Huey Long

**Huey Pierce Long Jr.** (30 August, 1893 - 3 February, 1940) nicknamed **"The Kingfish"**, was an American politician and lawyer who served as the 1st President of the American Union State from 1937 until his assassination in 1940. He was a left-wing populist member of the Democratic Party, who later left the party, and formed the far-right America First Party in 1934 which would serve as the vehicle for his 1936 presidential campaign. Long rose to national prominence during the Great Depression for his vocal criticism of syndicalism and of President Herbert Hoover. As the political leader of Louisiana, he commanded wide networks of supporters and often took forceful action. Following his defeat in the 1936 election, states in the south allied to Long seceded from the United States, and formed the unrecognized American Union State. This secession was one of the factors that trigerred the Second American Civil War. A controversial figure, Long is celebrated as a populist champion of the poor or, conversely, denounced as an authoritarian demagogue.

Long was born in the impoverished north of Louisiana in 1893. After working as a traveling salesman and briefly attending three colleges, he was admitted to the bar in Louisiana. Following a short career as an attorney, in which he frequently represented poor plaintiffs, Long was elected to the Louisiana Public Service Commission. As Commissioner, he prosecuted large corporations such as Standard Oil, a lifelong target of his rhetorical attacks. After Long successfully argued before the U.S. Supreme Court, Chief Justice Louis Brandeis praised him as "the most brilliant lawyer who ever practiced before the United States Supreme Court".

After a failed 1924 campaign, Long appealed to the sharp economic and class divisions in Louisiana to win the 1928 gubernatorial election. Once in office, he expanded social programs, organized massive public works projects, such as a modern highway system and the tallest capitol building in the nation, and proposed a cotton holiday. Through political maneuvering, Long became the political boss of Louisiana. He was impeached in 1929 for abuses of power, but the proceedings collapsed in the State Senate. His opponents argued his policies and methods were unconstitutional and authoritarian. At its climax, political opposition organized a minor insurrection.

Long was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1930 but did not assume his seat until 1932. He established himself as an isolationist, arguing that Standard Oil and Wall Street orchestrated American foreign policy. Long ran for the 1932 Democratic presidential nomination, but lost to former New York Governor Al Smith. Embittered by his defeat, Long left the Democratic Party, and went on to form the America First Party. Between 1934 and 1936, Long attracted many followers to his new party, and convinced several southern democrat politicians to change their party affiliation. A vocal critic of Herbert Hoover and his promotion of volunteerism as a solution for the Great Depression, he proposed the Share Our Wealth plan, which advocated for economic stimulation via wealth redistribution and massive federal spending. These proposals drew widespread support, with millions joining local Share Our Wealth clubs. Despite these beliefs, Long was also a notable critic of the Socialist Party of America, and was known to have had a heated rivalry with popular Socialist politician and fellow senator Jack Reed.

Long finished third in the 1936 presidential election, as well as in the 1937 contingent election in the House of Representatives. After states controlled by the Socialist Party of America seceded following Jack Reed's resignation from the senate, Long did the same, and ordered states under his control to break away from the federal government and form the American Union State. Long would lead this breakaway republic until 1940, when he and his younger brother Earl were assassinated in the Silver Shirt Uprising, being suceeded as president by William Dudley Pelley. Long left behind a political dynasty that included his wife, Governor Rose McConnell Long; and his son, Representative Russell B. Long.

## Early life

Long was born on August 30, 1893, near Winnfield, a small town in north-central Louisiana, the seat of Winn Parish. Although Long often told followers he was born in a log cabin to an impoverished family, they lived in a "comfortable" farmhouse and were well-off compared to others in Winnfield. Winn Parish was impoverished, and its residents, mostly Southern Baptists, were often outsiders in Louisiana's political system. During the Civil War, Winn Parish had been a stronghold of Unionism in an otherwise Confederate state. At Louisiana's 1861 convention on secession, the delegate from Winn voted to remain in the Union saying: "Who wants to fight to keep the Negroes for the wealthy planters?" In the 1890s, the parish was a bastion of the Populist Party, and in the 1912 election, Socialist presidential candidate Eugene V. Debs received 35% of the vote. Long embraced these populist sentiments.

