Well, I’m always up for a good 
story about unreconstructed Republicans making themselves look stupid with racial wackiness. And I thought maybe I had one. The Hotline picked up a story from the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer today which said that two members of the Georgia state legislature had some problems with a certain musical. (“The Broadway musical “South Pacific” is ‘offensive to Southern tradition,'” said two GA legislators 2/27″.) Here’s the item from the Ledger-Enquirer website.
Georgia Senators Attack “South Pacific” Themes
“South Pacific,” smash Broadway musical hit, is “offensive to Southern tradition,” two Georgia legislators charged yesterday.
Rep. David C. Jones of Sylvester and Sen. John Sheppard of Ashburn said in a written statement they would ask the next legislature for a bill to prevent the showing of “theatricals which have an underlying philosophy inspired by Moscow.”
Jones said the play “justifies intermarriage of different races” which “produces half breeds which are not conducive to the higher type of society… We in the South are a proud people and have pure blood lines. We want to keep it that way.”
Now, as regular readers know, TPM likes nothing better that ridiculing these sorts of yahoos.
But, I’ll be honest: this one just seemed a bit too good to be true. So I picked up the phone and called the Georgia House Information Office and the same office on the Senate side. According to them, neither of these men exists. At least, neither is a member of the Georgia House or Senate.
The other items on the page at the Ledger-Enquirer website are from the early 1950s so it seems like this is maybe something that actually happened back then. From the site, it’s just not clear. Whatever the case, on this one the Hotline looks like the Coldline.
TPM, preserving the good name of the South one step at a time.
