Man with Music

Next year South Carolina will swear in a new governor to replace old (74) James Francis Byrnes, who may not succeed himself under the state's one-term law. Last week, with the filing deadline past, the voters found the Democratic Primary (June 8) narrowed to two candidates.

Lester Lee Bates, 48, is a loud-talking, nondrinking, nonsmoking insurance-company president from Columbia. Bates, who ran a poor second to Byrnes in 1950, never stopped campaigning Accompanied by a male quartet (later built up to a mixed octet), he has hustled around the state speaking at family reunions, barbecues, church dinners and almost anywhere he finds more than two voters gathered. (Cracked a sponsor: "We can get a speaker anywhere, but where else can we get one with a quartet?")

His opponent is Lieut. Governor George Bell ("Little George") Timmerman, 41, a lawyer with offices in Lexington. Little George is the son of "Big George" Timmerman, once a power in the state's Democratic Party organization, and one of the federal district judges who ruled in favor of public-school segregation in the South Carolina test case now before the U.S. Supreme Court. An aloof, self-assured politician, Timmerman is campaigning quietly, speaking extemporaneously, without musical background.

There are few basic differences between the two candidates, e.g., both believe in public-school segregation. But the race issue has risen. There has been whispered criticism of Bates because his insurance company sells to Negroes; he will probably get most of the Negro vote. Although Timmerman has the behind-the-scenes support of most party leaders, the man with music last week was generally conceded to be running well ahead of Little George.

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