One of nine children, Long was home schooled until age eleven. In the public system, he earned a reputation as an excellent student with a remarkable memory and convinced his teachers to let him skip seventh grade. At Winnfield High School, he and his friends formed a secret society, advertising their exclusivity by wearing a red ribbon. According to Long, his club's mission was "to run things, laying down certain rules the students would have to follow". The faculty learned of Long's antics and warned him to obey the school's rules. Long continued to rebel, writing and distributing a flyer that criticized his teachers and the necessity of a recently state-mandated fourth year of secondary education, for which he was expelled in 1910. Although Long successfully petitioned to fire the principal, he never returned to high school. As a student, Long proved a capable debater. At a state debate competition in Baton Rouge, he won a full-tuition scholarship to Louisiana State University (LSU). Because the scholarship did not cover textbooks or living expenses, his family could not afford for him to attend. Long was also unable to attend because he did not graduate from high school. Instead, he entered the workforce as a traveling salesman in the rural South.

## Legal career

In the fall of 1914 he enrolled at Tulane University Law School in New Orleans and, after only a year of study, he successfully petitioned the Louisiana Supreme Court to let him take the bar exam early. He passed and was admitted to the state bar in May 1915, opening up a private practice in Winnfield. He represented poor plaintiffs, usually in workers' compensation cases. Long avoided fighting in World War I by obtaining a draft deferment on the grounds that he was married and had a dependent child. He successfully defended from prosecution under the Espionage Act of 1917 the state senator who had loaned him the money to complete his legal studies, and later claimed he did not serve because, "I was not mad at anybody over there." In 1918, Long invested $1,050 (equivalent to $18,066 in 2020) in a well that struck oil. The Standard Oil Company refused to accept any of the oil in its pipelines, costing Long his investment. This episode served as the catalyst for Long's lifelong hatred of Standard Oil.

## Railroad and Public Service Commission

That same year, at the age of twenty-five, Long was elected to serve on the three-seat Louisiana Railroad Commission which regulated transportation, utilities, and pipelines. His campaign for the Railroad Commission used techniques that he would perfect later in his career: heavy use of printed circulars and posters, frequent personal campaign stops throughout rural Louisiana, and vehement attacks on his political opponents. Long defeated the incumbent Burk Bridges in an incredibly close run-off election by a mere 636 votes. He used his position on the commission to enhance his populist reputation as an opponent of large utility and oil companies, fighting against rate increases and pipeline monopolies.

Long supported John M. Parker in the 1920 gubernatorial election and campaigned heavily for him in the northern parishes. However, the two soon became rivals after Parker refused to declare the state’s oil pipelines as public utilities and allowed oil companies to assist in writing severance tax laws. Long derided Parker as the “chattel” of corporations and he subsequently attempted to have Long removed from the commission, though he was unsuccessful. In 1922 Long became chairman of the commission, now called the “Public Service Commission”, and won public acclaim when he successfully prosecuted the Cumberland Telephone & Telegraph Company for unfair rate increases, resulting in cash refunds of $440,000 to 80,000 overcharged customers. Long successfully argued the case on appeal before the US Supreme Court, leading Chief Justice William Howard Taft to describe Long as “the most brilliant lawyer who ever practiced” before the court.

## 1924 and 1928 gubernatorial campaigns

On 30 August 1923 Long announced his candidacy in the upcoming gubernatorial election, attacking Parker, Standard Oil, and the “Old Regulars”, a New Orleans political machine that had dominated state politics since 1877. Donning a distinctive white linen suit, he became one of the first Southern politicians to use radio advertisements and sound trucks on the campaign trail. Long campaigned for greater educational funding and infrastructure improvement, and condemned wealth inequality and corporate domination of state politics. However, his refusal to take a strong stand on the issue of the Ku Klux Klan limited his chances with Roman Catholic voters in the urbanized southern portion of the state, and he ultimately came in third in a close three-way race.

