Released August 2013
COUP
COUP is the story of the extraordinary 1979 ouster of Tennessee’s Governor Ray Blanton by senior leaders of his own political party. Based on 163 interviews, Keel Hunt’s COUP describes one fateful day when collaborators came together from opposite sides of the political aisle and – with no precedent in American history - reached agreement to stop what one FBI agent called “the state’s most heinous political crime in half a century” – selling pardons for cash.
On January 17, 1979, driven by new information that some of the worst criminals in the state’s penitentiaries were about to be released (and fears that James Earl Ray might be one of them), a small bipartisan group chose to take charge. Senior Democratic leaders, friends of the sitting governor, together with the Republican governor-elect Lamar Alexander (now U.S. Senator from Tennessee), agreed to oust Blanton from office before another night fell. It was a maneuver unique in American political history.
FROM THE FOREWORD BY JOHN L. SEIGENTHALER
“The individual stories of those government officials involved in the coup–each account unique, but all of them intersecting–were scattered like disconnected pieces of a jigsaw puzzle on the table of history until the author conceived this book. Perhaps because it happened so quickly, and without major disagreement, protest, or dissent, this truly historic moment has been buried in the public mind. In unearthing the drama in gripping detail, Keel Hunt assures that the ‘dark day’ will be remembered as a bright one in which conflicted politicians came together in the public interest.”
What others have said about Keel Hunt’s COUP…
“…told with page-turning intensity”
–Professor Michael Nelson, Presidential Historian at Rhodes College
“A recommended read for anyone interested in Tennessee history or politics.”
–Tom Humphrey, Knoxville News Sentinel
“…a great accomplishment of reporting and writing. It’s a page-turner from start to finish, with lots of great insights into the characters involved and a compelling chronicle of compelling events.”
–Kenneth Jost, Author of The Supreme Court Yearbook
“…well-written and hard to put down once you open the first pages.”
–Victor Ashe, former Mayor of Knoxville and U.S. Ambassador to Poland
“Every elected official in America should read it.”
–Philip Bredesen, former Governor of Tennessee
“Keel Hunt gives us a fascinating account of an important moment in Tennessee history. It’s a story of a time when Tennesseans of both parties came together to resolve a crisis that had rocked the state.”
–Fred Thompson, former U.S. Senator from Tennessee
“This is a story about men of different political parties who found ourselves in a place none of us wanted to be and how we worked together over a few hours to do something unprecedented but necessary that none of us wanted to do. What fascinates me 34 years later is how much I did not know about what had happened until I read Keel Hunt’s book.”
–Lamar Alexander, former Tennessee Governor and U.S. Senator
“ In those few hours, key political leaders of both parties came to know, trust and rely on one another to achieve results and opened the door to a very different future. What followed was 40 years of bipartisanship collaboration to get Tennessee to the point it is today.”
–Doug Jones, former U.S. Senator of Alabama, in a 2018 speech to the National Association of Former United States Attorneys.
Click here to read Senator Jones’ speech to the former U.S. Attorneys
Photos from COUP
