Ray Blanton emerged from the 1974 primary as the Democratic nominee for governor of Tennessee. It had been a contentious primary in with twelve men competing for the nomination. Blanton had barely edged banker Jake Butcher to be the nominee. The Republicans had their...
By Ray Hill After having lost the 1972 race for the U. S. Senate to incumbent Howard Baker by a wide margin, Ray Blanton found himself out of Congress. Blanton returned to Tennessee and immediately began planting the seeds for an expected bid for the Democratic...
By Ray Hill Tennessee had lost a congressional district in the redistricting in 1971. Congressmen Ray Blanton and William Anderson, both Democrats, would likely have run against one another if both sought reelection. Anderson flirted with a bid for the Democratic...
By Ray Hill Charles Evans Hughes achieved just about every high office that could come to one man save one: the presidency, and he came mighty close to achieving that as well. Judge Learned Hand once paid tribute to both Hughes and his son, Charles Evan Hughes, Jr.,...
By Ray Hill For a time, there was no more influential Republican in the State of Tennessee than Newell Sanders. Sanders was a Republican at a time when the GOP was at a distinct disadvantage in the Volunteer State, yet he helped to build his party and became a...
By Ray Hill There are likely more pedigrees in politics than the American Kennel Club and if anyone ever possessed a pedigree, it would be Robert Alphonso Taft of Ohio. For decades, Robert A. Taft was one of the most prominent members of the United States Senate. ...
By Ray Hill Few politicians have a career as successful as that of John William Bricker of Ohio; state attorney general (an elected position in Ohio), three times governor and twice United States senator. Bricker came from very humble beginnings, born on September 6,...
By Ray Hill “If you trust the people, they will trust you.” Arthur Capper Before there was Bob Dole, there was Arthur Capper. Capper was the most successful politician in Kansas for decades. Of the many campaigns he waged, he lost only one. He served two terms as...
By Ray Hill Part One By 1934, Republicans were not much of a factor in statewide elections in Tennessee. The political landscape in the Volunteer State had changed with the resignation of Senator Cordell Hull, who had agreed to serve as Secretary of State in the...
By Ray Hill Tennessee, like the rest of the country, was suffering terribly from the effects of the Great Depression. Despite the general impression the 1920s had been a decade of plenty and prosperity, that was not entirely true in the South. Tennessee was...
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