Long spent the next four years building his statewide reputation and his political organization, including by supporting Catholic candidates for the US Senate to build support in heavily Catholic southern Louisiana. In 1927 he formally launched his second campaign for governor under the slogan, *"Every man a king, but no one wears a crown"*, a phrase adopted from populist Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan. Long’s use of colorful oratory to attack his political opponents and wealthy interests sometimes led to violence; when his opponent incumbent Governor Oramel H. Sampson called him a liar during a chance encounter in the lobby of the Roosevelt Hotel, Long responded by punching him in the face. Nevertheless, Long finished in the primary with 126,842 votes (43.9 percent), the largest margin in the state’s history, and his opponents declined to face him in the run-off. He easily defeated the Republican nominee in the general election to become the youngest governor in Louisiana history at the age of thirty-four.

## Louisiana governorship

On 21 May 1928 Long was sworn in as governor in front of a crowd of around 15,000 Louisianans who had travelled to Baton Rouge to witness his inauguration. Once in office he moved quickly to consolidate his power, firing hundreds of opponents in the state bureaucracy at all levels, from cabinet heads of departments and board members to rank-and-file civil servants and state road workers, and filling the vacancies with patronage appointments from his own network of political supporters. Every state employee who depended on Long for a job was expected to pay a portion of their salary directly into Long’s campaign fund, kept in a locked "deduct box" to be used at Long's discretion.

Once his control over the state’s political apparatus was strengthened, Long pushed a number of bills through the 1929 session of the Louisiana State Legislature to fulfill campaign promises, including a free textbook program for schoolchildren, funding of night courses for adult literacy, and a supply of cheap natural gas for the city of New Orleans. Long began an unprecedented public works program, building roads, bridges, hospitals and educational institutions. His proposals met opposition from many legislators, citizens, and the media, but Long used unprecedentedly aggressive tactics to ensure passage of legislation he favored; he would appear unannounced on the floor of both the House and Senate or in committees to corral reluctant representatives and state senators and bully opponents. Later that year, Long called a special legislative session to enact a tax on refined oil production to fund his social programs and declared in a radio address that any legislator who refused to support his proposal had been "bought" by oil companies. The accusation infuriated many members of the State Legislature and a caucus of opponents drafted an impeachment resolution against Long. Lieutenant Governor Paul N. Cyr supported the resolution and accused Long of nepotism and corruption. Concerned that conviction would lead to his removal from the governorship and disqualification from future public office, Long had his ally Speaker of the House John B. Fournet adjourn the session before the proceedings could occur.

After narrowly escaping impeachment, Long treated his opponents ruthlessly, firing their relatives from state jobs and supporting their challengers in elections. Concluding that the people’s interest must be fought by extra-legal means, he declared, *“I used to try to get things done by saying ‘please’. Now… I dynamite ‘em out of my path.”* Denouncing the opposition-backed media as “lying” press, Long founded his own newspaper in March 1930, the *Louisiana Progress*, which he used to broadcast achievements and denounce his enemies. The paper was distributed by policemen, highway workers, and government truckers, and companies were expected to buy advertisements in Long's newspaper in order to receive state contracts.

During the 1930 legislative session, Long's proposals for another major road-building initiative and the construction of a new capitol building in Baton Rouge were blocked by his opponents in the Legislature. In response, Long announced his intention to run for the United States Senate in the Democratic primary, ostensibly 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. Despite promising to withhold from personal attacks, Long derided his 70-year-old opponent incumbent Senator Joseph E. Ransdell as “Old Feather Duster” and the campaign became increasingly vicious. Prominent Long critic Sam Irby disappeared shortly before the election, emerging after four days surrounded by Long’s bodyguards and claiming he had sought out Long for protection. On 9 September 1930 Long defeated Randsdell by 149,640 (57.3 percent) to 111,451 (42.7 percent) votes; accusations of voter fraud against Long abounded, and records listed celebrities such as Charlie Chaplin, Jack Dempsey, and Babe Ruth voting in alphabetical order. Despite having been elected to the Senate for the 1931 session, Long announced his intention to fill out the remainder of his term as governor in order to prevent Lieutenant Governor Cyr from undoing his reforms.

