William H. Murray

William Henry Davis " Alfalfa Bill" Murray ( born November 21, 1869 in Collinsville, Grayson County, Texas, † July 15, 1956 in Tishomingo, Oklahoma ) was an American politician and from 1931 to 1935, the ninth Governor of Oklahoma.

Early years and political rise

Murray attended the College Hill Institute in Springtown (Texas ). He then became a teacher himself and newspaper publisher. After a private law school, he was admitted in 1895 as a lawyer. In Fort Worth, he began to practice in his profession. In 1898 he moved to Tishomingo in what was then Indian Territory. There, he was the personal lawyer of the competent territorial governor. He also worked as a rancher.

In 1905 he was a delegate at the so-called Sequoyah Convention, which unsuccessfully sought the establishment of a separate Indian state; In 1906 he was a delegate to the Constitutional Convention of Oklahoma. Between 1907 and 1908, Murray was a member of the House of Representatives from Oklahoma. He was even the first president of this chamber. Between 1914 and 1918 he represented his state in the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington. In the years 1910 and 1918, he competed unsuccessfully for the nomination of the Democratic Party for the office of Governor of Oklahoma. In the years 1908, 1912, 1916, and 1932 he was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention. In the 1920s he moved to Bolivia, where he worked as a rancher. In 1929, he returned to Oklahoma and in 1930 he was elected governor of his state, where he prevailed with 59:41 percent of the vote to Republican Ira A. Hill.

Governor of Oklahoma

William Murray stepped up his new post on January 12, 1931. During his tenure, the global economic crisis reached its peak. Unemployment rose, banks collapsed and the poverty of the population increased. The governor launched an aid program and established a tax commission to monitor government spending. To maintain the inner peace he imposed with the help of the National Guard temporarily state of emergency in the country. In 1932 he was a Democratic presidential candidate in the interview. However, the Party nominated Franklin D. Roosevelt. Meanwhile, the New Deal policies rejected Murray. Nevertheless, Oklahoma benefited from the program of the Federal Government and in the further course of the 1930s, the country gradually recovered from the effects of the crisis.

Governor Murray was also a strong supporter of racial segregation. In order to preserve this institution, he used even the National Guard. Otherwise, it was for toll-free state bridges over the Red River to Texas. After the abolition of the prohibition law in 1933 at the federal level, Oklahoma was a so-called "dry state " in which the ban on alcohol also continued to be valid. In Oklahoma, the governor was temporarily close some sources of oil, because the oil barons did not stop its pricing policy. This led to an increase in the oil price.

Further CV

In 1938, failed another attempt to be elected governor, already in the primaries of his party. Even his attempts to be elected to the U.S. Congress, were unsuccessful. Politically he was after his governorship becoming an extremist. He was an outspoken racist who moved to the vicinity of fascism, which he supported, at least temporarily. With his wife, Mary Alice Hearrell he had four children, including the son of Johnston Murray, who should be governor of Oklahoma also 1951-1955.

Honors

In honor of William Murray were named:

• Murray State College, Tishomingo (Oklahoma)
• The Alfalfa County
• The Murray County ( Oklahoma)
• Lake Murray State Park, at Ardmore (Oklahoma)