Robert F. Kennon

Robert Floyd Kennon, Sr. ( born August 12, 1902 in Minden, Webster Parish, Louisiana, † January 11, 1988 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana ) was an American politician and 1952-1956 Governor of the State of Louisiana.

Early years and political rise

Robert Kennon visited by the Minden High School Louisiana State University, where he received his law degree in 1925. In the same year he was elected mayor of his home town of Minden, an office which he held until 1928. Between 1930 and 1940 he was district attorney in the 26th Judicial District of Louisiana. In 1942 he was for a short time judge in a court of appeal. During the Second World War, he was first in the National Guard and later lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army. Between 1945 and 1947 he was Associate Justice of the Louisiana Supreme Court in 1948, there was in Louisiana after the death of U.S. Senator John H. Overton to a by-election for the vacant seat in the Kennon narrowly against Russell B. Long subject. He was then taken by the Group of the Long - opponent as the leading candidate of the Democratic Party for the next election for governor and elected to this office on 22 April 1952.

Governor of Louisiana

Robert Kennon took up his new post on 13 May 1952. In his four-year tenure, he supported the city of New Orleans, promising, or at least not less than his predecessors in their internal affairs to interfere. In the whole of Louisiana voting machines have now been introduced and prepared a jail reform. Governor Kennon fighting organized crime and banned gambling and prostitution. His tenure was for some time the first did not fall under suspicion of corruption. But Governor Kennon was also a supporter of racial segregation. He advocated the segregation in schools even then, when the Supreme Court having regarded this as unconstitutional. The way to overcome this institution began in Louisiana only under Kennons successors.

Further CV

After the end of his term on May 8, 1956, he operated a law firm in Baton Rouge. In 1963 he applied again to the office of governor of Louisiana. This time he failed in the primaries. One reason could have been his criticism of President John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert F. Kennedy. Since the code was held just days after the assassination of President Kennedy, Kennon hurt his criticism, because almost everywhere in the U.S., the sympathy with the Kennedys was very large. Incidentally, Kennon remote inwardly more and more of his party. He supported Dwight D. Eisenhower, Barry Goldwater and Gerald Ford, all competed for 1952-1976 as a candidate of the Republican party for the presidency. Robert Kennon died in 1978. Together with his wife Eugenia Sentell he had three children.