Herman Talmadge - Career After 1946

Career After 1946

Talmadge soon gave in to the court decision and prepared for the special election in 1948, in which Talmadge defeated Governor Thompson. Talmadge was then elected to a full term in 1950. During his terms, Talmadge encouraged industry to move into Georgia. He remained a staunch supporter of racial segregation.

Talmadge was barred by law from seeking another full term as Governor in 1954. He was elected to the United States Senate in 1956. That same year, a "faithless elector" from Alabama cast a single Electoral College vote for Talmadge as Vice President of the United States. During his time as U.S. Senator, Talmadge remained a foe of civil rights legislation. After President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Talmadge, along with more than a dozen other southern Senators, boycotted the 1964 Democratic National Convention. With the help of Richard Russell, Talmadge was appointed to the Agriculture Committee during his first year in Washington and to the Senate Finance Committee shortly thereafter. Talmadge would eventually be named chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee. He sponsored bills to help farmers, an important constituency, and served on the Senate Watergate Committee.

In 1968, Talmadge faced the first of his three Republican challengers for his Senate seat. E. Earl Patton (1927-2011), later a member of the Georgia State Senate, received 256,796 votes (22.5 percent) to Talmadge's 885,103 (77.3 percent). Patton, a real estate developer, was the first Republican in Georgia to run for the U.S. Senate since the Reconstruction era.Talmadge won another large reelection margin in 1974, but he ran afoul of Republican Mack Mattingly in 1980.

On October 11, 1979, Talmadge was "denounced" by an 81–15 vote of the Senate for "improper financial conduct" between 1973 and 1978, after having accepted reimbursements of $43,435.83 for official expenses not incurred and for improper reporting of such as campaign expenditures.

Talmadge also went through a divorce from his wife and a tough primary challenge from Zell Miller in 1980. Talmadge defeated Miller but lost to Mack Mattingly in the general election. Mattingly was the first Republican to represent Georgia in the Senate since Reconstruction, but he was unseated in 1986 by the Democrat Wyche Fowler.

After his defeat, Talmadge retired to his home where he died more than two decades later at the age of eighty-eight. Talmadge had two sons, Herman E. Talmadge, Jr., and Robert Shingler Talmadge.