A third difference is that companies are now being judged by both current and potential future employees about where they stand on the country’s critical issues. Young employees are pressuring their companies’ leaders to speak out. They want companies to take pride in their stands on issues such as climate change, income inequality and diversity. Companies that refuse to get involved risk alienating their workforces.
Companies are also more susceptible to pressure than they ever were before. Michael Useem, a management professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, told me that he thought that the pressure that activist investors have applied to companies has inspired other groups. That seems plausible when you look at Georgia.
After the voting bill first passed, Delta, Coca-Cola Co. and Home Depot Inc., all based in Atlanta, issued mild statements supporting voting rights without criticizing the new law. Then Frazier and Kenneth Chenault, the former CEO of American Express, wrote the open letter signed by 70 other Black executives opposing the law. On Tuesday night, Frazier and Chenault also began lobbying White CEOs behind the scenes.
By Wednesday, the damning statements were pouring in. “The entire rationale for this bill is based on a lie: that there was widespread voter fraud in Georgia in the 2020 election,” said Ed Bastian, the CEO of Delta. James Quincey, the CEO of Coke, said, “The Coca-Cola Company does not support this legislation, as it makes it harder for people to vote, not easier.”
Home Depot, JPMorgan, Facebook Inc., Apple Inc., Bank of America Corp. and at least a dozen other large U.S. companies also issued strong statements backing expanded voting rights and opposing the Georgia law. Mark Mason, the chief financial officer of Citigroup, wrote on LinkedIn, “I see it as a disgrace that our country’s efforts to keep Black Americans from engaging fully in our Constitutional right to vote continue to this day.”
The initial response in Georgia both from Governor Brian Kemp and key legislators was to push back. Kemp, for instance, said that Bastian was simply repeating the “false attacks” of “partisan activists.” But the truth is, the companies hold the cards. Think back to North Carolina. Once there was a concerted effort to hurt the state economically with a boycott—which cost the state an estimated $3.76 billion, according to the Associated Press—the legislature backed down. If companies stick to their guns, Georgia is likely to back down as well. No state wants to be a corporate pariah. And no state wants to leave billions on the table if it can avoid it.
There is one other thing. Business leaders want to be on the right side of history, especially on matters of race. In 1964, after Martin Luther King Jr. won the Nobel Peace Prize, Atlanta decided to throw a dinner in his honor. It sent out hundreds of invitations to the city’s elites—almost none of whom responded.
Mayor Ivan Allen went to see Robert Woodruff, the former president of Coke and still the most important man in Atlanta. “It is going to be an embarrassment for Atlanta,” he told Woodruff. Woodruff in turn went to Coke’s CEO, J. Paul Austin. In a New York Times article about the lack of response to the dinner, Austin was quoted as saying “Coca-Cola cannot stay in a city that’s going to have this kind of reaction and not honor a Nobel Prize winner.” On the night of the dinner, all 1,600 seats were sold out.
That story has two morals. First, companies like Delta, Coke and Home Depot have immense power in their home cities—if they are not afraid to use it. And second, that dinner, which took place 57 years ago, is still recounted. It was a key moment in the modern history of Atlanta. Does Ed Bastian hope to be seen someday in the same light as J. Paul Austin? I’m betting he does.
Joe Nocera is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering business. He has written business columns for Esquire, GQ and the New York Times, and is the former editorial director of Fortune. His latest project is the Bloomberg-Wondery podcast "The Shrink Next Door."