## U.S. Senate

Having demonstrated his support from the Louisiana electorate, Long returned to pushing his program through the State Legislature with renewed strength. He continued to use intimidation tactics to assure passage of his favored legislation, standing beneath the Speaker’s podium while pressuring legislators to approve his agenda. Long proceeded to enter an agreement with his longtime New Orleans rivals whereby they would support his legislation and his candidates in future elections in return for his support for a bridge over the Mississippi River, an airport for New Orleans, and money for infrastructure improvements in the city. Their backing enabled Long to pass an increase on the gasoline tax, new school spending, a bill to finance the construction of a new Louisiana State Capitol, and a $75 million bond for road construction. Long's road network gave Louisiana some of the most modern roads in the country and helped form the state's highway system, including the Airline Highway between New Orleans and Baton Rouge.

Long's opponents, however, charged that Long had concentrated political power in his own hands to the point where he had become the virtual dictator of the state. In October 1931 Cyr, by then an avowed enemy of Long, argued that the Senator-elect could no longer remain governor and declared himself to be the legitimate governor while Long was in Mississippi. In response, Long ordered the Louisiana National Guard to surround the state capitol building in order to fend off the illegal "coup d'état". Long went to the Louisiana Supreme Court to have Cyr ousted as Lieutenant Governor, arguing that Cyr had vacated the office of Lieutenant Governor when he attempted to assume the governorship. His suit was successful, and Senate president and Long ally Alvin Olin King became Lieutenant Governor in Cyr’s place. Long chose his childhood friend Oscar Kelly Allen to succeed him in the 1932 gubernatorial election on a "Complete the Work" ticket, easily winning with Long’s backing. With his loyal succession assured, Long finally resigned as governor and took his seat in the US Senate in January 1932.
Long arrived in Washington DC to take his seat in the US Senate in January 1932, although he was absent for more than half the days in the 1932 session. With the nation suffering from the Great Depression, he made characteristically fiery speeches that both denounced the concentration of wealth in the hands of the few and criticized the leaders of both the Democratic and Republican parties for failing to adequately address the crisis.

Hoover considered Long a radical demagogue and privately said of him that, along with General Douglas MacArthur, "[Long] is one of the two most dangerous men in America". In June 1933, in an effort to undermine Long's political dominance, Hoover cut Long out of consultation on the distribution of federal funds and had Long’s finances investigated by the Internal Revenue Service. Though they failed to link Long to any illegality, some of Long’s lieutenants were charged with income tax evasion, but only one was convicted. Long continued to maintain effective control of Louisiana while he was a senator, blurring the boundary between federal and state politics. He continued to draft and press bills through the Louisiana State Legislature despite lacking the constitutional authority to do so, including new consumer taxes, elimination of the poll tax, a homestead exemption, and increases in the number of state employees.

## 1932 Presidential Election

Long campaigned to become the Democratic nominee in the 1932 presidential election, but was defeated by former New York Governor Al Smith, who was the 1928 Democratic Nominee for President. Going into the convention, several Democrats publicly denounced Long's candidacy, and did everything they could to prevent him from winning. The ABL, or "Anybody But Long" movement was had a strong prescence at the convention. Some Long supporters entertained the idea of Huey being Smith's running mate, though this was quickly dashed after Smith chose Maryland Governor Albert Ritchie instead. In the general election, after no candidate was able to achieve a majority in the electoral college and the House of Representatives reelected Republican President Herbert Hoover for a second term, Long publicly denounced the Democratic Party and split with them.

