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224 Chapter 21 The White Morning Sunday, when it snowed, it was like all of it had been washed away. —Honey Alexander News of the coup dominated front pages of the next day’s newspapers, and still more elected officials spoke their minds. “It had to be done to stop the insanity of Ray Blanton,” said Senator Victor Ashe, the Republican from Knoxville. He described the ousted governor as “an individual who went berserk.” Senator Joe Crockett, a Democrat from Nashville: “We kind of feel we’ve had our own little Watergate. It’s a sad time to be a Democrat. I hope the people don’t judge the party by the actions of its former leader.” The two days that followed, Thursday and Friday, were full of more quick decisions through an uncharted situation. If there had been “no road map” for the coup itself, this first full day of the accelerated transition was a time unlike any encountered before in American history. Alexander did not go to the capitol on these two days. He would not sit at his new desk until Monday morning, following the scheduled inauguration on Saturday. Ingram, Donelson, and a few others did arrive early on Thursday to begin reorganizing the office, but on Bill Koch’s advice, no official decisions were to be made. The new cabinet officers, who would not be sworn in until Saturday, were cautioned not to visit their new offices until Monday morning and, in any case, were not to transact any government business until after the weekend. This was chiefly to minimize the chances for any legal challenge from outside parties to official acts that might otherwise have been made between Wednesday night and Saturday morning. In spite of the high volume of television news coverage throughout the night before, at least two members of Blanton’s administrative staff at the capitol had not seen or heard the news and arrived for work as normal. For them the day would be most abnormal. They quickly discovered the world was upside down. The White Morning 225 One of these state employees was Lee Lucas. She and her friend Terry Huffman, who worked on the opposite end of the floor in the finance and administration office, normally carpooled to and from their homes in Hendersonville . This morning, neither was aware the coup had occurred. On Wednesday afternoon, Lucas and Huffman had departed the capitol at about 5:00 p.m. as usual. Once home, Lucas quickly departed to meet her sister Diane, who had offered her an after-hours job assisting with endof -year inventory at Castner-Knott Company, the retail department store in Hendersonville. Since the inventory work ran into the late evening, Lucas did not see either the 6:00 or 10:00 p.m. local news on television. “Next morning, Terry and I drove back in to the capitol, and we saw TV trucks parked outside,” she said. “I just assumed that was because of the earlier investigation. It wasn’t unusual to see TV trucks there. The capitol had already been invaded once by the FBI. Terry parked and we went in. It was about a quarter to eight.” Reporters were in the hallway, clustering around the governor’s office. “I thought, ‘Wow, what’s going on?’ I just assumed I was still working for Blanton, thinking I haven’t heard yet from the new administration, but hoping I would hear something. I was mainly just coming in until I was told to do something different. Terry went to her office, on the other end of the first floor, and I went to the reception room. Tom Ingram was there. There were two reporters and a TV camera. I put my purse down at my desk.” Ingram: Are you Lee Lucas? Lucas: Yes. Ingram: We need to talk. He led her behind a pair of double doors, into the space that had been Gene Blanton’s unofficial office. Lucas, at this moment, was wondering, “Is this where he tells me to leave? Am I still going to have a job?” This conversation was tense but brief. “Lamar Alexander was sworn in early,” Ingram told her. “They’re all gone. He swung his arm in a sweeping motion. “We need you to keep doing what you’ve been doing as receptionist. Do what you always did. There will be a lot of reporters up here today. You’ll have some help.” “He introduced me to Sharon Sinclair...

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