Walter F. George

Walter Franklin George (January 29, 1878 – August 4, 1957) was an American politician from the state of Georgia. He was a longtime Democratic United States senator from 1922 to 1957 and was President pro tempore of the United States Senate from 1955 to 1957.

Born near Preston, Georgia, George practiced law after graduating from Mercer University. He served on the Supreme Court of Georgia from 1917 to 1922, resigning from the bench to successfully run for the Senate. Philosophically a conservative Democrat, Nevertheless, George not only signed the Southern Manifesto opposing integration, he formally presented it to the Senate.

By the end of his Senate career, George was one of the most powerful U.S. Senators and was well-regarded by both political parties and by liberals and conservatives. George was an early and leading champion of vocational education, a strict constitutionalist who believed in limited federal government, a fiscal conservative. During the course of his Senate career, he transitioned from being a foreign isolationist to a fervent supporter of internationalism, including playing an important role in the Senate's 1945 approval of the United Nations Charter. He attended public schools and then Mercer University in Macon, Georgia. He was a member of Sigma Nu fraternity. He received his law degree from Mercer in 1901 and entered the practice of law. George served as a judge of the Georgia Court of Appeals in 1917 and as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of Georgia from 1917 to 1922. While he was a judge he was a "vociferous reader" of serious history as well as historical novels.

Senator

1920s When Senator Thomas E. Watson died on September 26, 1922, George resigned from the Supreme Court of Georgia to run for the vacant seat. George won the resulting special election. He did not take his seat immediately when the Senate reconvened on November 21. Instead he waited one day. Thus Rebecca Latimer Felton, who had been appointed by governor Thomas W. Hardwick on October 3, could be sworn in and be the first woman seated in the Senate. Felton served one day, until George was sworn in on November 22.

George was re-elected to his first full six-year term in 1926. He served in the Senate from 1922 until 1957, declining to run for a sixth full term in 1956. In this period, the Republican Party in Georgia was very weak, so the real re-election contests for George were in the Democratic primaries.

During the 1920s, George, a Democrat, tended to vote conservatively. George supported prohibition, opposed civil rights legislation, the Rural Electrification Administration, and the Agricultural Adjustment Act. and during Roosevelt's time in office, he supported 34 New Deal bills that went through the Senate, opposing only 10.

From July 31, 1941 to August 2, 1946, Senator George was the chairman of the United States Senate Committee on Finance, and one of Washington's most powerful legislative forces. As chairman of this powerful committee, George defeated many of Roosevelt's efforts to increase taxes and enact very progressive tax regimes. George and Roosevelt were in greater agreement on foreign affairs;

That fall, after thirty-four years in the U.S. Senate, George approached what would be his seventh senatorial campaign. At the age of 78, he vacillated on whether to seek re-election since he faced a strong opponent, Herman Talmadge He told President Eisenhower that "if I retire, I want to stay at home and rest. I am really tired." U.S. Senators from both political parties actively worked to encourage George’s reelection, including Minnesota's Hubert Humphrey who offered George, "represented the finest of traditions of this great deliberative body ... a profound and effective statesman ... when some of us felt too timid to speak up, this brave man spoke up." While the President and other national politicians favored George’s reelection, Talmadge had the state political machinery built by his father, Eugene, firmly behind him. Moreover, George's refusal to publicly denounce Brown v. Board of Education harmed his reelection prospects, since segregation became a primary campaign focus. Balancing his age, re-election prospects, his seniority and leadership in the Senate, the support of Georgia's businesses, and other considerations, George declined to run, realizing that his health likely would not withstand the strenuous campaign.

George was a member of twelve committees while he was in the Senate and the chairman of five, including the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations from 1940 to 1941 and from 1955 to 1957 and the United States Senate Committee on Finance from 1941 to 1947 and from 1949 to 1953. He was also President pro tempore of the Senate from 1955 to 1957. In the Senate, George became known for his polished oratory and was considered one of the Senate's best public speakers.

Early in 1957, shortly after George retired from the Senate, President Eisenhower appointed him special ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. After about six months' service, George became seriously ill. He died in Vienna, Georgia and is interred in the Vienna cemetery. George was a Freemason, member of Vienna Lodge No. 324.

Remembrances The Walter F. George School of Law of Mercer University, the former Walter F. George High School (presently South Atlanta High School) in Atlanta, Georgia, and Walter F. George Lake in western Georgia were named for him. The Walter F. George Foundation, created at Mercer when the university's law school was named in honor of George in 1947, continues to award scholarships to Mercer law students who plan to pursue careers in public service. George's portrait hangs in the Georgia state capitol. A bronze bust of Sen. George was dedicated in 1950 in Vienna, Georgia. The bust was donated by the Georgia Vocational Association (now Georgia Association for Career & Technical Education) for George's support of Vocational Education and passage of the George-Deen Act.

In 1960, the United States Postal Service issued a $0.04 stamp honoring George. The place of issue was Vienna, Georgia, George's final home.