Speech at the Hungry Club Forum, Atlanta, Georgia, on what the elections mean for Americans, 1976 November 3 (2 of 2)

1 The loudest sound to be heard in Atlanta as last night's long count came to a climax was not the cheers and happy tears of the victory celebration held to hearald the success of the fi[?] region's first native son to suceed in national politics in 100 years; it was rather the quiet click of thousands of suitcase locks as final packing for the great exodus for washington begins.

Never who have so many placed their faith - and roisked their political fortunes - on a chance so obsure. Never before in memory has a candidate for the White House so captured the attention and loyalty of so many in so fervent a fashion.

Never before

2 We have just completed the quadrennial occasion in whicech Americans express their preferences about what kind of world they want to live in.

Despite all predicton to the contrary the [illegible] was respectible one, and the result not [illegiblr

It has been a rather long time coming. For Jimmy Carter and his early supporters, it was the climax of more that two years of planning and work.

For those veterans of the contests of 1972 and 1968, it was a chance at power again, the creation of four years of breathing space in which to plot and plan the future.

For the loser, it is the end of a career that had already gonor ^gone further than it should.

For the country, it was a chance to turn loose a government which had been warm toward special interests and tight with a helping hand toward those who needed it.

For the winner, it was the beginning of a chance to prove that was not misplaced, the kope hope could be born again, and that charity would begin at home.

3 What yesterday's election ^finally means is a subject to be debated for many, many months to come.

For some it signifies a New South, a dissapearance of yesterday's politics of race in this region, and the return of the Confederate states ^back into the Union.

For others, the election will have no regional significance at all, but will serve ^only as a classic example of an outsider's achievement against entrenched ^{ane established} power.

For others, this will mark the first American election in which Black voters "qualified" a candidate, made it all right for [illegible] suspicious ^voters often while [illegible to cast their votes for a white Southerner. For some, it simply means that the electorate had had too much for crime in the suites, too much unemployment and inflation, too much of an administration that government governed by veto, and that Democrats turn had come round again.

For whatever reason or combination of reasons, one man has triumphed and another lost. In the process, new political fortunes have been made.

4 That the choice we were offered this year were not ^{did not appear to be} universally popular or inspiring is not surprising. Yesterday's scandals have reinforced an old American suspicion of political figures. The contradictory rhetoric one heard from the candidates added to the inescapable conclusion that in order to bei all things to everyone they were willing ^{at times,} to be nothing at all. The federal election law guaranteed a monopoly [illegible] and public subsidies for only two political parties, and a complicated series of state election laws insured that lesser candidates ^{and smaller parties} would never really have a chance to place their option before the public.

In the end, for most voters, the choice was between the accidental president, ^{slow minded and toungue-twisted,} elevated to office _only because two other men committed crimes which threw them out, and the arrogant, self-assured Georgian, riding a crest of regional pride and the outsider's image past all comers to his party's nomination.

5 The election held on yesterday was [illegible] clearly several things to different people, but apparently for a large number of Americans who chose not to choose, it was a ^only choice between "Fritz and [illegible between the unknown and the known, between the "luster" and the "lackx - luster" a choice of which picture would hang on the post office wall.

But for most Americans, the choice became one between the unproved promises, of one fallible man and the poor past performance of another - nothing else, no ^single issue of massive importance, no single concern for ending any particular problem seemed to intrude on the public consciousness.

It was a dramatic election up to election day. The opposing candidates went form [?] ³³ spread ^{in July, to 18 points in August,} to an unpredictable margin too close to call ^{on election eve.}

The entire political year, beginning in New Hampshire's chill in January, has been an unusal one.

1976 was the year in which >[?] American voters in both major parties had more to say about who would win than ever before. Despite the real retreats the Democrat party made from [?] its strong stand in favor of minorities iin 1972, both parties offered a greater chance for the candidates to meet the voters, to be questioned and tested by them, and to submit their platform, promises and past performance to the public jury.

What occurred then, was a record ^high number of primaries in which a large number of candidates offerred themselves to a record small number of voters. Pluralities replace majorities, and candidates won with margins that might have guaranteed oblivion in years before.

The American political process guarantees only a series of declining options - the primary season narrowed them down, as the song goes, to a precious few.

The pre-election surveys showed the electorate in an unusual state of flux. According to the New York Times - CBS poll, Ford passed Carter in America's cuburbs and small towns; Ford passed Carter among voters under 29, and ^{an early} Carter and [illegible] among Black voters had been out with more than over before saying they were undecided.

The reasons why a candidate slides from sure victory on Labor Day to possible defeat the day before the election will be left for others to decide and debate - the lack of issues, or our lack of any perception of them, the candidates' [illegible] character or lack of it - all these ^will become chapters in the civics textbook of tomorrow.

For many Americans, [?] Tuesday's choice was unimportant, and anyo