Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for October 2, 2020

On October 2, 1789, President George Washington signed a resolution transmitting the (then-twelve) amendments constituting the Bill of Rights to the states that had ratified the Constitution. Click here for the letter from Washington to Governor Charles Pinckney of South Carolina that accompanied the amendments.

On October 2, 1835, Texans and Mexicans met in the first military battle of the Texas Revolution, the Battle of Gonzales.

In 1831, Mexican authorities gave the settlers of Gonzales a small cannon to help protect them from frequent Comanche raids. Over the next four years, the political situation in Mexico deteriorated, and in 1835 several states revolted. As the unrest spread, Colonel Domingo de Ugartechea, the commander of all Mexican troops in Texas, felt it unwise to leave the residents of Gonzales a weapon and requested the return of the cannon.

When the initial request was refused, Ugartechea sent 100 dragoons to retrieve the cannon. The soldiers neared Gonzales on September 29, but the colonists used a variety of excuses to keep them from the town, while secretly sending messengers to request assistance from nearby communities. Within two days, up to 140 Texians gathered in Gonzales, all determined not to give up the cannon. On October 1, settlers voted to initiate a fight. Mexican soldiers opened fire as Texians approached their camp in the early hours of October 2. After several hours of desultory firing, the Mexican soldiers withdrew.

On October 3, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national day of Thanksgiving to be observed on November 26, 1863 and on the fourth Thursday in November every succeeding year.

This announcement harkened back to when George Washington was in his first term as the first president in 1789 and the young American nation had only a few years earlier emerged from the American Revolution. At that time, George Washington called for an official celebratory “day of public thanksgiving and prayer.” While Congress overwhelmingly agreed to Washington’s suggestion, the holiday did not yet become an annual event.

Thomas Jefferson, the third president, felt that public demonstrations of piety to a higher power, like that celebrated at Thanksgiving, were inappropriate in a nation based in part on the separation of church and state. Subsequent presidents agreed with him. In fact, no official Thanksgiving proclamation was issued by any president between 1815 and the day Lincoln took the opportunity to thank the Union Army and God for a shift in the country’s fortunes on this day in 1863.

On October 2, 1879, Wallace Stevens was born. Stevens would become a renowned poet and insurance industry lawyer. My favorite poem of his is “Connoisseur of Chaos.”

A. A violent order is disorder; and
B. A great disorder is an order. These
Two things are one.

President Woodrow Wilson suffered a stroke at the White House on October 2, 1909.

On October 4, 1918, President Woodrow Wilson sent a telegram to the Georgia Democratic Party Convention delegates in appreciation for their support of his admininstration.

On October 3, 1922, Rebecca Latimer Felton was appointed to the United States Senate from Georgia following the death of Senator Tom Watson. After initially being rebuffed by the Senate, Felton was sworn-in on late in November, becoming the first woman to serve in the United States Senate.

The Savannah River Bridge opened on October 4, 1925.

Thurgood Marshall was sworn-in as an Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court on October 2, 1967.

Betty Talmadge, then wife of Senator Herman Talmadge, hosted a fundraiser with Rosalynn Carter and Joan Mondale on October 2, 1976.

Ground was broken for The Carter Presidential Center in Atlanta on October 2, 1984.

Beverly Hills, 90210 debuted on October 4, 1990.

On October 3, 1995, O.J. Simpson was acquitted of murder.

The last Braves game at Turner Field was played on October 2, 2016, with the Detroit Tigers besting the Braves by 1-0.

Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections

Governor Brian Kemp appointed Lt. Col. Chris Wright as Commissioner of the Department of Public Safety and colonel of the Georgia State Patrol, according to the Albany Herald.

The Board of Public Safety voted Thursday to approve Lt. Col. Chris Wright to serve as the next Commissioner of the Department of Public Safety and colonel of the Georgia State Patrol, following interim Commissioner Gary Vowell’s planned departure.

