George Wallace (World War III-1956)
From Alternative History
George Corley Wallace, Jr.
36th President of the United States from January 20th, 1969 until January 20th, 1973. Noted for his failures in stemming the growing Civil Rights Movement and public and attempts to maintain racial segregation and "Jim Crow" laws.
Wallace lost to California Governor Ronald Reagan in the 1972 election.
His failure to embrace, and even to oppose, the Civil Rights Movement, split the Democratic Party, which didn't recover until the 1984 election of Jimmy Carter.
[edit] Later Life
Wallace was considered disgraced, not only by his loss of re-election, but his stance on civil rights. He returned to Montgomery and lived out the rest of his life there.
His wife, First Lady Cornelia Snively Wallace divorced him in 1980. In 1984 Wallace married Lisa Taylor, a country music singer. That relationship ended in 1990.
In the late 1980s, Wallace had what he called an "epiphany" and publicly repented and apologized for his racist past. He spent the remaining years of his life speaking before black churches and black civil rights groups, asking forgiveness and promoting racial harmony.
Upon his death in 1998, Martin Luther King Jr. surprisingly offered a eulogy for Wallace, praising his later life and stating that it showed "the potential for redemption in all men."
