1930: Bills Rejected in Legislature But Winning Campaign For Senate
In the 1930 legislative session, Long proposed another major road-building initiative as well as the construction of a new capitol building in Baton Rouge. The State Legislature defeated the bond issue necessary to build the roads, and his other initiatives failed as well.
Long responded by suddenly announcing his intention to run for the U.S. Senate in the Democratic primary of September 9, 1930. He portrayed his campaign as a referendum on his programs: if he won he would take it as a sign that the public supported his programs over the opposition of the legislature, and if he lost he promised to resign. Long defeated incumbent Senator Joseph E. Ransdell, an Alexandria native from Lake Providence in East Carroll Parish, by 149,640 (57.3 percent) to 111,451 (42.7 percent).
Although his Senate term began on March 4, 1931, Long completed the remainder of his four-year term as governor. Leaving the seat vacant for so long, he said, would not hurt Louisiana; "with Ransdell as Senator, the seat was vacant anyway." By not leaving the governor's mansion until January 25, 1932, Long prevented Lieutenant Governor Paul N. Cyr, a former ally, from succeeding to the office. A dentist from Jeanerette in Iberia Parish, Cyr had subsequently broken with Long and been threatening to roll back his reforms if he succeeded to the governorship.
Read more about this topic: Huey Long
Famous quotes containing the words bills, rejected, legislature, winning, campaign and/or senate:
“It is only by not paying one’s bills that one can hope to live in the memory of the commercial classes.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
“A few [women] warrant our attention not because they have the answer but because they have rejected the mentality that insists there must be one answer. What makes them role models is not how much or how little they work, how many or how few hats they wear, but rather how well they understand, and accept, that for all rewards there will be commensurate sacrifice; for all gains, some loss; for any pleasure, some pain.”
—Melinda M. Marshall (20th century)
“An ... important antidote to American democracy is American gerontocracy. The positions of eminence and authority in Congress are allotted in accordance with length of service, regardless of quality. Superficial observers have long criticized the United States for making a fetish of youth. This is unfair. Uniquely among modern organs of public and private administration, its national legislature rewards senility.”
—John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908)
“There are two great pleasures in gambling: that of winning and that of losing.”
—French proverb.
“The winter is to a woman of fashion what, of yore, a campaign was to the soldiers of the Empire.”
—Honoré De Balzac (1799–1850)
“What times! What manners! The Senate knows these things, the consul sees them, and yet this man lives.”
—Marcus Tullius Cicero (106–43 B.C.)