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1950 Georgia gubernatorial election

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Field	Value
election_name	1950 Georgia Democratic gubernatorial primary
country	Georgia (U.S. state)
type	presidential
ongoing	no
previous_election	1948 Georgia gubernatorial special election
previous_year	1948 (special)
next_election	1954 Georgia gubernatorial election
next_year	1954
election_date	June 28, 1950
flag_year	1920
image1	File:HermanTalmadge.jpg
image_size	150x150px
nominee1	Herman Talmadge
party1	Democratic Party (United States)
popular_vote1	287,637
percentage1	49.33%
electoral_vote1	295
image2	Melvin Thompson.png
nominee2	Melvin E. Thompson
party2	Democratic Party (United States)
popular_vote2	279,137
percentage2	47.88%
electoral_vote2	115
map_image	File:1950 Georgia gubernatorial Democratic primary election results map by county.svg
map_size	250px
map_caption	County results
Talmadge:
Tie:
Thompson:
title	Governor
before_election	Herman Talmadge
before_party	Democratic Party (United States)
after_election	Herman Talmadge
after_party	Democratic Party (United States)
votes_for_election	410 county unit votes
needed_votes	206 unit

Talmadge:

Tie: Thompson:

The 1950 Georgia gubernatorial election was held on November 7, 1950. Incumbent governor Herman Talmadge won the Democratic primary over Melvin Thompson on June 28 with 49.33% of the vote and 295 out of 410 county unit votes. The primary was a rematch of the 1948 special election. This would be the last gubernatorial rematch in the state until 2022.

At this time, Georgia was a one-party state, and the Democratic nomination was tantamount to victory. Talmadge was re-elected in the November general election without an opponent.

Democratic primary

County unit system

From 1917 until 1962, the Democratic Party in the U.S. state of Georgia used a voting system called the county unit system to determine victors in statewide primary elections.

The system was ostensibly designed to function similarly to the Electoral College, but in practice the large ratio of unit votes for small, rural counties to unit votes for more populous urban areas provided outsized political influence to the smaller counties.

Under the county unit system, the 159 counties in Georgia were divided by population into three categories. The largest eight counties were classified as "Urban", the next-largest 30 counties were classified as "Town", and the remaining 121 counties were classified as "Rural". Urban counties were given 6 unit votes, Town counties were given 4 unit votes, and Rural counties were given 2 unit votes, for a total of 410 available unit votes. Each county's unit votes were awarded on a winner-take-all basis.

Candidates were required to obtain a majority of unit votes (not necessarily a majority of the popular vote), or 206 total unit votes, to win the election. If no candidate received a majority in the initial primary, a runoff election was held between the top two candidates to determine a winner.

Candidates

Pat Avery
C. O. Baker
J. W. Jenkins
Herman Talmadge, incumbent governor since 1948
Melvin Thompson, former governor (1947–48)

Results

General election

Results

References

"County Unit System". Georgia County Clerks Association.
"Eugene Talmadge". The African American Experience.
(6 October 2011). "County Unit System, eh?". Richard B. Russell Library for Political Research and Studies.
(13 June 2017). "County Unit System".
"Our Campaigns - GA Governor -D Primary".
"Our Campaigns - GA Governor Race - Nov 07, 1950".

Info: Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

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