Elections past

In case you have not noticed, we are very close or have just passed the national elections for our country. This brings me back to a time when there was little or no competition for the votes of Georgia. We were called “Yellow Dog Democrats”. Georgians would vote for a yellow dog if he were a Democrat. I do not know how this started, but I do know why.

We had just suffered through the years of the Great Depression. Many folks in Emanuel County and through our state had lost everything, businesses, jobs, income and even homes. Hope for assistance was bleak until the Democratic candidate, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, offered us a New Deal. After his election in 1933 prosperity returned with jobs and many programs that erased the hardships. Therefore, for several following elections, we were considered loyal to a Democrat, even if it was a yellow dog. Of course, this was fatuous, but the yellow dog tale continued. We also had ties with FDR because of his bout with polio and recovery and death at Warm Springs. As the hearse carrying his body passed through the state, Georgians lined the roads.

I was so eager to be able to vote at age eighteen. My birthday is November 8, and election date on the Tuesday after first Monday in November was Nov 3. I missed being able to vote by five days. In the next election, I was living in Atlanta. I had to my cast my first ballot as an absentee. If possible, I do not vote early, mail in or absentee. I love the process of going to the polls, marking my ballot, placing it in the box and walking out wearing a “I Voted” pin. I am no longer a total yellow dog Democrat, but I would surely vote for FDR if he were still around. On November 5, 2024, enjoy the American privilege of voting and proudly wear your pin all day.

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