Albert Gore, Sr.
Albert Arnold Gore, Sr. , an
American politician of the
Democratic Party, was a
U.S. Representative and a
U.S. Senator from
Tennessee. He was the father of former
Vice President Albert A. Gore, Jr. In 1937, Gore married the former Pauline LaFon, and in addition to Al Jr., had a daughter, Nancy LeFon Gore, born in 1938. Nancy died of lung cancer in 1984.
Encyclopedia
Albert Arnold Gore, Sr. , an
American politician of the
Democratic Party, was a
U.S. Representative and a
U.S. Senator from
Tennessee. He was the father of former
Vice President Albert A. Gore, Jr. In 1937, Gore married the former Pauline LaFon, and in addition to Al Jr., had a daughter, Nancy LeFon Gore, born in 1938. Nancy died of lung cancer in 1984.
The son of
farmers Allen Gore and Margie Denny, Gore was born in Granville, Tennessee. He attended
public school and graduated from the State Teachers' College in
Murfreesboro, Tennessee , in 1932 and from the
Nashville Y.M.C.A. Night Law School in 1936. He taught in the
rural schools of
Overton County, Tennessee, and his native Smith County .
He served as county superintendent of education of Smith County from 1932 to 1936, was admitted to the bar in 1936, and commenced practice in
Carthage, Tennessee. After serving as Tennessee Commissioner of Labor from 1936 to 1937, he was elected as a Democrat to the 76th Congress in 1938, reelected to the two succeeding Congresses and served from January 3, 1939, until his resignation on December 4, 1944, to enter the
U.S. Army. Re-elected to the 79th and to the three succeeding Congresses , he was not a candidate for re-election but was elected in
1952 to the
U.S. Senate. In his 1952 election, he defeated six-term incumbent
Kenneth McKellar. Gore's victory, coupled with that of Frank G. Clement for governor of Tennessee over incumbent Gordon Browning on the same day, is widely regarded as a major turning point in Tennessee political history and as marking the end of statewide influence for E. H. Crump, the
Memphis political
boss. Gore was re-elected in
1958 and again in
1964, and served from January 3, 1953, to January 3, 1971, after he lost reelection in
1970. In the Senate, he was chairman of the Special Committee on Attempts to Influence Senators .
Gore was one of only three Democratic senators from the 11 former
Confederate states who refused to sign the 1956 opposing
integration, the other two being Senate Majority Leader
Lyndon B. Johnson and Gore's fellow Tennesseean
Estes Kefauver . Gore could not, however, be regarded as an out-and-out integrationist, having voted against some major
civil rights legislation including the
Civil Rights Act of 1964. He did support the
Voting Rights Act of 1965. He had easily won renomination in 1958 over former governor of Tennessee Jim Nance McCord, which at that point was still tantamount to election ; by 1964 he faced an energetic
Republican challenge from Memphian Dan Kuykendall, who ran a surprisingly strong race against him.
By 1970 Gore was considered to be fairly vulnerable for a three-term incumbent Senator. He faced a spirited primary challenge, predominantly from former
Nashville news anchor Hudley Crockett, who used his broadcasting skills to considerable advantage and generally attempted to run to Gore's right. Gore fended off this primary challenge, but he was ultimately unseated in the 1970 general election by Republican Congressman
William E. Brock III. In this Senate race, Brock was widely perceived to have won by playing on white voters' fears of
civil rights and desegregation for
blacks. In fact, Gore was one of the key targets in the Nixon/Agnew "Southern strategy";
Spiro T. Agnew himself traveled to Tennessee in 1970 to mock Gore as the "southern regional chairman of the Eastern Liberal Establishment." Other prominent issues in this race included Gore's opposition to the
Vietnam War and Gore's vote against Sen.
Everett Dirksen's amendment on prayer in public schools.
After leaving Congress, he resumed the practice of law with
Occidental Petroleum Company and became vice president and member of the board of directors, taught law at
Vanderbilt University 1970-1972. He became chairman of Island Creek Coal Co.,
Lexington, Kentucky, in 1972, and in his last years operated an
antiques store in Carthage. He died three weeks shy of his 91st birthday and is buried in Smith County Memorial Gardens in Carthage.
External links
- : answers questions about Gore's civil rights record
- : Boston Globe article describing 1970 congressional races of Al Gore Sr., and George H. W. Bush
...
.
...
, including some description of the former's relationship with his father.
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Served in Senate Alongside:
Estes Kefauver, Herbert S. Walters,
Ross Bass,
Howard Baker
