Miller's parents were both involved in local politics in the North Georgia mountains. Miller, a Democrat, taught history and political science at Young Harris College, In 1964 and 1966, Miller unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for the
United States House of Representatives. He endorsed
segregation in both races. In these congressional races, Miller denounced Lyndon Johnson as ""a Southerner who has sold his birthright for a mess of dark porridge.". Miller later served in state government as the executive secretary to Governor
Lester Maddox Miller was elected
Lieutenant Governor of Georgia in 1974, serving four terms from 1975 to 1991, through the terms of Governors
George Busbee and
Joe Frank Harris, making him the longest-serving lieutenant governor in Georgia history. In 1980, Miller unsuccessfully challenged
Herman Talmadge in the Democratic primary for his seat in the
United States Senate. Some analysts surmised that Miller so severely weakened Talmadge in the primary, considered one of Georgia's nastiest, that it caused Talmadge to narrowly lose in the fall to Georgia's first Republican elected to the Senate since Reconstruction,
Mack Mattingly.
Governor of Georgia Miller was elected governor of Georgia in
1990, defeating
Republican Johnny Isakson (who later became his successor as U.S. Senator) after defeating former
Atlanta Mayor
Andrew Young and future Governor
Roy Barnes in the primary. Miller campaigned on the concept of term limits and pledged to seek only a single term as governor. He later ran for and won re-election in
1994.
James Carville was Miller's campaign manager. In 1991, Miller endorsed Governor
Bill Clinton of
Arkansas for president. Miller gave the
keynote speech at the 1992
Democratic National Convention at
Madison Square Garden in New York City. The HOPE Scholarships were funded by revenue collected from the state lottery. In December 1995, his office announced a proposal for $1 billion more in spending on education. HOPE won praise from national Democratic leaders. The HOPE Scholarship program still to this day provides Georgia students with an opportunity to attend a public college or university, who otherwise may have no opportunity to do so. Upon leaving the governor's office in January 1999, Miller accepted teaching positions at Young Harris College, Emory University, and the University of Georgia. He was a visiting professor at all three institutions when he was appointed to the U.S. Senate in 2000.) and oil drilling in the
Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. However, Miller remained a Democrat, saying, "I'll be a Democrat 'til the day I die." Miller campaigned for fellow Georgia Democrat
Max Cleland in his
2002 re-election campaign against Republican Congressman
Saxby Chambliss, despite their ideological differences. Miller argued in his book
A National Party No More: The Conscience of a Conservative Democrat (authored and published in 2003) that the Democratic Party lost its majority because it did not stand for the same ideals that it did in the era of
John F. Kennedy. He argued that the Democratic Party, as it now stood, was a far left-wing party that was out of touch with the America of today and that the Republican Party now embraced the conservative Democratic ideals that he had held for so long. The book spent nine weeks in the
New York Times Best Seller list for hardcover non-fiction, peaking at number four. In 2003, Miller announced that he would not seek re-election after completing his term in the Senate. He also announced that he would support President
George W. Bush in the
2004 presidential election rather than any of the nine candidates then competing for
his own party's nomination. Shortly after announcing his retirement, Miller began to call for the repeal of the
Seventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which allowed for the direct election of U.S. Senators, rather than having U.S. Senators be elected by state legislatures. During his four years in the Senate, Zell Miller received a cumulative rating of 70% from the
American Conservative Union, including a rating of 96% in 2004.
2004 election support for Republicans In his keynote speech at the
2004 Republican National Convention, delivered on September 1, 2004, Miller criticized the state of the Democratic Party. He said, "No pair has been more wrong, more loudly, more often than the two senators from Massachusetts –
Ted Kennedy and
John Kerry." He also criticized John Kerry's Senate voting record, claiming that Kerry's votes against bills for defense and weapon systems indicated support for weakening U.S. military strength. The speech was well received by the convention attendees, especially the Georgia delegates. Conservative commentator
Michael Barone compared the speech to the views and ideology of
Andrew Jackson. Miller's combative reaction to post-speech media interviews received almost as much attention as the speech itself. First, in an interview with
CNN, Miller had a dispute with
Judy Woodruff,
Wolf Blitzer, and
Jeff Greenfield when they questioned him on his speech, particularly on whether he had misinterpreted the context and full content of Kerry's votes, and the fact that
Dick Cheney, as Defense Secretary, had opposed some of the same programs he attacked Kerry for voting against. Shortly thereafter, Miller appeared in an interview with
Chris Matthews on the
MSNBC show
Hardball. After Miller expressed irritation at Matthews' line of questioning, Matthews pressed Miller with the question, "Do you believe now – do you believe, Senator, truthfully, that John Kerry wants to defend the country with spitballs?" Miller angrily told Matthews, "
That was a metaphor, wasn't it? Do
you know what a metaphor is? This is your program, and I'm a guest on your program, so I want to try to be as nice as I possibly can to you. I wish I was over there where I could get a little closer up into your face...I knew you was gonna be coming with all of that stuff...I think we ought to cancel this interview...get out of my face", and declared, "I wish we lived in the day where you could challenge a person to a
duel." Miller later said about the interview, "That was terrible. I embarrassed myself. I'd rather it had not happened." After Bush won the election of 2004, Miller referred to the Republican victories in that election (including a sweep of five open Senate seats in the South) as a sign that Democrats did not relate to most Americans. Calling for Democrats to change their message, he authored a column, which appeared in
The Washington Times on November 4, 2004, in which he wrote:
Post-2004 endorsements In 2008, after
Barack Obama was elected president and Democrats increased their majorities in the House and Senate, Miller endorsed Republican
Saxby Chambliss in the
Senate run-off against Democrat
Jim Martin and criticized Obama over "spreading the wealth." In 2012, Miller served as the national co-chair to the campaign of Republican presidential candidate
Newt Gingrich. The same year, Miller endorsed
Doug Collins, the Republican candidate in the 9th District of Georgia congressional race. However, he also endorsed incumbent Republican governor
Nathan Deal for reelection. ==Life after politics==