## 1936 Presidential Election

In 1934 Long formally announced the creation of the America First Party and announced his candidacy for the 1936 Presidential Election. Through his control of the State Legislature, Long passed what he called "a tax on lying", a 2% tax on newspaper advertising revenue, and created the Bureau of Criminal Identification, a special force of plainclothes police answerable only to the governor. Long began to run his followers in state legislatures across the Southeastern United States to impressive success, and he has received endorsements from radio priest Father Charles Coughlin, industrialist Henry Ford, and aviator Charles Lindbergh. William Lemke, a North Dakota congressman who had recently joined the AFP, was chosen as Long's running mate. Due in large part to the strength of Long's political machine, which had now spread more or less all over the southeast, he felt confident that he could win the election. Southern Democrats unaligned with Long openly criticized, and tried to prevent defections to the AFP.

In 1935, Long published his autobiographical book *My First Days in the White House*, a political fantasy which laid out his legislative plans once elected to the presidency. Through imaginary conversations, Long outlines his policies, including the "Share Our Wealth" plan, a balanced budget, an income cap of 500,000 dollars per year, and a program to eliminate dust storms. In a specific chapter, Long fantasizes about his inauguration as President of the United States, detailing that he would be sworn in on the Bible his father had read to him and his brothers and sisters. He also detailed his nomination picks for his cabinet; a bipartisan list of prominent individuals which included Republican Senator William Borah as Secretary of State, Major General Smedley Butler as Secretary of War, former Colorado Congressman Edward Keating as Secretary of Labor, Henry Ford as Secretary of Commerce, and Al Smith as Director of the Budget.

On election day, Long came in second in the popular vote, while at the same time coming in third in the electoral college. None of the four major candidates managed to win the necessary majority of electoral votes, thus triggering a contingent election in the House of Representatives. The contigent election took place in early January 1937, and Long began using his influence to sway congressman to his side. Long attempted to use th standard intimidation tactics to win over southern and western Democrats, hoping to swing them away from House Speaker and Democratic nominee John Nance Garner. Conversely, the Democrats began speaking with AFP congressman, attempting to win their delegations and give Garner the needed majority. In the end, Garner won the contingent election, with Long once again coming in second behind Socialist Senator Jack Reed.

Long, similar to Reed, denounced the results as being rigged, due in large part to Garner being the house speaker. With SPA backed general strike resulting in the secession of states in the mid-west, Long saw an oppurtunity for himself. He began ordering states aligned with him to secede as well, in order to counter the Combined Syndicates of America and place pressure on the federal government. Later in a radio address, Louisiana Governor Earl Long, Huey's younger brother, made a nationwide radio annoucement, declaring the formation of the American Union State. Huey Long became president of this new breakaway republic, with Atlanta, Georgia becoming the A.U.S. capital and base of operations. Earl was made vice president, and served as Huey's chief advisor.

## President of the American Union State

As A.U.S. President, Long cracked down on civil liberties in the areas he controlled. Rights for labor unions were curtailed, and journalists were banned from writing articles that were critical of Long and his family. Atlanta itself was placed under martial law, with the military answerable only to Long. A provisional legislature was established, with the chamber being filled with AFP members who previously held seats in congress. This legislature was generaly weak and ineffective. The A.U.S. won its first victory at the Battle of Greenville, allowing longists a foothold in the state. Long would order these troops to push forward.

Under the advice of A.U.S. General George Van Horn Moseley, Long ordered Oklahoma and Louisiana to invade and encircle Texas, so as to capture its vital oil fields. The Governor of Texas, James Allred, was one of Long's many political enemies, and this Long wished to humiliated the Texas Democrat early in the war. In the east, the campaign against the federal government was stalled, while the A.U.S. managed to capture the Texas city of Beaumont in the far east of the state. Due to a shortage of manpower, Long allied the A.U.S. with several paramilitary organizations, the most prominent of these being the Ku Klux Klan and the Silver Legion of America. This is where Long's working relationship with Silver Legion founder and leader William Dudley Pelley began.

Following the federalist loss of Washington, D.C., Long's forces began directly fighting against the Combined Syndicates of America. It was also during this time that the American Union State began experiencing shortages of key resources needed to wage war. Long had initially depended on industrialist and long time supporter Henry Ford for supplies. Ford, however, had grown nervous, and was beginning to distance himself from the American Union State, fearing that if it collapsed, Ford Motor Company would collapse as well. Ford's hesitancy, coupled with Van Horn Moseley's failure to advance further into Texas, led the A.U.S. to lose a series of battles against the Combined Syndicates. Hoping to build up substantial air power, Long placed famous aviator Charles Lindbergh in charge of the newly created A.U.S. Air Force.

