Henry Styles Bridges | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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.jpg) Bridges in 1939 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| United States Senator fromNew Hampshire | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In office January 3, 1937 – November 26, 1961 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Henry W. Keyes | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Maurice J. Murphy Jr. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| 63rdGovernor of New Hampshire | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| In office January 3, 1935 – January 3, 1937 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Preceded by | John Winant | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Francis P. Murphy | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Personal details | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | Henry Styles Bridges (1898-09-09)September 9, 1898 Pembroke, Maine, U.S. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Died | November 26, 1961(1961-11-26) (aged 63) Concord, New Hampshire, U.S. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Political party | Republican | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Spouses | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Education | University of Maine (BA) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Henry Styles Bridges (September 9, 1898 – November 26, 1961) was an American teacher, editor, andRepublican Party politician fromConcord, New Hampshire. He served one term as the 63rdgovernor of New Hampshire before a twenty-four-year career in theUnited States Senate.
Bridges was born inWest Pembroke, Maine, the son of Alina Roxanna (Fisher) and Earle Leopold Bridges.[citation needed] He attended thepublic schools inMaine. Bridges attended theUniversity of Maine atOrono until 1918. From 1918 he held a variety of jobs, including teaching, newspaper editing, business and state government. He was an instructor at Sanderson Academy,Ashfield, Massachusetts, from 1918 to 1919. He was a member of the extension staff of theUniversity of New Hampshire atDurham from 1921 until 1922. He was the secretary of the New Hampshire Farm Bureau Federation from 1922 until 1923, and the editor of theGranite MonthlyMagazine from 1924 until 1926. Meanwhile, He was the director and secretary of the New Hampshire Investment Corporation from 1924 until 1929. He was then a member of the New Hampshire Public Service Commission from 1930 until 1934.
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Bridges ran forgovernor of New Hampshire in 1934, and won, becoming the nation's youngest governor at the time, according toJohn Gunther'sInside U.S.A.
Republican presidential nomineeAlf Landon considered Bridges as his running mate for the1936 United States presidential election, but aides pointed out that Democrats could use "Landon Bridges falling down" as a campaign slogan.[1] Bridges was elected to theUnited States Senate in 1936, and would serve until his death in 1961. In 1937, he retired from the Army Reserve Corps, in which he had served as a lieutenant since 1925. In 1940, he attempted to win theRepublican nomination forPresident; the nomination was eventually won byWendell Willkie. That same year, Bridges also received two delegates for the Republicanvice presidential nomination, which eventually went toCharles L. McNary. Bridges broke his hip onNew Year's Eve 1941, and missed several months of the next Senate session.
Bridges was reelected to four subsequent terms in 1942, 1948, 1954, and 1960, but died in office a year into his final term. He became the highest-ranking Republican senator, serving as chairman of the Joint Committee on Foreign Economic Cooperation when the Republicans had control of the Senate from 1947 until 1949,Senate Minority Leader from 1952 until 1953,President pro tempore of the United States Senate when the Republicans had control of it from 1953 until 1955, chairman of the Joint Committee on Inaugural Arrangements for both of the inaugurations of PresidentDwight Eisenhower,Chairman of the Committee on Appropriations when the Republicans had control of the Senate from 1947 to 1949 and 1953–1955, andChairman of the Republican Policy Committee from 1954 until his death.
