Huey Long

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Huey Long (1935)

Huey Pierce Long, Jr. (born August 30, 1893 in Winnfield , Louisiana , † September 10, 1935 in Baton Rouge , Louisiana), called The Kingfish , was an American politician in the US state of Louisiana. He belonged to the Democrats and was often referred to as a radical populist . Long died at the age of 42 as a result of an assassination attempt.

Life

Long was born in Winnfield, north central Louisiana, the seventh of nine children in a middle-class family. He attended local schools, was reportedly an excellent student, and had a photographic memory . In 1910 he was expelled from school for distributing a petition against the previously introduced twelfth year of compulsory schooling. Long spent the next four years as a traveling salesman in books and canned food. In addition, he sold non-prescription medicines and worked as an auctioneer . In 1913 he married Rose McConnell .

At the law school of the University of Oklahoma , later at Tulane University , Long studied law and took the state examination in New Orleans in 1915 . He then founded a law firm in Winnfield and Shreveport . According to the Long Legacy Project Foundation (committed to Long's memory) , he particularly represented socially disadvantaged clients and small companies against corporations. In the course of this, Long also aspired to politics. From 1918 he applied for political offices in Louisiana, partly in combat candidacies. From 1928 he was then governor at the head of the state. He then represented Louisiana in the US Senate until 1935 .

In the 1932 presidential election in the United States , Long supported Franklin D. Roosevelt , but fell out with him in June 1933, as Roosevelt's plans did not go far enough for him, and planned his own candidacy for the office of for the 1936 election President . He gained nationwide attention in 1934 with the campaign "Share Our Wealth" (German about "We share our wealth"), which he initiated as a reaction to the Great Depression and as a counter-campaign to the New Deal by Roosevelt. In this campaign he called for an extensive redistribution of wealth, u. a. with the demand that every family should be guaranteed a basic income, for which high income should be taxed more heavily in return. Critics, however, considered these plans to be radical or unworkable.

Although he made significant progress in the expansion of the education system, health system and road network of Louisiana during his tenure, Long was controversial. His leadership style was considered autocratic because he tried to enforce his political goals through office patronage and blackmail and attacked his opponents with aggressive polemics. He became famous for his 15-hour long speech in the Senate (1935 filibuster ), in which he presented his recipes for fried oysters, among other things . He tried to prevent the passage of a law that he believed favored the rich and disadvantaged the poor.

Long died on September 10, 1935, from the gunshot wounds he had sustained two days earlier in an assassination attempt at the Louisiana State Capitol in Baton Rouge. His alleged murderer, the doctor Carl Austin Weiss , was the son-in-law of the judge and Long's opponent Benjamin Pavy, whose impeachment for political reasons Long pushed on that very day. Weiss was shot dead by the police and Long's bodyguards immediately after the shot he had fired; due to the large number of shots fired (Weiss was hit by 62 bullets), it was suspected for some time that Long himself might have been killed by a missed shot by his own bodyguards, which today is considered refuted.

The Long political dynasty

After Long's death in 1935, some members of his family were politically active.

  • His wife, Rose McConnell Long, was a Senator from 1936 to 1937.
  • His son Russell B. Long was a Senator from 1948 to 1987.
  • His younger brother Earl Long was Governor of Louisiana (1939-1940, 1948-1952, 1956-1960).
  • His older brother George S. Long represented the now abolished 8th district of Louisiana in the House of Representatives from 1953 to 1958.
  • His nephew Gillis William Long represented Louisiana between 1963 and 1965 and again from 1973 to 1985 in the House of Representatives.

souvenir

The Huey P. Long Bridge , which crosses the Mississippi River at Baton Rouge, and the Huey P. Long Bridge , which crosses the Mississippi River in Jefferson Parish, are named after him. The Long-Allen Bridges are named after him and his supporter and successor OK Allen . There is also a Huey P. Long Hospital in Pineville on the Red River near Alexandria.

Literature and film

  • 1936: It can't happen here deutsch: This is not possible with us , dystopian novel by Nobel Prize winner Sinclair Lewis and theater versions based on it. One of the main characters in it, Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip, is based on Long.
  • 1946: The game of power ; Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Robert Penn Warren . The main character Willie Stark , who rose to power in his state as a populist after studying law, has many parallels to Long, but Warren denied having modeled her exclusively on this model.
  • 1949: The man who wanted to rule ; A film adaptation of The Game of Power with Broderick Crawford in the lead role.
  • 1977: The Louisiana Assassination - The death of Senator Huey Pierce Long on September 8, 1935 ; Original radio play / documentation by Friedrich Feld , director: Claus Villinger in the SDR series "Entertainment and Knowledge" (episode 195).
  • 1995: Kingfish (Kingfish: A Story of Huey P. Long) , TV film with John Goodman in the lead role.
  • 1995: Max Allan Collins, Blood And Thunder - Roman, original edition by Dutton, New York 1995, German: Blut und Donner, with afterword and bibliography, Dumont Cologne 1999.
  • 2006: The Game of Power ; the American film starring Sean Penn is a remake of the 1949 film.

additional

Founding member of the Black Panther Party , Huey Percy Newton was named after Long.

Works

  • Huey Long: Every man a king; the autobiography of Huey P. Long . National Book Co., New Orleans 1933, LCCN  33-029663

literature

Web links

Commons : Huey P. Long  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Jump up ↑ Richard D. White: Kingfish: The Reign of Huey P. Long . Random House, New York 2006, ISBN 0-8129-7383-6
  2. ↑ hueylong.com/childhood hueylong.com (English) accessed on April 26, 2010
  3. ^ A b Long Legacy Project. Huey Long: Early Career; accessed on February 2, 2018
  4. ↑ Karin Priester : Populism: Historical and current manifestations . Campus Verlag, Frankfurt 2007, p. 112.
  5. ^ David M. Kennedy, American History: Depression, New Deal, World War II. Retrieved April 26, 2010
  6. ↑ Karin Priester: Populism: Historical and current manifestations . Campus Verlag, Frankfurt 2007, p. 109f f.
  7. ↑ filibuster and cloture. (English)
  8. ^ Bennett Wall (Ed.): Louisiana. A history . Malden 1984, p. 266.
personal data
SURNAME Long, Huey
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Long, Huebert Pierce junior; Long, Huey Pierce
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American politician, governor, and senator for Louisiana
DATE OF BIRTH August 30, 1893
PLACE OF BIRTH Winnfield , Louisiana
DATE OF DEATH September 10, 1935
Place of death Baton Rouge , Louisiana