The "U.S. News and World Report" forecast a Callaway victory because of the Republican's business support. Republican optimism had soared in the 1966 municipal elections, when their candidates won the offices of mayor and all six city council seats in Savannah, the state's second largest city. Arnall compiled a dossier on Callaway, which he claimed would guarantee a Democratic victory in the fall, with him as the head of the ticket. He denounced the tax-exempt status of the Callaway Foundation. "Time" proclaimed Arnall "the odds on favorite;" "Newsweek" predicted that Maddox was "certain to lose." The "Athens Daily News" claimed that Maddox lacked "a Chinaman's chance." The "Macon Telegraph" said that Maddox's "anger, hate, and vengeance... has from earliest biblical times... divided and destroyed."