernatorial Campaign. Long (Huey P.) Papers 30:3, Box 4, #2005. Hill Memorial Library, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge.Google Scholar
Lowbrow, Dave. 1911. Letter to the Editor. Southern Sentinel, 4 April. Box 1, Folder 4, Theodore G. Bilbo Papers. McCain Library and Archives, University of Southern Mississippi Libraries.Google Scholar
Marino, Angela. 2018. Populism and Performance in the Bolivarian Revolution of Venezuela. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mead, Howard N. 1981. “Russell vs. Talmadge: Southern Politics and the New Deal.” Georgia Historical Quarterly 65, 1:28–45.Google Scholar
Mixon, Harold. 1981. “Huey P. Long’s 1927–1928 Gubernatorial Primary Campaign.” In The Oratory of Southern Demagogues, ed. Logue, Cal M. and Dorgan, Howard, 175–204. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.Google Scholar
Moffitt, Benjamin. 2016. The Global Rise of Populism: Performance, Political Style, and Representation. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Morgan, Chester M. 1985. Redneck Liberal: Theodore G. Bilbo and the New Deal. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.Google Scholar
Pathe News. 1936. “Incumbent Senator Russell and Governor Talmadge Campaign in Griffin Georgia.” 26 August. Sherman Grinberg Library. Accessed 6 June 2020. http://filmlibrary.shermangrinberg.com/?s=file=460358.Google Scholar
Rawls, H.C. 1926. Letter to Theodore Bilbo, 2 July. Box 20, Folder 19, Theodore G. Bilbo Papers. McCain Library and Archives, University of Southern Mississippi Libraries.Google Scholar
Roach, Joseph. 2007. It. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sea Coast Echo . 1926. “Bilbo Homecoming Day is Big and Attracts Many.” The Sea Coast Echo, 17 July. William F. Winter Archives, Mississippi Department of Archives.Google Scholar
Shannon, J.B. 1939. “Presidential Politics in the South-1938, II.” The Journal of Politics 1, 3:282–83.Google Scholar
Shaw, Arthur Marvin. 1950. “The First Time I Saw Huey.” Southwest Review 35, 1:59–64.Google Scholar
Shows, E.M. 1927. Letter to Bilbo Campaign, 18 June. Box 1, Folder 15, Theodore G. Bilbo Papers. McCain Library and Archives, University of Southern Mississippi Libraries.Google Scholar
Sitkoff, Harvard. 1978. A New Deal for Blacks: The Emergence of Civil Rights as a National Issue. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Smith, Gerald L.K. 1970. “The People’s Choice.” In Huey Long, ed. Graham, Hugh Davis, 85–87. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
State Times . 1927. “Huey P. Long Opens Campaign in Alexandria.” 4 August. Historic Newspaper Archive.Google Scholar
Strauss, Julia C., and O’Brien, Donal B. Cruise. 2007. Staging Politics: Power and Performance in Asia and Africa. London: I.B. Taurus.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gram Swing, Raymond. 1970. “Forerunner to Fascism.” In Huey Long, ed. Graham, Hugh Davis, 99–101. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Taggart, Paul A. 1996. The New Populism and the New Politics: New Protest Parties in Sweden in a Comparative Perspective. London: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, Diana. 1997. Disappearing Acts: Spectacles of Gender and Nationalism in Argentina’s “Dirty War.” Durham, NC: Duke University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
TIME Magazine . 1946. “Prince of the Peckerwoods.” 1 July:22–23.Google Scholar
TIME Magazine . 1927a. “2500 Hear Long Open Gubernatorial Race.” 4 August:3.Google Scholar
TIME Magazine . 1927b. “Long Fires First Gun in State Campaign for Gubernatorial Honors.” 4 August:1.Google Scholar
Turner, Victor. 1982. From Ritual to Theatre: The Human Seriousness of Play. New York: PAJ Press.Google Scholar
Vaughn, Courtney. 1979. “The Legacy of Huey Long.” Louisiana History: The Journal of the Louisiana Historical Association 20, 1:93–101.Google Scholar
White, Richard D. 2006. Kingfish: The Reign of Huey P. Long. New York: Random House.Google Scholar
Zorn, Roman J. 1946. “Bilbo, Theodore G.: Shibboleths for Statesmanship.” In Public Men In and Out of Office, ed. Salter, John Thomas, 276–96. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar

TDReading

Jakovljević, Branislav. 2008. “From Mastermind to Body Artist: Political Performances of Slobodan Milosević;.” TDR 52, 1 (T197):51–74. https://doi.org/10.1162/dram.2008.52.L51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mazer, Sharon. 2018. “Donald Trump Shoots the Match.” TDR 62, 2 (T238):175–200. https://doi-org/10.1162/DRAM_a_00713.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Raphael, Tim. 1999. “The King Is a Thing: Bodies of Memory in the Age of Reagan.” TDR 43, 1 (T161): 46–58. https://doi.org/10.1162/105420499320582150.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Raphael, Tim. 2009. “The Body Electric: GE, TV, and the Reagan Brand.” TDR 53, 2 (T202):113–38. https://doi.org/10.1162/dram.2009.53.2.113.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schechner, Richard. 2017. “Donald John Trump, President?” TDR 61, 2 (T234):7–10. https://doi-org/10.1162/DRAM_e_00644.CrossRefGoogle Scholar