The Kingfish at 130: The Life and Legacy of Huey P. Long

This year marks the 130th anniversary of the birth of Huey P. Long, the Kingfish of Louisiana. The colorful populist came from humble beginnings in rural backwoods Louisiana, then in a short but rapid career, ascended to the Louisiana Governorship and the United States Senate, along with amassing great national prominence before being felled by an assassin’s bullet in 1935. Despite his tragic, premature deathat the age of forty-two, Huey Long achieved vast results while leaving behind a legacy that still lingers to this day. 

Huey Pierce Long was born on August 30, 1893 in rural Winn Parish, Louisiana. The red clay hills of northern Louisiana had long been a hotbed of populist activity. Forced to make a living off the dry soil that was seared by constant drought, the people of Winn held many grievances against the Bourbon elite, those select few families whom they felt had exploited state politics for their own benefit at the expense of the poor. Winn Parish’s rebellious political streak no doubt rubbed off on the young Huey, who avidly devoured books and closely monitored national events from an early age, later reminiscing “that the first time I knew anything about politics, I was in it.” His parents, Huey P. Long Sr. and Caledonia Tison, inculcated within their son a deep distrust of corporations and a strong sympathy towards the working man.

Armed with such beliefs and an unwavering confidence in his abilities, Huey Long acted. With no high school diploma and only a little more than a semester of undergraduate education, Huey enrolled in Tulane Law School, and after only a year, sat for the bar exam and passed easily. Over the next several years, the up-and-coming attorney’s disdain for big business was on full display as he primarily only accepted workers compensation cases which had him defending Winn Parish’s poverty stricken laborers against the corporations who employed them. Having garnered a reputation as a friend of the poor, Huey set his sights on politics and won a seat on the Louisiana Public Service Commission, a regulatory body that oversaw the various public utilities and corporations in the state. He was soon elected chairman by his indifferent colleagues and over the next several years, waged numerous lawsuits against the behemoth corporations of the state. Some cases even rose as far as the United States Supreme Court, where Chief Justice William Howard Taft praised Huey as “the most brilliant lawyer who ever practiced” before the nation’s highest tribunal.

Huey Long capitalized on his immense popularity among the common folk of Louisiana and was elected governor in 1928. Nothing in Louisiana, a state that had proven to be so impervious to reform, would ever be the same. 

Through his iron-fisted control of the legislature, Huey’s administration inaugurated an unprecedented public works program, much of which remains to this day as physical monuments memorializing his dominance over Louisiana. Thousands of miles of paved roads were constructed. Over 100 new bridges crossed the previously impassable bayous. A new thirty-four story capitol building, the tallest structure in the South, rose above the skyline of Baton Rouge. Dozens of public schools were renovated or rebuilt, Louisiana’s state hospital system was drastically modernized, and its institutions for the mentally disabled were greatly civilized and expanded. 

Realizing that attaining a proper education could serve as a ticket out of poverty, Huey worked doggedly to ensure that every Louisianan would have the same opportunity. Through taxes levied on Standard Oil, the state government was able to provide impoverished school children with free textbooks as well as transportation to and from class each day. As a result, the state’s school attendance rapidly increased by twenty percent. A highly effective statewide system of night classes was established, teaching over 100,000 citizens, both black and white, how to read, which dramatically decreased Louisiana’s appalling illiteracy rate. Louisiana State University was transformed into one of the South’s premier institutions of higher learning, thus providing an opportunity for thousands of low income students to achieve a college education. 

Huey Long also introduced new economic policies that revolutionized Louisiana. Big business, which for so long had been allowed to run roughshod over the state, was finally held in check. Numerous taxes were imposed on corporations, many of which had previously paid little to no taxes at all. As a result, the state government was furnished with increased revenue, much of it going towards paying for the Long administration’s expansive programs. As the Great Depression continued to ravage the national economy, Huey was instrumental in lessening its effects on Louisiana. With the state’s financial sector on the verge of collapse, the governor instituted a statewide banking plan that helped ameliorate losses and prevented dozens of banks from closing. By the time he left office, over 4,800 banks throughout the nation had closed, but only seven in Louisiana. Huey’s massive public works projects provided tens of thousands of much needed jobs for citizens across the state, acting as a precursor to what Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal would accomplish several years later. 