“I want to thank Col. Vowell for his service to the people of Georgia,” Gov. Brian Kemp said in a news release. “When he took over as interim Public Safety Commissioner, none of us could have imagined the challenges we would face in the coming months. He has been an exemplary public servant, and my family and I wish him the best in the days ahead.

Georgia First Lady Marty Kemp announced a new Human Trafficking hotline, according to the Albany Herald.

First Lady Marty Kemp joined the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council’s (CJCC) Georgia Coalition to Combat Human Trafficking Thursday to announce the creation of a statewide anti-trafficking hotline at 1-866-ENDHTGA.

“The launch of this hotline is great news for our state,” First Lady Marty Kemp said in a news release. “It’s going to allow all Georgians to play a critical role in advocating for those who are at risk and those who have been sexually exploited, increasing our capacity to address human trafficking in every community across the state.”

From the Capitol Beat News Service via the Gwinnett Daily Post:

The hotline also comes with a new website at www.endhtga.org.

The Georgia Board of Education voted to reduce the weight given to end-of-year tests, according to the Capitol Beat News Service via the Rome News Tribune.

State school officials balked Thursday at approving steps that would wipe out the weighted grades for year-end tests amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Instead, they chose to cut those grade weights in half from their usual amount.

[Georgia State School Superintendent Richard] Woods proposed reducing the grade weights of the annual Georgia Milestones tests to 0.01%, which is the lowest state law allows. Normally, the tests count 20% toward students’ final grades.

“Because we have so many learning platforms and approaches to learning this year, these tests will not mean anything as far as information,” Woods said Wednesday.

“I think it’s just unconscionable that we give a test,” he added. “But I have to give a test. We have to follow federal law.”

From the AJC:

“I’m not ready to throw out this year and say it doesn’t matter,” said Mike Royal, who voted with the majority for an alternate proposal. It reduces the weight of the tests to a tenth of the grades for the four courses in which they are given.

Board members expressed frustration with the way Woods released his proposal publicly last week — without talking it over with them first. One asked why he had chosen to weight the tests at 0.01% of a course grade.

The proposal now goes to the public for a 30-day comment period before a final board vote.

The Fulton County Board of Elections will promote early voting, according to GPB News.

At a press conference Thursday, officials also unveiled one of two mobile voting buses that will show up at multiple locations across the 70-mile-long county and can accommodate up to eight voters at once. The county also unveiled a new voting app that has information on early voting and drop boxes, plus a new advertising campaign designed to encourage residents to vote early.

Fulton elections director Rick Barron said the goal is to have a vast majority of the votes this fall cast before Election Day.

“Our target is to get 80% of the voters to use absentee-by-mail and early voting to make Election Day run smooth,” he said.

There will be 30 early voting sites, including the Georgia International Convention Center in College Park and the Benson Senior Center that will each have 50 voting machines, and State Farm Arena, which will have 300 machines during the 19-day early voting period that begins Oct. 12.

County manager Dick Anderson said the elections budget doubled to $34 million for 2020 to ensure things would run smoothly.

Fulton has added 91 new locations for Nov. 3, up more than 50% from the primary.

“We have 255 locations, that’s up from 164 in June and 147 in August,” Barron said. “At the beginning of the year our goal was 210-220, but through private partnership and hard work of my staff, we were able to get it up to 255.”

From the AJC:

Officials claim the vehicle is the first of its kind in Georgia. Costing roughly $350,000, the vehicle is Fulton’s latest tool to help avoid the debacle seen nationwide during the June election, which featured some voters waiting all day in lines and many voters who never got their mail-in ballots.

The vehicle holds eight ballot-marking devices that voters will use to select candidates, one scanner where voters will feed their printed selections and two places to check in on polls pads.

Those poll pads, which are tablets poll workers use to make sure people are properly registered, concern Fulton Commission Chairman Robb Pitts, who has been critical of the equipment selected by the state.

