View source for Pat Harrison

{{Short description|American politician (1881–1941)}}
{{other people}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=November 2016}}
{{Infobox officeholder
|name         = Pat Harrison
|image        = PatHarrison1918.jpg
|order        = [[President pro tempore of the United States Senate]]
|term_start   = January 6, 1941
|term_end     = June 22, 1941
|predecessor  = [[William H. King]]
|successor    = [[Carter Glass]]
|jr/sr1       = United States Senator
|state1       = [[Mississippi]]
|term_start1  = March 4, 1919
|term_end1    = June 22, 1941
|predecessor1 = [[James K. Vardaman]]
|successor1   = [[James Eastland]]
|state2       = [[Mississippi]]
|district2    = {{ushr|MS|6|6th}}
|term_start3  = March 4, 1911
|term_end3    = March 4, 1919
|predecessor3 = [[Eaton J. Bowers]]
|successor3   = [[Paul B. Johnson Sr.]]
|birth_name   = Byron Patton Harrison
|birth_date   = {{birth date|1881|8|29}}
|birth_place  = [[Crystal Springs, Mississippi]], U.S.
|death_date   = {{death date and age|1941|6|22|1881|8|29}}
|death_place  = [[Washington, D.C.]], U.S.
|party        = [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic]]
|education    = [[Louisiana State University|Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge]]
}}
'''Byron Patton "Pat" Harrison''' (August 29, 1881{{spaced ndash}}June 22, 1941) was a [[Mississippi]] politician who served as a [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democrat]] in the [[United States House of Representatives]] from 1911 to 1919 and in the [[United States Senate]] from 1919 until his death.

==Early life and education==
Pat Harrison was born at [[Crystal Springs, Mississippi]]. His father was a Confederate veteran of the Civil War and died in 1885.<ref name="Ole Miss Archives">{{cite web | url = http://www.olemiss.edu/depts/general_library/archives/finding_aids/MUM00222.html | title = Pat Harrison Collection | access-date = September 21, 2011 | author = Department of Archives and Special Collections | date = 1883–1943 | publisher = University of Mississippi}}</ref> As a child, Harrison sold newspapers to supplement his family's income.<ref name="Ole Miss Archives" /> After graduating as class valedictorian from Crystal Springs High School in 1899, he attended a summer term at the [[University of Mississippi]] before transferring to [[Louisiana State University]] at Baton Rouge on a baseball scholarship.<ref name="Swain article">{{cite web | url = http://mshistory.k12.ms.us/articles/374/senator-pat-harrison-new-deal-wheelhorse-suspicious-of-his-load-1933-1941 | title = Senator Pat Harrison: New Deal Workhorse (1933-1941) Suspicious of His Load | access-date = September 21, 2011 | last = Swain | first = Martha H. | date = September 2011 | work = Mississippi History Now | publisher = Mississippi Historical Society | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20111102070206/http://mshistory.k12.ms.us/articles/374/senator-pat-harrison-new-deal-wheelhorse-suspicious-of-his-load-1933-1941 | archive-date = November 2, 2011 | url-status = dead }}</ref>

He dropped out after two years due to a lack of funds but was brought on to pitch for the Pickens, Mississippi, semi-professional baseball team in the 'Old Tomato League' summer circuit.<ref name="Swain article" /> After his stint in semi-professional baseball, Harrison moved to [[Leakesville, Mississippi]]. He taught and later became principal of the local high school.<ref name="Swain article" /> While supporting himself as an educator, Harrison studied law. He passed the Mississippi State Bar and opened a law practice in 1902.<ref name="Ole Miss Archives" /><ref name="Swain article" />

==Legal and political career==
In 1906, Harrison was elected district attorney to the Second Judicial District, and in 1908, moved to [[Gulfport, Mississippi]].<ref name="Swain article" /><ref name="Congress">{{cite web | url = http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=H000265 | title = Harrison, Byron Patton (Pat) | access-date = September 21, 2011 | work = Biographical Directory of the United States Congress | publisher = United States Congress}}</ref> He served as district attorney until being elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1910.<ref name="Ole Miss Archives" /> The 1910 election introduced Harrison as a skilled orator and witty debater, a reputation he maintained throughout his political career. Newspaper editor Clayton Rand described his longtime friend's oratory style as "an eloquence that flowed like a babbling brook through a field of flowers."<ref name="Swain article" />

