Word: agnew
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Maryland's fifth Republican Governor in 180 years, Agnew proved to be an eminently competent and imaginative chief executive. In contrast to some of his predecessors, he was positively revolutionary. Enjoying a year-long honeymoon with the Democrat-dominated state legislature, he pushed through a graduated income tax and obtained passage of one of the nation's toughest state antipollution laws. He also won repeal of the state's 306-year-old antimiscegenation law and signed the first statewide open-housing law below the Mason-Dixon line (which was across Maryland's northern border). The law was limited to dwellings...
Nixon's strategy rests on his ability to siphon off enough strength from Alabama's George Wallace to nail down the electoral votes of several Southern states. He is emphasizing "law and order" himself, but Agnew is doing it in much tougher terms. "Nixon and Agnew are riding the right issue?trouble in the streets," said a Maryland Republican. "It's the big issue. It outruns everything, especially with women voters. They're scared to death to walk down the street any more. But what a hell of an issue to have to run on." According to a Democratic strategist...
...record in the Governor's mansion was also laudably progressive. Even though Maryland's voters register 3 to 1 Democratic, Agnew was elected to the governorship in 1966 because, once again, the Democrats had been split by a bloody primary campaign. His opponent was Baltimore Contractor George P. Mahoney, a buffled-headed segregationist who campaigned on the slogan: "Your home is your castle?protect it." Agnew staked out a moderate position, emphasizing the need for fiscal responsibility and tax reform...
Personal Offense. In spite of that splendid record, the man from the suburbs was never fully attuned to the brutal realities of Baltimore's gritty ghettos. Last spring's riots in the wake of Martin Luther King's assassination wrought a peculiar change in Agnew. When he saw the Negroes who had helped him to defeat Mahoney rioting in the ghettos, he took it practically as a personal offense, reacting in the style of the stiff-necked counterpuncher...
Having restored order with National Guard and federal troops, he summoned about 100 of the city's black moderate leaders to a conference. Agnew dressed them down like a prison warden. He accused them of conspiring with such black radicals as Rap Brown and suggested that they had abdicated their leadership. "I publicly repudiate all white racists," he said. "I call upon you to publicly repudiate all black racists. This, so far, you have not been willing to do." Seventy of the Negroes angrily rose and walked out. State Senator Verda Welcome, who had praised Agnew as "a wonderful, honest...