Furnifold McLendel Simmons

Furnifold McLendel Simmons ( * January 20, 1854 in Pollocksville, Jones County, North Carolina, † April 30, 1940 in New Bern, North Carolina ) was an American politician (Democratic Party), that of the state of North Carolina in both chambers Congress represented.

Lawyer and congressman

Furnifold McLendel Simmons came on the plantation of his father in eastern North Carolina to the world. He attended a private school and the Wake Forest College, before he took his degree in 1873 from Trinity College in Durham. He subsequently studied law, was admitted to the bar in 1875 and began the following year to practice as a lawyer in New Bern.

On March 4, 1887 Simmons moved as a deputy of the second electoral district of North Carolina, a House of Representatives of the United States. He spent a two -year term, subject to the attempt to re-election but the Republicans Henry P. Cheatham, who thus became the only African-American member of Congress at the beginning of its 51st session. 1890 Simmons joined again for election, but was without a chance, especially since the majority of Democrats candidate James M. Mewborne supported. However, this also lost against Cheatham.

During this time, Simmons was an attorney in New Bern again. 1893 appointed U.S. President Grover Cleveland to him tax collector (Collector of Internal Revenue ) for the fourth district of North Carolina, which he remained until 1897. From 1898 to 1900 he was the Democratic Party before in his state, which he pretended a strategy of White Supremacy. As a result of this policy of the African American population of North Carolina was denied the right to vote for half a century.

U.S. Senator

Even after his election as U.S. Senator in 1900, Simmons was the leading figure of his party at the state level. During his time in Washington, D.C. acted AD Watts, a deputy in the House of Representatives from North Carolina, when its stakeholders. Simmons went on 4 March 1901 in the Senate and was its mandate after repeated re-election exercise to March 3, 1931. During this time he was 1913-1919 chairman of the influential Finance Committee; He also chaired several other committees.

In the run up to the presidential elections 1920, Simmons sought to his party's nomination for the highest office. But he had no chance at the nomination before the Democratic National Convention. As Al Smith in 1928 applied for the Democrats for the presidency, Simmons denied this support. This led, together with the effects of the Great Depression to the fact that he lost the Democratic primary for his Senate seat against the support of Governor Oliver Max Gardner Josiah William Bailey in 1930. Simmons returned to New Bern, where he died in April 1940. Since July 1938, he was the oldest living former U.S. Senator.

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