Huey Long (at last)

HUEY PIERCE LONG



Today in the USA, Obama's policy about public health is creating a real polemic. Americans do not seems to be ready for such a socialist system? But this duality between capitalism and socialisim is not that recent. Huey Long, during the 1930's ha proposed something not that different from today's policy. And this polititian isn't famous only about this part of his program.
Who was Huel Long ? What kind of policy had he proposed ? Why is he so famous, even today ?

I/ The beginning of a brilliant career

Huey Long was born the thirty of august in 1893. He was a farm boy of Winnfield, a rural community in the poorest part of Louisiana.
He was a descendant of William Tison and Sarah Vince Tison, two farmers without a story but rich enough to pay some education to their children.
So, Huey Long got the chance to have an education, wherehas many of his neighbours and friends could'nt have such an opportunity.
He was an excellent student and begans his career as a travelling salesman*(vendeur) in Texas.
This experience gave him easiness with communication and humans contacts. It also improved*(améliorer) his natural charism and his conception of the american life: a few part of the population where keeping wealth*(richesse) while poor and rural people where needing help.
In 1913, he married Rose Mc Connell and had tree children: Rose, Russel and Palmer.
After some very short but brilliant studies, he became a lawer in 1915. He opened his own office the same year. The Kingfish, as he named himself, was proud not to had defended a case against a poor man, and his representing for a widow against a bank mades him famous. This famous nikmane started during this periode. Huey Long gave it to himself because he had the habit to said: «I'm a small fish in Washington. But I'm the Kingfish to the folks down in Louisiana» .It stayed after his carrer in law, while he was occuped with politic, his true passion.


II/ A farmer boy becoming a famous polititian

Huey Long decided to start his politic career in 1918; in fact he was elected to the Louisiana Railroad Commission on an anti-standard oil platform. He ran a first time in 1924 the place of governor in Lousiana and lost it, missing 7400 votes. But he won four years after.
He ran for office as Governor of Louisiana in 1928 with his slogan «every man is a king, but no one where a crown*(couronne)». He changed politic by going to the voters and the rural poors, explaining his program: education was the main theme of his election campaign. Long attacked on the utilities industries in the United State.
He pulled out*(mettre en œuvre) a global program of modernization in Louisiana including: building roads, bridges infrastructures in general, providing education and found some economics opportunities for the vulnerables masses.
He extended voting right to all citizens, while it was still reseved to the wealth people.
His success as a radical populist in Louisiana drove him the US senate in 1930.
Long became a national force with his «Share our Wealth» movement. The aim*(but) was simple: to guarante every family a decent life with a house, a radio and an automobile. He wanted to limitate personnal fortune and installed a system of pension.
An impeachment from the Standart Oil's legislative allies was the beginning of some complications,after that the King Fish started to attack seriously his opponents, and inevitably received the first death treaths (menaces de mort). He believed first into a candidate who was sharing*(partager) his ideal, Franklin.D.Rossevelt. But this one failed*(échoua), so Huey Long thought about running himself the place of president of the U.S, and did it in 1935. He wrote a biography untilted Every Man a King in 1933 and a book in 1935 where he named his cabinet and imagined the first hours of his life as a president of the U.S, My Firsts Days in the White House

III/ A death that didn't mark the end of his ideals and his popularity

The end of his life was tragic; he was the victim of an assassination attempt(victime d'un attentat) by doctor Carl Austin Weiss, a political ennemy. the 8 September 1935 into Louisana's capitol: Bâton-Rouge. It appenned because of his intention to become an independant applicant*(candidat) to the presidential elections of 1936, but also because his program was absolutly against both parties, bringins some forms of communism and dictatorship as for the press.
He died the 10 September 1935 while he was telling these last words: « God don't let me die, I have so much to do (entreprendre)».
After his death, some members of his family tried to take (reprendre) his movement under the name of Union Party. They presented the republican William Lemke, however he never knew the same popularity.
Huey Long was considered as a champion of the common people; and defended them from his beginnings of his career to the end, even after the pression from the death treath.
Long was somebody colourful*(personnage haut en couleurs), charismatic, controversial*(provocateur) but he always skating on the edge (ne pas dépasser la frontière), and that made him popular and rejected in the same time. The duality that instaured his run for the presidence in Louisiana can be take as an exemple of it.
He defended an ideal of socialism and equality, but even today, the majority of Americans are rejecting this ideal of «share our wealth».
This story inspired writers, like Robert Penn Warren, who wrote All the King's men (les fous du roi) and win the Pulitzer price in 1946. It had been adapted twice as a TV show (1958 and 1999)but also by the movie industry (1949 and 2006).



Huey Long was somebody loved or hated for his politic, not only because of his program, but also because of his radical position. Has we have seen it, the Kingfish tried to represent the unfortunate classes of the american population. He also rejected racism in politic. But he had the bad habit to impose his law projet and his ideas to the other polititans. Today, his program and way to act are still a subject of quarrel (dispute)