Breckinridge Long - Early Life and Career

Early Life and Career

Born to Margaret Miller Breckinridge and William Strudwick Long in St. Louis, Missouri, Long was a member of the Breckinridge family. Long graduated from Princeton University in 1904 and studied at Washington University School of Law in 1905-1906, and received his M.A. from Princeton University in 1909. He was admitted to the bar in Missouri in 1906 and opened an office in St. Louis in 1907. He married Christine Alexander in 1912, and later had a daughter: Christine Blair. Long continued to practice law independently until 1917. During 1914–15 he was a member of the Missouri Code Commission on Revision of Judicial Procedure. Long then worked to establish the League of Nations and supported Wilsonian Democracy. He was credited with drafting Woodrow Wilson's "He kept us out of war" slogan, which helped secure Wilson's reelection as President in 1916.

He joined the State Department shortly after the election. In 1917, Long was appointed Third Assistant Secretary of State and remained at the post until he resigned in 1920 to pursue election to the U.S. Senate from Missouri. While in the Department of State, he held responsibility for overseeing Asian affairs. During this time he also directed attention to the improvement of U.S. foreign communications policy, and coordinated the first interdepartmental review of U.S. international communications.

In 1920 Long was the Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate seat in Missouri held by Selden P. Spencer, but was defeated, garnering 44.5% of the vote to Spencer's 53.7%. He would go on to lose a second bid for the Senate in 1922.

Read more about this topic:  Breckinridge Long

Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or career:

    Pray be always in motion. Early in the morning go and see things; and the rest of the day go and see people. If you stay but a week at a place, and that an insignificant one, see, however, all that is to be seen there; know as many people, and get into as many houses as ever you can.
    Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)

    “Maman”, said Annaïse, her voice strangely weak. “Here is the water.”
    A thin blade of silver came forward in the plain and the peasants ran alongside it, crying and singing.
    ...
    “Oh, Manuel, Manuel, why are you dead?” moaned Délira.
    “No”, said Annaïse, and she smiled through her tears, “no, he is not dead”.
    She took the old woman’s hand and pressed gently against her belly where new life stirred.
    Jacques Roumain (1907–1945)

    Each of the professions means a prejudice. The necessity for a career forces every one to take sides. We live in the age of the overworked, and the under-educated; the age in which people are so industrious that they become absolutely stupid.
    Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)