The vehicles will also be used to react to polling locations that have long lines. The vehicles are able to zip around the county to fill any gaps should a precinct go down. But it might have trouble keeping up with Ga. 400 traffic, the speedometer only tops out at 100 mph.

Muscogee County Elections Director Nancy Boren spoke with the Ledger-Enquirer about voter registration and voting in the General Election.

The Whitfield County Board of Elections will begin processing absentee mail ballots on October 22d, according to the Dalton Daily Citizen News.

Pursuant to State Election Board Emergency Rule 183-1-14-0.7-.15, the board will open absentee ballots and begin scanning them starting at 9 a.m. on Oct. 20 in the board’s office in the county courthouse, 205 N. Selvidge St. in Dalton. The process will be monitored as authorized by the rule.

This processing will not include any tallying or tabulation of results, only the opening of the envelopes and the ballot scanning.

The Savannah Morning News profiles the candidates for House District 166, which is currently held by Republican Jesse Petrea.

Typically, the [November] vote is more of a rubber stamp, with only a Republican candidate on the ballot.

Not so this year. For the first time since 2010, there is a Democratic challenger in the district. Michael Mack, a mental health professional and Wilmington Island resident, will face the three-term incumbent, Jesse Petrea.

District residents traditionally vote Republican. During the June primaries, nearly twice as many voters cast Republican ballots than Democratic ballots. The GOP preference explains why Republicans have run opposed in the district for a decade.

The Gainesville Times profiles the campaign between Republican State Rep. Emory Dunahoo and his District 30 challenger, Democrat Leigh Miller. The Times also look at Dunahoo on the issues.

A Donald Trump impersonator will join the pro-Trump boat parade on Lake Thurmond on the Georgia-South Carolina border Saturday, according to the Augusta Chronicle.

An advisory group is figuring out for whom Georgia college buildings are named as a first step in figuring out whether to rename them, according to the Gwinnett Daily Post.

Glynn County Commissioners voted to ban alcohol on “Frat Beach” during the GA-FL game weekend, according to The Brunswick News.

The ban will be in effect only on Nov. 6-7 and applied exclusively to East Beach on St. Simons Island.

Actually enforcing the ban is another matter. Commission Vice Chair Bill Brunson said it would be “naive” to believe the county can do so.

Glynn County Police Chief Jay Wiggins said Fourth Amendment restrictions on police search and seizure may come into play when identifying alcohol outside original containers.

More issues are likely to arise when officers have to interact with students. They will keep them safe, Wiggins said, but ideally contact with students would be minimized to keep officers from potentially contracting COVID-19.

It is “really a no-win situation,” Wiggins said.

Dalton expects to receive an additional $3.5 million in federal coronavirus funding, according to the Dalton Daily Citizen News.

That’s in addition to the $1.7 million the city has already received and spent on hazard pay for police officers, firefighters and Public Works employees, financial assistance for small businesses and food aid to low-income residents.

But at Wednesday’s meeting of the Dalton Finance Committee, some council members expressed concern. The $3.5 million would have to be spent before the end of the year, and so far, the state hasn’t released the money and hasn’t given the city any guidelines on how it can be spent.

Georgia received about $4.1 billion in COVID-19 relief funding from the federal government.

Sea turtles laid more than a quarter-million eggs on Georgia beaches, according to the Savannah Morning News.

Over the spring and summer, loggerhead sea turtles hauled their massive bodies from the sea and nested almost 3,000 times on Georgia beaches from Little Tybee to Cumberland.

That’s the third best year in recent records.

Cooperators count the hundred or so eggs in each nest, either when relocating the nests to higher ground if necessary or when examining the leathery shells left behind once the babies have hatched. The total egg count this year was 279,104, mostly from loggerheads but also from at least eight green turtle nests.

The first nest was discovered on Cumberland Island in late April and the last on Wassaw in late August. Nest continue to hatch, though that’s slowed with the most recent emergence on Sept. 20 on Sapelo, according to the data tracking website Seaturtle.org.