Joseph Eugene Ransdell | |
|---|---|
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| United States Senator fromLouisiana | |
| In office March 4, 1913 – March 3, 1931 | |
| Preceded by | Murphy J. Foster |
| Succeeded by | Huey Long |
| Member of theU.S. House of Representatives fromLouisiana's5th district | |
| In office August 29, 1899 – March 3, 1913 | |
| Preceded by | Samuel Thomas Baird |
| Succeeded by | James Walter Elder |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1858-10-07)October 7, 1858 Alexandria, Louisiana, U.S. |
| Died | July 27, 1954(1954-07-27) (aged 95) |
| Resting place | Lake Providence Cemetery |
| Party | Democratic |
| Spouse | Olive Irene Powell Ransdell (married 1885-1935, her death) |
| Relations | Francis Xavier Ransdell (brother) Frank Voelker Sr. (nephew by marriage) |
| Occupation | Attorney; farmer;real estate |
Joseph Eugene Ransdell (October 7, 1858 – July 27, 1954) was an attorney and politician from Louisiana. Beginning in 1899, he was elected for seven consecutive terms asUnited States representative fromLouisiana's 5th congressional district.[1] He subsequently served for three terms in theUnited States Senate fromLouisiana before being defeated in the 1930 Democratic primary for the seat by GovernorHuey Long.
Born inAlexandria inRapides Parish in central Louisiana, Ransdell attendedpublic schools. He wasRoman Catholic by birth. In 1882, he graduated fromUnion College inSchnectady,New York. He returned to Louisiana to read the law with an established firm, and was admitted to thebar in 1883.
He practiced from 1883 to 1889 inLake Providence inEast Carroll Parish. Ransdell's law partner during the 1880s was his younger brother, Francis Xavier Ransdell, who years later was elected as a judge of the Louisiana 6th Judicial District Court.
Joseph Ransdell served asdistrict attorney for the 8th Judicial District of Louisiana for 15 years, from 1884 to 1896. He also had a plantation, where he cultivatedcotton andpecan groves. From 1896 to 1899, he served on the Fifth Levee District Board. In 1898, he was a member of thestate constitutional convention.
In 1899, Ransdell was elected as aDemocrat to theFifty-sixth Congress to fill the vacancy created by the death ofSamuel Thomas Baird. He won his first full term in Congress in 1900, having defeated theRepublicanbusinessmanHenry E. Hardtner ofUrania inLa Salle Parish, 6,172 votes (90.8 percent) to 628 (9.2 percent). Hardtner was the last Republican to contest the seat until 1976, whenFrank Spooner ofMonroe waged a strong but losing challenge to the DemocratJerry Huckaby ofRinggold inBienville Parish. By 1910, Hardtner had switched to Democratic affiliation and served for two years in theLouisiana House of Representatives as the first member ever from La Salle Parish. From 1924 to 1928, Hardtner was astate senator.
Ransdell served in the House from August 29, 1899, to March 3, 1913. He was not a candidate for renomination in 1912, having instead been elected by theLouisiana State Legislature to theUnited States Senate, prior to the passage of theSeventeenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. In 1918, he defeated future U.S. SenatorJohn H. Overton of Alexandria in a disputed vote. Ransdell won his third term in the Democraticprimary election in 1924, having defeatedLee Emmett Thomas, themayor ofShreveport, 104,312 (54.9 percent) to 85,54 (45.1 percent). Huey Pierce Long Jr., while himself running for a second term on the regulatory Louisiana Public Service Commission spent more time supporting Ransdell for the Senate than he did his own campaign in which he carried all twenty-eight parishes in his district. Long was particularly motivated by his fierce opposition to Mayor Thomas though Long was then a resident of Shreveport.