===Political career===
After four years as district attorney on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, Harrison won a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1911 and was re-elected three times.<ref name="Congress" /> One of the youngest members of the House, Harrison made his mark as an effective debater against Republican tariff and tax policies and soon became a favored aide to Democratic President [[Woodrow Wilson]].<ref name="Swain article" /> In particular, Harrison supported Wilson's [[The New Freedom|New Freedom]] policies and those concerning Mexico and Germany at the onset of America's involvement in [[World War I]].<ref name="Swain article" /> In 1918, he ran against  incumbent U.S. Senator [[James K. Vardaman]], an enemy of President Wilson.<ref name="Swain article" /> In return for Harrison's past support, President Wilson personally endorsed him for Senator.<ref name="Swain article" /> Already popular among his constituents, Harrison emphasized his differences with Vardaman and won over a majority of Mississippi voters, who were effectively limited to white Democrats, following the state legislature's [[Disfranchisement after Reconstruction era|disenfranchisement of most black voters]] by a new constitution and discriminatory practices dating from 1890. After winning Vardaman's Senate seat in 1918, Harrison was re-elected for another three terms, as Mississippi was a one-party state dominated by Democrats. He ran unopposed in 1930 for his third term in the U.S. Senate.<ref name="Swain article" />

A supporter and former law partner of [[Theodore G. Bilbo]], Stewart C. "Sweep Clean" Broom surprisingly aided Harrison's 1936 reelection campaign by giving a well-received speech encouraging "Bilbo folks" to save Bilbo "from his own blunder."<ref name="Broom">{{cite magazine |title=Broom or Bilbo |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] |date=August 24, 1936 |url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,756514,00.html?iid=chix-sphere |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110629001714/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,756514,00.html?iid=chix-sphere |url-status=dead |archive-date=June 29, 2011 }}</ref> Despite having received past help from Harrison, Bilbo actively supported [[Martin Sennett Conner]] for Harrison's Senate seat, presumably as a self-serving political maneuver.<ref name="Indestructible">{{cite magazine | title = Mississippi: Indestructible Man | magazine = Time | date = September 9, 1940| url = http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,764598,00.html | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20101014054012/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,764598,00.html | url-status = dead | archive-date = October 14, 2010 | access-date = September 21, 2011}}</ref>

[[File:Signing Of The Social Security Act.jpg|thumb|right|President Roosevelt signs the [[Social Security Act]] into law, August 14, 1935. (Harrison second from right)]]
As chairman of the powerful [[Senate Finance Committee]], Harrison was one of the three or four key people behind the creation of the [[Social Security (United States)|Social Security]] system in 1935. He also promoted low tariffs and reciprocal trade agreements. When the Senate majority leader's job opened up in 1937, Harrison was expected to win the position,<ref name="Swain article" /> but nose counts put him in a near tie with Kentucky's [[Alben Barkley]].<ref>{{cite news | title = Bitter Fight in Progress Over New Leader of Senate | date = July 20, 1937 | url = http://www.newspaperarchive.com/SiteMap/FreePdfPreview.aspx?img=114302983 | work = The Chillicothe Constitution-Tribune | page = 6 | access-date = September 21, 2011 | quote = In the fight for the leadership today's session until Thursday which will be devoted to considering over of the Senate, however, neither Harrison or Barkley forces would express more than a hopeful optimism. An impartial check of votes claimed showed that not more than three or four separated the two candidates.}}</ref> Harrison's campaign manager asked Bilbo, the junior member from Mississippi, to consider voting for his fellow Mississippian. Bilbo, a race-baiting Democratic [[demagogue]] whose base was among tenant farmers, hated the upper-class Harrison, who represented the rich planters. The rivalry between the two had deepened over years of disagreement over aspects of the [[New Deal]] and how federal money should be distributed throughout Mississippi.<ref name="Swain article" /> Bilbo said he would vote for Harrison only if he were personally asked. Harrison replied, "Tell the son of a bitch I wouldn't speak to him even if it meant the presidency of the United States."<ref>{{cite journal | title = Mississippi Spurning | journal = U.S. News & World Report | year = 1996 | volume = 120 | page = 122| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Wi8nAQAAIAAJ | access-date = September 21, 2011}}</ref> Despite Harrison's support for Roosevelt and his policies,<ref>[https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=1cskAAAAIBAJ&pg=PA1&dq=No+administration+labor+Senator+Harrison&article_id=484,831922&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiu-5z956yKAxXWQkEAHYWAMYwQ6AF6BAgFEAI#v=onepage&q=No%20administration%20labor%20Senator%20Harrison&f=false The Woodville Republican 21 Oct 1933, ‘Harrison Scores Democrats Who Fail Roosevelt’]</ref> shortly before the vote, the president wrote a letter of support for Barkley.<ref name="Swain article" /> When the ballots were in, Harrison lost by one vote, 37–38.

