John H. Bankhead II
John Hollis Bankhead II ( born July 8, 1872 in Lamar County, Alabama, † June 12, 1946 in Bethesda, Maryland) was an American politician who was politically active for the state of Alabama in the United States Senate.
Life
John Hollis Bankhead belonged to an influential political family; his father, John H. Bankhead was like the son of a United States Senator from Alabama; Bank Heads brother William B. Bankhead was a delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives from 1936 to 1940 and its Speaker. Bank Heads niece Tallulah Bankhead has enjoyed success as a film actress.
Bankhead who grew up on a farm, the duty of schools visited in Wetumpka and Fayette. He then enrolled at the University of Alabama, where he studied law. After graduating, in 1891, he studied politics at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. First political experience he gained as an intern at his father, who was still a deputy to the House of Representatives at that time the office. After he was admitted to the Bar of Alabama in 1893, he moved to Jasper, where he began to practice as a lawyer.
On December 26, 1894, he joined with Musa Harkins down the aisle, a woman with whom he had been friends since school days. The couple had three children, son Walter Will and the daughters Marion and Louise over time.
As a lawyer Bankhead represented mainly companies, including the railroad and coal mines. In 1901 he represented his district, Walker County, at the Constitutional Convention in Montgomery. Here he became a broad voters layer also known nationwide. In 1903, he ran as a delegate of the Democratic Party successfully for a seat in the House of Representatives from Alabama, which he, however, only one legislative period, 1904-1905, was a member. With his father and brother Bankhead acquired the Caledonia Coal Company, a company which they renamed Bankhead Coal Company. Bankhead was its president from 1911 to 1925.
1926 Bankhead ran for the first time for a seat in the U.S. Senate, but was defeated in the internal party primaries Democrat Hugo Black. Four years later, in 1930, he tried again, but this time had more success. On 4 March 1931 he was sworn into his new office as a senator. Then the Democrat James Thomas Heflin appealed against the election result an appeal because he thought the primaries would extend unfair, and he would instead of Bankhead claim to the Senate seat. After nearly two years of stalemate in which even a subcommittee of the Senate had to decide on the election results in favor of Bank Heads was confirmed.
Since Alabama was affected in the so-called Great Depression particularly hard by the world economic crisis, Bankhead continued for a rapid reaction of Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal a. He also put himself in his political work for farmers and peasants. In the early 1940s it was due Bankhead that in Alabama research institutions were settled in agriculture, and thus created jobs. Also, Bankhead engaged in education for the children of farmers, and was able to transfer a lot of money from the federal budget to Alabama thanks to its negotiation destiny. On the other hand, Bankhead was a typical Southern politician who spoke out against the civil rights of African Americans.
1944, at the federal party of the Democrats, Bankhead was a good chance to become U.S. vice- presidential candidate of President Roosevelt. Nevertheless, Bankhead withdrew his candidacy, so that U.S. Senator Harry S. Truman was again on the ticket.
On 24 May 1946, after a long day at work, suffered Senator Bankhead a severe stroke from which he never recovered. He was taken to the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, where he barely three weeks later, died at the age of 73 years.
Like his father, he was elected three times to the U.S. Senator and as John H. Bankhead Bankhead junior senior died during his tenure.