Return of a Moderate

The candidate who had most to lose from the riots in Atlanta's Negro slums was Ellis Arnall, a polished millionaire lawyer who in 1942 wrested the governorship from the legendary Gene Talmadge. Running as an outspoken racial moderate, Arnall, now 59, this year had to compete with five others for the Democratic nomination to succeed Governor Carl Sanders. His most formidable opposition came from segregationists, who did their utmost to exploit the specter of black power.

As it turned out, last week's primary gave Arnall a 45,000-vote margin over his closest rival. His showing was all the more remarkable because in the county courthouses, which still pay fealty to Ol' Gene's son Herman, he is unfondly remembered as the "boy wonder" Governor who hobbled the Talmadge machine, abolished the state's poll tax, and established a merit system for state employees.

Since his 211,000 votes did not constitute a clear majority, Arnall faces a runoff on Sept. 28 against Atlanta's Lester Maddox, 50, who became a martyr to the segregationist cause by closing down his Pickrick restaurant in Atlanta rather than obey the 1964 civil rights law barring racial discrimination in public accommodations. Maddox drew 166,000 votes in an unexpectedly close struggle for second place with State

Senator Jimmy Carter, 41, a moderate in the Arnall mold, who had so meager a pre-primary following that people habitually referred to him as "Jimmy Who?" As it turned out, the Arnall-Carter brand of rational race relations pulled a total of 365,000 votes, 25,000 more than Maddox and two other ardent white supremacists could raise between them.

Arnall is an odds-on favorite to trounce Maddox in next week's runoff. In the November election, he will run head-on into a powerhouse Republican candidate, Representative Howard ("Bo") Callaway, 39, who is also a millionaire. A states'-righter who was elected on the tails of Barry Goldwater's 1964 Georgia victory, Callaway is given at least an even chance of defeating Arnall, to become Georgia's first Republican Governor since Reconstruction.

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