But these vast achievements did not come without a storm of controversy. Huey was impeached in 1929 and narrowly escaped being removed from office by only two votes in the state senate. It became a familiar occurrence to see the governor running committee hearings, invading the floor of the legislature to direct its affairs, and packing the state courts with ardent supporters, whether they be qualified or not. Two political enemies were abruptly kidnapped and whisked away to an island out in the Gulf of Mexico during the 1930 U.S. Senate election. State workers were required to sign undated letters of resignation upon being hired, as well as directed to contribute ten percent of their income to the Long campaign war chest, and most menacingly of all, could be fired for the slightest sign of disloyalty. 

Despite his blatant disregard for the Constitution, the people of Louisiana were as infatuated with the Kingfish as ever, and elected him to the Senate in a landslide victory. From the moment he stepped foot in the nation’s capital, Huey Long stole the show. He refused to sit on any committees, nor would he yield to the Congressional tradition of seniority; instead, the Kingfish preferred filibustering bills and cultivating the national media. He made dozens of highly publicized speaking engagements throughout the country, but most importantly, was the first politician to effectively utilize the radio as a new mode of communication. With his genius for homespun humor and the ability to condense complex ideas into phrases the common man could understand, Huey’s broadcasts attracted a regular audience of 25,000,000 listeners, one-fifth of the nation’s total population. His office received over 60,000 letters a week, thousands more than President Roosevelt, and his nationwide Share Our Wealth organizations accumulated 7,500,000 devoted members. As the 1936 presidential election geared up, Jim Farley, FDR’s top political advisor and Chairman of the Democratic Party, considered the Kingfish as a serious third party contender. President Roosevelt himself viewed Huey as “one of the two most dangerous men in America” (the other being General Douglas McAurthur). 

But Huey Long never let go of his grip on the Bayou State, and despite being a U.S. Senator, he was still the de facto governor of Louisiana. He made frequent trips to Baton Rouge to oversee the affairs of the legislature, and on one such trip at the height of his power in September 1935, the Kingfish was met with an unexpected surprise. As he walked out of the house chamber, a lone gunman, Carl Wiess, shot Huey in the gut. The wound was severe, and surgery failed to stop the bleeding. Two days later, on September 10th, 1935, Huey Long died at the age of forty-two. 

Despite his early exit from the national stage, Huey Long’s legacy has had numerous ripple effects throughout history. Several major components of the New Deal, such as Social Security and the millions of jobs provided by the Works Progress Administration, were co-opted by Roosevelt from Huey’s Share Our Wealth program. Lyndon Johnson’s transformational Great Society legislation, Medicaid and Medicare, were heavily influenced by Huey’s public health reforms while as governor. Perhaps Long’s greatest influence for our current day, however, was his highly appealing populist rhetoric. Long before Donald Trump, Huey was famous for tagging his enemies with derogatory nicknames and masterfully articulating the hopes and fears of the masses, two skills that the 45th president has undoubtedly adopted. The Kingfish’s disdain for his party’s establishment and his willingness to espouse radical ideas on a national stage has certainly influenced Bernie Sanders, a left-wing populist not unlike Huey Long.

Denounced by some as an unscrupulous demagogue and hailed by others as a defender of the common man, one thing is for certain, however, and that is the fact that Huey Long showed what a skillful and determined, though flawed politician could accomplish in just a short amount of time. The Kingfish left behind him a different world, a world in some respects we are still living in.

Sources:

T. Harry Williams, Huey Long (Vintage, 1981)

Lucas, Tyler. Kingfish of The Lodge: The Extraordinary Governorship of Huey P. Long. Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing, 2023

Richard D. White Jr, Kingfish: The Reign of Huey P. Long (Random House, 2009)
William Ivy Hair, The Kingfish and His Realm: The Life and Times of Huey P. Long (LSU Press, 1997)