Turner, a Democratic elector from Alabama, voted for a local circuit judge, Walter E. Jones, for president instead of the Democratic nominee, Adlai Stevenson.

There is an echo here of intellectuals’ reaction to the defeat of Adlai Stevenson, the liberal “egghead” candidate, in 1952.

In describing my grandmother, Eleanor Roosevelt, Adlai Stevenson once said “she would rather light a candle than curse the darkness.”