Like other Southern Senators, he opposed federal action on [[civil rights movement|civil rights]], becoming the first senator to use the [[Senate Journal]] as a means to [[Southern filibuster|filibuster]] during the 1922 debate on the [[Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill]].  The [[Standing Rules of the United States Senate|Senate rules]] state that "the reading of the Journal shall not be suspended unless by unanimous consent",<ref>IV, 1, (b), https://www.rules.senate.gov/rules-of-the-senate</ref>  so Harrison's discussion of the Senate Journal was unable to be [[cloture]]d until the sponsors withdrew the Bill.<ref name="CaroSenate3">{{Cite book |last=Caro |first=Robert |title=Master of the Senate: The Years of Lyndon Johnson |title-link=Master of the Senate|publisher=[[Alfred A. Knopf]] |year=2002 |isbn=0-394-52836-0 |location=New York |chapter=3. Seniority and the South}}</ref>

Harrison served on the Senate Finance Committee and was chairman of that body from 1933 to 1941 (Seventy-third through Seventy-seventh Congresses), and served as [[President pro tempore of the United States Senate|President pro tempore of the Senate]] during the Seventy-seventh Congress, in 1941 until his death that year. 

===Political reputation===
Harrison was a highly effective politician and a brilliant orator. He listened to his district and provided information, services, and patronage. Due to his ability to maneuver through the political landscape and because he was well-liked by many of his fellow politicians, Harrison became rather influential in both legislation and political endorsement. In 1928, he supported New York Governor [[Al Smith]] for President and campaigned for him across the South, where there was opposition and superstition among white Southerners because of Smith’s Catholicism.

Harrison became known as the "Gadfly of the Senate" due to his oratory rebuking Republican policies.

At the [[1932 Democratic National Convention]], he swung the Mississippi delegation to [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]] on the crucial third ballot and became welcome at the White House.

Senator [[Tom Connally]], who supported Harrison's unsuccessful bid to become Senate majority leader, described him in his autobiography as such:

{{Blockquote|Pat was especially well liked by the general membership of the Senate, and because of his position as chairman of the powerful Finance Committee, where so much of the recovery program was channeled, he was known as an effective and liberal senator. He had played a large role in passing the NRA, the Social Security Act and the Roosevelt tax program. In addition, on the Senate floor, Pat was a splendid debater.<ref>My Name Is Tom Connally by Senator Tom Connally as told to Alfred Steinberg, Thomas Y. Crowell Company: New York, 1954, P.192</ref>}}

==Death==
On 16 June 1941, Harrison underwent surgery for an [[intestinal obstruction]]. He died from post-operative complications six days later.<ref>https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=Fr8DH2VBP9sC&dat=19410623&printsec=frontpage&hl=en The Montreal Gazette, 23 June 1941, p.12.</ref>

