United States, Georgia, 32.75042, -83.50018Arnall, Ellis Gibbs, 1907-1992Henderson, Harold P.1988-03-28Ellis Gibbs Arnall was born in 1907 and attended public school in Newnan until college. Arnall attended Mercer University in Macon, Georgia, and transferred to the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. He graduated in 1928 and attended University of Georgia Law School. After graduating in 1931, Arnall returned to Newnan to practice law. He began his political career in 1932, when he was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives to represent Coweta County. As a freshman legislator, he was elected to Speaker pro tempore , a position to which he was reelected in 1935. In 1937, Governor Eurith D. (E.D.) Rivers appointed him as assistant attorney general and in 1939, to attorney general. In 1939, Arnall was the youngest attorney general in the country at thirty-one years old. In 1940, he was elected attorney general. In 1942, Arnall was elected governor, defeating Eugene Talmadge. He was the youngest governor in the country at that time. Arnall served from 1943 to 1947 with a progressive program that included reforming the prison system, repealing the poll tax, lowering the voting age, revising the state constitution (1945), establishing a teachers' retirement system, and paying off the state debt, as well as helping Georgia colleges regain accreditation. Arnall's reforms brought attention to the South, and his fight against discriminatory railroad freight rates helped boost the region's industrialization and economic prominence on the national scene. Unable to serve more than one successive term as governor by mandate of the state constitution, Arnall started a book lecture tour around the country after leaving office, marketing his books The Shore Dimly Seen (1946) and What the People Want (1948). He eventually returned to law practice and started the firm of Arnall, Golden, and Gregory, LLP, in Atlanta in 1949. In 1952, President Harry S. Truman appointed Arnall director of the Office of Price Stabilization, a position in which he served for six months. Arnall also became involved in the insurance business, serving as president of Dixie Life Insurance Company, chairman of the board of Coastal States Life Insurance, and vice chairman of the Sun Life Group of America. Arnall re-entered Georgia politics in 1966 when he ran for governor. While he did not win the Democratic primary, which after a run-off between Arnall and Lester Maddox went to Maddox, supporters created a substantial write-in campaign for him. Arnall served as the president of the Society of Independent Motion Picture Producers (1948-1963) and belonged to the Capital City Club, Piedmont Driving Club, and Central Baptist Church of Newnan. He was married to Mildred Slemons Arnall, who died in 1980, for forty-five years. They had two children, Alvan and Alice. In 1981, Arnall married Ruby Hamilton McCord. Ellis Arnall died on December 13, 1992.Interviewed by Harold Paulk (Hal) Henderson.Arnall discusses the election of 1948, including the support for M.E. Thompson and reasons why Herman Talmadge won. Arnall also talks about responses to the Talmadges’s and Roy V. Harris’s criticisms against him in the election of 1948 regarding the reputation of Georgia, civil rights, the county unit system, alleged corruption in road building (“negotiated contracts”), his relationship with the press, and alleged corruption while Arnall was president of the Pan-Hellenic Council at UGA. Arnall talks about why he did not run for office in the 1950s and 1960s, the state sales tax, Brown v. Board of Education, and Ernest Vandiver and the possibility of closing Georgia schools over integration (1959-1961).text/plainenghttp://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/Harold Paulk (Hal) Henderson, Sr. oral history collection.Georgia--Politics and governmentPolitics and governmentGeorgiaEllis G. Arnall interviewed by Harold Paulk (Hal) Henderson, Sr., 28 March 1988.Text