Ransdell was a US senator from March 4, 1913, to March 3, 1931. But in 1930Governor Huey Long ran in the Democratic primary against him for the seat and won. With 149,640 votes (57.3 percent), Long toppled Randsell, who polled 111,451 (42.7 percent). Long was elected in the general election without Republican opposition.[citation needed]
Ransdell had appeared in 1927 at a Long political rally in Lake Providence, where his younger brother introduced Long. District AttorneyJefferson B. Snyder, another long-term advocate of planter interests, sat on the stage. Snyder had not really favored Long so much as he was convinced that Long would defeat his chief opponent, U.S. RepresentativeRiley J. Wilson, the favorite of most planter interests, and Snyder wanted to influence the new governor. At the rally, Huey Long began "a harangue that castigated their closest friends and political allies and the old establishment itself, of which these men were a part."[2] Particularly outraged at Long's treatment of the Randsdells was state SenatorNorris C. Williamson of East Carroll Parish, the vice-president of the Constitutional League of Louisiana. He would notcompromise with the Longs and retired to private life in 1932, rather than face likely defeat by the Longfaction.[3]
T. H. Harris, the long-term Louisiana state superintendent of education, called Ransdell "one of the most lovable and distinguished citizens of the United States. [Yet] the people elected Long to the Senate because they believe that he can be of more use to them there. The people trust Long. I find it mighty easy to get on with Governor Long. I have seen the school appropriations increased by $1.9 million during the past two years. .."[4]
Ransdell was chairman of the Committee on Public Health and NationalQuarantine (Sixty-third throughSixty-fifth Congresses) and a member of the Committee on Mississippi River and Its Tributaries (Sixty-sixth Congress). It was in this capacity that Ransdell sponsored theRansdell Act, which created theNational Institutes of Health.
In 1920, Ransdell founded a printing firm inWashington, D.C., at a time when members of Congress could run businesses while serving in office. When his Senate tenure ended in 1931, Ransdell returned to Lake Providence to engage inreal estate and growing cotton and pecans. He was a member of the board of supervisors ofLouisiana State University atBaton Rouge from 1940 to 1944 during the administration of GovernorSam H. Jones. Ransdell died in Lake Providence and is interred there at Lake Providence Cemetery. At the time of his death, he was the last living Senator to have been elected by a state legislature.
Ransdell was a great-uncle ofFrank Voelker Jr., a Lake Providence attorney who chaired the formerLouisiana State Sovereignty Commission during the administration of GovernorJimmie Davis and then ran unsuccessfully for governor in the1963 Democratic gubernatorial primary, withdrawing before the balloting. Frank Voelker Sr., judge of the Sixth Judicial District from 1937 until his death in 1963, was married to Ransdell's niece, Isabel, and was hence a son-in-law of Judge Francis Ransdell.[5]
Ransdell's great-great nephew was theNew Orleans entrepreneur and philanthropistDavid Ransdell Voelker. FollowingHurricane Katrina, Democratic GovernorKathleen Babineaux Blanco named David Voelker to theLouisiana Recovery Authority. Blanco's successor and past opponent,RepublicanBobby Jindal, elevated Voelker as chairman of the authority.[6] In 2008, though he had been identified previously as a "longtime, diehard Republican", David Voelker was the largest donor in Louisiana to DemocratBarack H. Obama ofIllinois, having given the then neophyte presidential candidate $80,000, (~$114,099 in 2024) according to the nonpartisanOpenSecrets in Washington, D.C.[7]
Ransdell named the community of Elmwood southwest of Lake Providence, where he owned much of the land, for his boyhood plantation in Rapides parish. In 1976, more than thirty years after Ransdell's death, St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Church in Lake Providence moved into a new building on a lot which the former senator had willed to the congregation. The new location at 207 Scarborough Street, is directly across the street from the earlier structure where Ransdell and his family had long worshiped.[5]
A biography of Ransdell was written in 1951 byAdras LaBorde, long-time managing editor of theAlexandria Daily Town Talk.
| Party political offices | ||
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| First | Democratic nominee forU.S. Senator fromLouisiana (Class 2) 1918,1924 | Succeeded by |
| U.S. House of Representatives | ||
| Preceded by | Member of the U.S. House of Representatives fromLouisiana's 5th congressional district August 29, 1899 – March 3, 1913 | Succeeded by |
| U.S. Senate | ||
| Preceded by | U.S. senator (Class 2) from Louisiana March 4, 1913 – March 3, 1931 Served alongside:John Thornton,Robert F. Broussard,Walter Guion,Edward Gay,Edwin Broussard | Succeeded by |
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| Preceded by | Oldest living U.S. senator July 19, 1947 – July 27, 1954 | Succeeded by |
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