Coup: The Day the Democrats Ousted Their Governor, Put Republican Lamar Alexander in Office Early, and Stopped a Pardon Scandal

Epilogue: What Became of Them

233 Epilogue What Became of Them They never spoke of it after. Among the principals, there were no further meetings on the subject, ever. In later years, Wilder seemed the least inclined to discuss the coup or to revisit the decision or the day in any form. McWherter did not bring up the subject with the others; in a 2005 interview, he said he had never discussed the coup even with Wilder, whom he knew for forty-three years as legislative colleague, fellow party elder, and friend. Nor did Alexander and Leech, who as governor and attorney general worked together most closely through the early years of the new administration, ever discuss the coup again. Hardin quickly resumed his work as the US attorney and, two years later, left that post to return to his private law practice in Nashville. Chief Justice Joe Henry, for the remaining months of his life, likewise kept his own counsel about what he had done and why. There was one attempt at a reunion of sorts, but it was canceled before it happened. It was to be a private dinner, one year later, at the governor’s residence. Only eight people were to attend: the six principals—Alexander, the two speakers, Hardin, Leech and Henry—plus Lewis Donelson and Tom Ingram. “It was Lamar’s idea,” Hardin recalled. “He said, ‘You know, we all ought to get together while we still remember, and talk about it.” At the time, Alexander instructed his staff not only that the evening would be private but also that if news reporters or others inquired about the gathering, no one should call it an “anniversary” nor use any other term suggesting celebration. Instead, it would simply be described for what it was— the first occasion the small group of participants in the coup had had to come together, out of range of reporters and TV cameras, to reflect quietly together on what had transpired, what they had done, the history they had made. “I wanted to do it out of curiosity, and maybe for history,” Alexander told 234 COUP me. “We all knew what we’d individually done that day—and why—but I don’t think any of us knew much about what the others had done.” In short order, all agreed to attend, except Wilder. When he declined, Alexander quickly called the whole thing off—worried that some of the others might then reconsider and stay away also, or that word of the dinner would get around more publicly and its purpose be misreported and misunderstood , or both. “He [Wilder] was afraid it might look like he was participating in something that was gloating over Ray Blanton’s demise,” Alexander told me. “He was Ray Blanton’s state senator, that was his territory, and he was a cautious man anyway. And so we didn’t have the dinner.” Five months later, Joe Henry was dead. There were a handful of retrospective events over the years involving a few of the surviving participants, mostly organized by the legal communities in Knoxville and Nashville. A public program at Vanderbilt University in April 2012 featured Alexander and Hardin on a panel discussion that also included Fred Thompson and Bill Koch, and Donelson was in the audience. But by this time the other principals in the coup were gone. Bill Leech died in 1996, Wilder in 2010, and McWherter the year after that. Hal Hardin told me, in 2011, that even he and his old friend Bill Leech never revisited the subject of the coup, did not look back together on how the awkward afternoon had unfolded in room 416 on that cold January day. He also said that over three decades, he and Alexander never reminisced about the extraordinary midday phone call, nor how the decision was finally made just four hours later. Alexander confirmed this. He told me, in fact, that he had been unaware of many of the specific actions of Hardin and of Leech through that long afternoon of the fateful day, until he read this manuscript. Nor was it necessary to talk about it. The decision, though unprecedented, was efficiently transacted. It was a job that needed doing, and the principal officials did it without any excess of review or palaver afterward. Though the final minutes of the transition became suddenly very public, the principals had determined that their decision had to be made in strictest secrecy—lest more prisoners be irretrievably released, lest civil disorder...