Chauncey Sparks

Gov. Chauncy Sparks House
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Location	257 Broad St., Eufaula, Alabama
Coordinates	31°53′40″N 85°8′45″W / 31.89444°N 85.14583°W / 31.89444; -85.14583Coordinates: 31°53′40″N 85°8′45″W / 31.89444°N 85.14583°W / 31.89444; -85.14583
Area	less than one acre
Built	1857
Architectural style	Greek Revival
NRHP Reference #	72000157
Added to NRHP	June 28, 1972

George Chauncey Sparks (October 8, 1884 – November 6, 1968), known as Chauncey Sparks, was an attorney and Democratic American politician who served as the 41st Governor of Alabama from 1943 to 1947. He made improvements to state education of whites and expanded the state schools and centers for agriculture. He campaigned for passage of the Boswell Amendment to the state constitution, which was designed to keep blacks disfranchised following the US Supreme Court ruling Smith v. Allwright (1944) against use of white primaries by the Democratic Party in the states.

Under the state constitution, Alabama governors at the time could not serve consecutive terms so Sparks left office without seeking reelection. In 1950, Sparks ran unsuccessfully for reelection as governor.

Chauncey Sparks was born in Barbour County, Alabama, the son of George Washington and Sarah E. (Castello) Sparks. After the death of his father when Chauncey was two years old, the family moved to Quitman County, Georgia where his mother's people lived. He attended school and helped with the family farm. Sparks graduated from Mercer University in Macon, Georgia in 1907 with a Bachelor of Arts degree and received his law degree in 1910.

He wanted to return to Alabama and passed the State Bar exam that year, opening a law practice in Eufaula soon afterward. It was the commercial center of Barbour County, which still had prosperous, extensive white-owned plantations and a majority-black population. Most blacks had been disfranchised since 1901, when the state passed a new constitution containing voter registration requirements such as poll taxes, literacy tests and grandfather clauses, resulting in virtual exclusion of blacks from the political system until after passage of federal legislation in the mid-1960s to enforce their constitutional rights as citizens. Tens of thousands of poor whites were also excluded at the time and over the following decades. In the first half of the 20th century, Alabama was effectively a one-party state controlled by white Democrats.