==Bibliography==
<!-- Keep in alphabetical order by surname; make additions in same format -->
* Coker, William S. "Pat Harrison – Strategy for Victory". ''Journal of Mississippi History'' 1966 28(4): 267–285.
* Coker, William Sidney. "Pat Harrison: the Formative Years." ''Journal of Mississippi History'' 1963 25(4): 251–278.
* Davis, Polly. "Court Reform and Alben W. Barkley's Election as Majority Leader". ''Southern Quarterly'' 1976 15(1): 15-31.
* Edmonson, Ben G. "Pat Harrison and Mississippi in the Presidential Elections of 1924 and 1928". ''Journal of Mississippi History'' 1971 33(4): 333–350.
* Grant, Philip A., Jr. "Editorial Reaction to the Harrison-Barkley Senate Leadership Contest, 1937". ''Journal of Mississippi History'' 1974 36(2): 127–141.
* Grant, Philip A., Jr. "The Mississippi Congressional Delegation and the Formation of the Conservative Coalition, 1937–1940". ''Journal of Mississippi History'' 1988 50(1): 21–28.
* Finley, Keith M. ''Delaying the Dream: Southern Senators and the Fight Against Civil Rights, 1938–1965'' (Baton Rouge, LSU Press, 2008).
* Lord, Lewis. ''U.S. News & World Report,'' June 17, 1996, p.&nbsp;12.
* Swain, Martha H. ''Pat Harrison: The New Deal Years'' (Jackson, Miss., 1978), the standard biography
* Swain, Martha. "Pat Harrison and the Social Security Act of 1935". ''Southern Quarterly'' 1976 15(1): 1–14.
* Swain, Martha H. "The Lion and the Fox: the Relationship of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Senator Pat Harrison". ''Journal of Mississippi History'' 1976 38(4): 333–359.
* Thomas, Phyllis H. "The Role of Mississippi in the Presidential Election of 1916," ''Southern Quarterly,'' 1966 4(2): 207–226.

==See also==
{{Portal|Biography}}
* [[List of members of the United States Congress who died in office (1900–1949)]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
{{Commons category|Pat Harrison}}
* [http://purl.oclc.org/umarchives/MUM00222/ The Pat Harrison Collection (MUM00222)] and Pat Harrison portraits can be found at the University of Mississippi in the Archives and Special Collections
* {{Find a Grave|8004327|Byron Patton Harrison}}

{{s-start}}
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{{s-ttl|title=Member of the [[List of United States representatives from Mississippi|U.S. House of Representatives]]<br>from [[Mississippi's 6th congressional district]]|years=1911–1919}}
{{s-aft|after=[[Paul B. Johnson Sr.]]}}
|-
{{s-ppo}}
{{s-new|first}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic]] nominee for [[United States Senator|U.S. Senator]] from [[Mississippi]]<br>([[Classes of United States Senators|Class 2]])|years=[[1918 United States Senate election in Mississippi|1918]], [[1924 United States Senate election in Mississippi|1924]], [[1930 United States Senate election in Mississippi|1930]], [[1936 United States Senate election in Mississippi|1936]]}}
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{{s-ttl|title=[[List of United States senators from Mississippi|U.S. Senator (Class 2) from Mississippi]]|years=1919–1941|alongside=[[John Sharp Williams]], [[Hubert D. Stephens]], [[Theodore Bilbo]]}}
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{{s-ttl|title=[[President pro tempore of the United States Senate|President pro tempore of the U.S. Senate]]|years=1941}}
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{{s-end}}

{{USSenMS}}
{{SenFinanceCommitteeChairs}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Harrison, Pat}}
[[Category:1881 births]]
[[Category:1941 deaths]]
[[Category:American segregationists]]
[[Category:Democratic Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Mississippi]]
[[Category:Democratic Party United States senators from Mississippi]]
[[Category:People from Crystal Springs, Mississippi]]
[[Category:Presidents pro tempore of the United States Senate]]
[[Category:Candidates in the 1924 United States presidential election]]
[[Category:People from Leakesville, Mississippi]]
[[Category:20th-century United States senators]]
[[Category:20th-century United States representatives]]