The Legacy of George Wallace
Alabama's Governor George Wallace faces General Henry Graham in Tuscaloosa on June 12, 1963, at the University of Alabama. Despite an order of the federal court, Governor George Wallace appointed himself the temporary University registrar and stood in the doorway of the administration building to prevent the students from entering. -/AFP via Getty Images hide caption
Alabama's Governor George Wallace faces General Henry Graham in Tuscaloosa on June 12, 1963, at the University of Alabama. Despite an order of the federal court, Governor George Wallace appointed himself the temporary University registrar and stood in the doorway of the administration building to prevent the students from entering.
-/AFP via Getty ImagesDuring his Alabama gubernatorial inauguration in 1963, George Wallace famously said: "Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever!"
That same year, Wallace tried to halt the integration of the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. And he tried to do it himself. Wallace famously stood in the doorway of an auditorium on the school's campus to block two black students, Vivian Malone and James Hood, from entering.
Despite this history, Wallace's name still appears on buildings across Alabama – including in Birmingham, at the University of Alabama's Bell-Wallace Gymnasium.
Some students say they're not okay with having a building still named for Wallace. What does that debate look like on campus?
And we also talked about Wallace's influence in shaping American populism, and how his political rhetoric and legacy reverberated across the entire country, not just the South.
With us to talk about his legacy are Shreya Pokhrel, a student organizer at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, Horace Huntley, the founding director of the Oral History Project at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute and Dan Carter, author of "The Politics of Rage: George Wallace, The Origins of the New Conservatism, and the Transformation of American Politics."
This episode was produced by Kaity Kline and Haili Blassingame.
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