Revolt of the Cities

For 60 years, populous Atlanta (331,314) has been frustrated by Georgia's archaic county-unit system, which keeps Democratic primaries and therefore state government firmly under the thumb of county woolhats. Four times suits to abolish the system have been instituted; each fizzled before the Supreme Court. Last week Atlanta's plucky Mayor William B. Hartsfield launched a determined fifth try. As Private Citizen Hartsfield, the mayor filed a Federal Court suit protesting that while Atlanta's Fulton County (pop. 473,572) contains 14% of Georgia's population, the county-unit system allows it only 1 1/2% of the state's voting power and is thereby discriminatory and unconstitutional.

Under the system,* statewide primaries are decided not by popular vote but by the number of unit votes for each candidate. The 121 least populous of Georgia's 159 counties cast two unit votes, the next 30 have four votes and the eight most populous counties have six votes. The candidate who wins a county's popular vote plurality also wins all its unit votes; the candidate with the most unit votes wins the primary. Under such a system a candidate can trail in popular votes and be elected. In 1946, for instance, red-gallusty Gene Talmadge lost the popular vote to Opponent James V. Carmichael, 297,245 to 313,389, beat Carmichael in unit votes, 242 to 146, thereby won a fourth term as governor.

Few Georgians expect Bill Hartsfield to have better success than earlier pleaders. But Georgians do believe that the county-unit system will eventually be defeated. The state's population is flowing from farm to city; growing cities--Macon, Augusta, Savannah, etc.--are beginning to suffer what Atlanta has suffered for 60 years at the hands of county legislators. When the cities agitate together, the wool-hats' reign may be doomed at last.

*The county-unit system is used in only one other state, Maryland.

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