The Ghosts of the Mountain Hollers: Populism, George Wallace, and the Shift of the Southern Working Man
By Christopher M Peeks August 31, 2026
Driving past the old Paul Marsh general store, closed decades ago, you find the vestiges of the political era that built Alabama: old men in Red Man tobacco juice-stained overalls holding court inside the local feed and seed, some smoking unfiltered Lucky Strikes or pipes, wearing John Deere green hats. Once filled with the smell of loose tobacco and iron, this relic is the fossil of the former Southern Democrat.
These men, products of the New Deal and Square Deal, of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and his successor Harry S. Truman, benefited from these populist programs. By bringing electricity to the mountains, stabilizing corn prices on the farm, creating fair labor standards for the men in the mines, and bringing old-age pensions to maw and paw, the economic security created a safety net, hammering home the idea that Democrats championed the working man.
While the "yellow dog Democrats," who would vote for a yellow dog rather than a Republican, embraced those economic policies, the backlash against integration caused great upheaval when integrationists challenged the Jim Crow standard of separate water fountains that read "Colored" and "White."
Enter George Wallace, a New Deal Democrat who refused to walk out with Strom Thurmond and other Dixiecrats at the 1948 convention when Minneapolis Mayor Hubert Humphrey pushed the civil rights platform. Preaching this gospel of populism like a Pentecostal preacher speaking hellfire and brimstone to the masses, this "Fighting Judge" from Barbour County, a former Golden Gloves boxer made the crowds flock to him.
Pouncing on the mounting public defiance, he vowed never to be "out-n****** again" after losing the 1958 gubernatorial race in which the NAACP endorsed him while the Ku Klux Klan backed Alabama Attorney General John Patterson. Wallace came back with a vengeance in 1962, playing the race card and announcing in his inauguration, "Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever."
Beyond his stand in the schoolhouse door—in which Wallace rejected another campus riot like Ole Miss's, choosing to act as a Christ-like figure taking on the sins of the people and shielding the flock to prevent blood from being shed in Tuscaloosa that fateful day—he governed with a brand of populism that Huey Long could not touch.
The "Guvna" enacted broad policies that benefited both white and black Alabamians. The Junior College and Trade School Act armed many farm boys and inner-city youth with a marketable skill to take care of themselves and their families.
Before Wallace, children lacked the foundation to receive a basic education because most families could not afford textbooks. The Free Textbook Act of 1964 changed all this, ensuring no child would ever be hampered by lacking essential tools, while the statewide free school lunch program ensured that kids—some of whom previously went without even one proper meal a day—were fed and ready to learn.
From the floorboards of the old general store to the dirt roads built under Wallace's mentor Big Jim Folsom with his farm-to-market legislation—which built routes around the state allowing producers avenues of travel to sell their goods—that brand of populism created the Alabama we see today. The old men in John Deere green hats still exist; only political dynamics have shifted, with the national establishment leaving them instead of vice versa.
The ghost of these Southern Democrats still haunts the mountain hollers. With progressives steering today's organization, pushing things like a transgender agenda, attempting to block violent illegal immigrants from being removed from the country, and believing abortion on demand is some inalienable right, these old men still in their Skoal tobacco juice-stained overalls do not identify with the platform.
These old seed stores stand as a reminder of days gone by, and until modern leadership realizes they need more figures cut from the Wallace mold, their defeat in upcoming elections is assured.
Christopher M Peeks
Reporter and Columnist
Alabama Political Contributor
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