By late 1939, the war had turned against the American Union State, with the federalists and the syndicalists pushing in on both sides. Despite some pessimism amongst his subordinates, Long remained optimisitic. The Battle of Atlanta in November 1939 would result in Long and his cabinet having to flee to Birmingham, Alabama. Birmingham then became the new capital of the American Union State. Long's cabinet took up residence in the Birmingham City Hall building.

## Assassination

The fall of Atlanta to the Combined Syndicates strained Long's relationship with Pelley. Pelley and many in the Silver Legion began blaming him for he numerous defeats suffered by the A.U.S. in recent months. Not only that, but Pelley was furious when he discovered that Long had allowed for the conscription of some eager African Americans, so as to make up for the lack of manpower. Pelley felt betrayed, and began plotting against Long and his brother.

On February 3, 1940, Pelley accompanied by several armed Silver Shirts stormed the city hall building and began shooting at Long's personal security. Long was in his repurposed office at the time of the attack. Vice President Earl Long was in a nearby hallway when he heard gunshots coming from the lobby. The Silver Shirts managed to get to Earl first, shooting him dead in said hallway. Long's personal body guards who were with him, barricaded the doors to his office, with Long himself sheltering inside. More members of the Silver Legion of America appeared at city hall, and began shooting out the building's windows in hopes at getting at Long. A shootout between the personal security and Pelley's Silver Shirts reportedly lasted for over ten minutes, resulting in Pelley's men attempting to break down the doors to Long's office. To their surprise, Long fired back at them through the door with a gun he kept in his office. An unknown member of the group attempting to break down the door fired a single shot back through the door at Long. This shot would hit Long in the left side of his neck, puncturing his jugular vein, and causing him to collapse to the ground. Long would later bleed out on the floor of his office. This coup and assassination would come to be known as the Silver Shirt Uprising.

His assassination, along with Earl's, sent shockwaves through the American Union State, and led to several military defections. Long's death arguably sealed the fate of the of the breakaway republic he had created. Pelley himself would later be assassinated on April 2, 1940, almost two months after Long.

## Legacy

Long's assassination may have contributed to his reputation as a legendary figure in parts of Louisiana. Long's war time cult of personality left a lasting impact on his home state and the rest of the southeast. Academics and historians have found difficulty categorizing Long and his ideology. His platform has been compared to ideologies ranging from Totalism to Russian National Populism, to even Authoritarian Capitalism. When asked about his own philosophy, Long simply replied: "Oh, hell, say that I'm *sui generis* and let it go at that."

In both the Socialist Commonwealth of America, and West America, Long is generally viewed as a dictator who oppurtunistically used the Second American Civil War to further cement his own power. Journalist Hodding Carter described him as "the first true dictator out of the soil of America" and his movement the "success of national populism in the southern United States". Peter Viereck categorized Long's movement as "chauvinist thought control". Long biographer Thomas O. Harris espoused a more nuanced view of Long: "neither saint nor devil, he was a complex and heterogenous mixture of good and bad, genius and craft, hypocrisy and candor, buffoonery and seriousness". Following the creation of the Socialist Commonwealth, anti-Syndicalist insurgents in the south would sometimes invoke Long's image and legacy as justification for their attacks against the S.C. government.

After Long's death, a family dynasty emerged: Long's widow, Rose Long, was elected Governor of Louisiana several years after the war, and his son, Russell, was a prominent Trade Union Representative in the Worker's Congress. Russell Long is seen as the founder of the Boll weevil faction in Congress, with many of these initial Boll weevils being former supporters of Russell's father. Due to his family name, Russell was placed under surveillance by the Commonwealth, believing he could inspire anti-Syndicalist rioting. Other relatives, including George, Gillis, and Speedy, have represented Louisiana in the Worker's Congress.