The People's Choice (story)

"The People's Choice" is a short story by Erskine Caldwell, a satire on 1930s local politics and religion in the writer's home state of Georgia and by extension on those topics in general.

Streetman is a heavy drinker of corn and gin, of which he keeps stashes at his home, at the barber shop where he spends much of his time and at his office in the local courthouse.

In the evening he emerges and goes to a traveling carnival visiting the town, taking in all the side shows with a big crowd of men and boys following him around the grounds, "whooping it up with him".

Noticing around midnight a tent featuring the sexually provocative performance of a "hoochie coochie girl", Streetman buys several dozen tickets and invites everybody to join him.

His friends disentangle him with difficulty from the furiously fighting girl, and take him to the back room of the barber shop before the marshal's arrival on the scene.