Alton Hornsby – författare

Shortly after taking office as Georgia's appointed United States senator in 2002, following the death of incumbent Republican senator Paul Coverdell, former governor Zell Miller stunned the political world with his tilt away from a moderate-liberal to a conservative politician. He further shocked political leaders, particularly in his own Democratic party, when he openly embraced the candidacy of Republican president George Bush for reelection in 2004. In the interim, Miller voted for most of Bush's conservative agenda in the Congress and lambasted his fellow Democrats, in and out of the Senate, as out of touch with contemporary American values. He also accused Democratic leaders of being overtly biased toward his native South. Most of these views were also expressed in his best-selling book, A National Party No More: The Conscience of a Conservative Democrat, which was published in 2003.This book investigates what some Democrats have called "the Miller betrayal" in the context of the politics of region, class, gender, and race. It seeks to explain Miller's political turn-about by detailing his southern origins and his devotion to what he and other Southerners view as a unique southern heritage based upon Christian and patriotic values. Professor Hornsby insightfully explores how Miller's "southern values" evolved and changed over time, leading to his oft-times radical swings in positions on major political, economical, and social issues. Prior to his term as senator in Washington, Miller had already acquired the name "Zig-Zag Zell" as a two-term Georgia governor.While political leaders and journalists alike have exhaustively attempted to explain Zell's baffling political conversion, this is the first work to study the topic, derived from what scholars have defined as "southernism", in terms of basic historical and contemporary issues.

From Reconstruction to recent times, the middle-class black leadership in Atlanta, while often subordinating class and gender differences to forge a continuous campaign for equality, successfully maintained its mantle of racial leadership for more than a century through a deft combination of racial advocacy and collaboration with local white business and political elites.Alton Hornsby provides an analysis of how one of the most important southern cities managed, adapted, and coped with the struggle for racial justice, examining both traditional electoral politics as well as the roles of non-elected individuals influential in the community. Highlighting the terms of Maynard Jackson and Andrew Young, the city's first two black mayors, Hornsby concludes by raising important questions about the success of black political power and whether it has translated into measurable economic power for the African American community.