" You can go back to bed, Walter, they have stole your Pa's nomination." These words were my initiation into the game of politics. The year was 1912, I was nine years old, and we were living in Toccoa at the North Georgia home of my banker brotherin-law. My mother had moved up from our home in nearby Bowman to take care of my sister and her first baby. I had waited up most of the night to hear the news of my father's fate in the balloting for Commissioner of Agriculture at the state Democratic convention in Macon. In those days there was, of course, no radio and communication was generally poor. However, my brothers, Polk and Ves, were in Macon, and after the convention vote they left on the long automobile trip back to Toccoa. In the early morning hours