In 1946, Bridges was part of a five-member committee which investigated racist, violent voter suppression inMississippi incited by the state's demagogic senatorTheodore G. Bilbo.[2] The committee, being composed of three Democrats and two Republicans, voted to exonerate Bilbo along party lines. Bridges and his fellow conservative colleague on the committee,Bourke Hickenlooper ofIowa, dissented from the decision on the grounds that Bilbo's actions violated federal laws and abused the First Amendment.[3]
Bridges was on the firstSenate Preparedness Investigating Subcommittee of theArmed Services Committee under the chairmanship ofLyndon Johnson.[4] Johnson's biographerRobert Caro argues that Bridges offered Johnson a free hand in running the committee in return for employing two subcommittee staff members who would in fact augment Bridges' staff.[5]
In the Senate, John Gunther wrote, Bridges was "an aggressive reactionary on most issues...and he is pertinaciously engaged in a continual running fight with theCIO, theRoosevelt family and theUnion of Soviet Socialist Republics."[6] Bridges voted present on theCivil Rights Act of 1957 and voted in favor of theCivil Rights Act of 1960.[7][8]
After WWII, when the U.S. government wasrecruiting Nazi scientists, engineers, and doctors, and Jewish members of the U.S. State Department obstructed thenaturalization andpolitical rehabilitation of those individuals, Bridges said on the floor of the Senate on July 18, 1950, that theState Department needed a "first-classcyanidefumigating job" to eliminate resistance to the program, part of an extended "house cleaning" metaphor referencing the common use of cyanide as a fumigant.[a][9][10]
Bridges was a staunch defender of SenatorJoseph McCarthy of Wisconsin, and was one of only 22 senators, all Republicans, who voted against the censure of McCarthy for his"red scare" communist investigations, and for his so-called "lavender scare" tactics aimed at homosexuals in 1954.[11]
Bridges was also a key collaborator, with fellow Republican senators McCarthy andHerman Welker of Idaho, in the blackmail of Democratic Wyoming senatorLester C. Hunt, harassment that led to Senator Hunt's suicide in his Capitol office on June 19, 1954.[12][13] Bridges threatened that if he did not immediately retire from the Senate and agree not to seek reelection, Bridges would see that Hunt's son, Lester Hunt Jr., who had been arrested for soliciting an undercover policeman, was prosecuted and that his son's homosexuality would be widely publicized. Bridges also threatened InspectorRoy Blick of the Morals Division of the Washington Police Department with the loss of his job for failing to prosecute Hunt Jr.[14][15] A Republican,Edward D. Crippa, was appointed by the Republican acting governor of Wyoming,Clifford Joy Rogers, to fill the vacant seat.[16]
Alex Ross inThe New Yorker wrote in 2012 of an event "loosely dramatized in thenovel andfilmAdvise & Consent [in which] Senator Lester Hunt, of Wyoming, killed himself after ... Bridges ... threatened to expose Hunt's son as a homosexual".[17]
Bridges died of a heart attack on November 26, 1961, in East Concord and, after a service attended by a thousand people at the State House in Concord, was buried in Pine Grove Cemetery.[18][19]
He was one of the poorest men ever elected governor and still of modest means when elected to the Senate, yet his widowDoloris told then Vice PresidentLyndon Johnson that her husband had left her "a million dollars in cash".[20] Bridges willed his East Concord home to the state to serve as a residence for New Hampshire's governors. TheNew Hampshire Governor's Mansion is known as "Bridges House".[21]
The "Styles Bridges Room" in theU.S. Capitol was named in his memory on March 12, 1981.[22]
Interstate 93 in New Hampshire, fromConcord north to theVermont state line, is named the Styles Bridges Highway. In December 2012, theBoston Globe called for the state to examine Bridges' role in SenatorLester Hunt's death and reconsider whether the state should continue to honor Bridges, or rename the highway.[23]
| Party political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Republican nominee forGovernor of New Hampshire 1934 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Republican nominee forU.S. Senator fromNew Hampshire (Class 2) 1936,1942,1948,1954,1960 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Senate Republican Leader 1952–1953 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Chair of theSenate Republican Policy Committee 1955–1961 | Succeeded by |
| Political offices | ||
| Preceded by John Winant | Governor of New Hampshire 1935–1937 | Succeeded by Francis P. Murphy |
| Preceded by | President pro tempore of the U.S. Senate 1953–1955 | Succeeded by |
| U.S. Senate | ||
| Preceded by Henry W. Keyes | U.S. Senator (Class 2) from New Hampshire 1937–1961 Served alongside:Fred H. Brown,Charles W. Tobey,Robert W. Upton,Norris Cotton | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by Kenneth McKellar | Chair of theSenate Appropriations Committee 1947–1949 | Succeeded by Kenneth McKellar |
| New office | Chair of the Joint Foreign Economic Cooperation Committee 1948–1949 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by Kenneth McKellar | Ranking Member of theSenate Appropriations Committee 1949–1953 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by Kenneth S. Wherry | Senate Minority Leader 1952–1953 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by Carl Hayden | Chair of theJoint Inaugural Ceremonies Committee 1952–1957 | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by Kenneth McKellar | Chair of theSenate Appropriations Committee 1953–1955 | Succeeded by Carl Hayden |
| Preceded by Carl Hayden | Ranking Member of theSenate Appropriations Committee 1955–1961 | Succeeded by |
| New office | Ranking Member of theSenate Space Committee 1958–1961 | Succeeded by |
| Honorary titles | ||
| Preceded by | Most seniorRepublicanUnited States senator 1951–1961 | Succeeded by Alexander Wiley |
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Chairs of theUnited States Senate Committee on Appropriations | ||
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