Georgia Verdict

In bright red pajamas Lawrence W. ("Chip") Robert Jr. popped out of a plane in Atlanta one midnight last month, rushed with seven other members of Georgia's Board of Regents to a nearby building, there convened a special meeting of the board. Purpose: a last desperate effort to save Georgia's academic reputation. The regents hurriedly voted to rehire two educators they had previously voted to fire at the behest of Governor Eugene Talmadge (Dr. Walter D. Cocking and Dr. Marvin S. Pittman--TIME, July 21; July 28), then let Regent Robert resume his trip.

The maneuver failed. Governor Talmadge challenged the regents' action on the ground that they lacked a quorum, vowed that the dismissed educators would never come back. Last week, despite a penitent appeal by the regents, the Southern Association of Colleges & Secondary Schools, official accrediting agency, decided to blacklist ten colleges in Georgia's University System.

Having made a thorough investigation, the association held that Governor Talmadge had packed the board, that his university system had been made "the victim of unprecedented and unjustifiable political interference." It ruled that students' credits at University of Georgia, Georgia Tech and eight other State colleges would not be recognized by other universities after next Sept. 1.

Already dropped by the Southern University Conference and the Association of American Universities, the University of Georgia also is being investigated by the American Association of Collegiate Schools of Business and the American Medical Association's Council on Medical Education and Hospitals.

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