But, What About Georgia's FIRST Republican Governor?

A good bit has been said lately about the fact it has been 130 years since Georgia had a Republican Governor, but practically nothing has been said about the term of Rufus B. Bullock or his interim Republican successor Benjamin F. Conley. Let's start with the end of the Civil War when Georgia, along with the rest of the South, was in political limbo and under the control of Union troops. To be readmitted to the Union as a state, Georgia had to have a constitutional convention. It had to annul secession and abolish slavery and several other things.

Rufus B. Bullock, a New Yorker who had moved to Augusta prior to the war, had served as an officer in the Confederate Army's Quartermaster Corps. Bullock accepted the outcome of the war, and thus was considered a "radical", but was named to the convention and had been an effective leader in the three-month-long effort that adopted Georgia's new constitution. Under reconstruction, the Union Army commander called for an election in 1868 and Republican Bullock faced Democrat John B. Gordon, a popular Confederate General. The election was chaotic. Former slaves had their first opportunity to vote, but Carpetbaggers and Scalawags got involved. There was question which, if any, former Confederate soldiers could vote. It was a mess. When the ballots were counted, Republican Bullock beat Democrat Gordon 83,527 to 76,356.

In the Legislature, the House had 29 Negroes and the Senate three. The Legislature voted to throw them out, and did. Governor Bullock called the Union troops back in, and the Negro legislators were reinstated. But General Alfred Terry not only reinstated the Negroes, he also threw out 29 Democrats and replaced them with the 29 Republicans who had opposed them in the election of 1868.

Meanwhile, the legislature, while under Democrat control, charged Governor Bullock with a series of scandals. He resigned and left the state. Tomorrow I'll tell you the rest of the story, and why ... to this day ... Gainesville is involved in it.

This is Gordon Sawyer, from a window on historic Green Street.