Jerry Voorhis
Encyclopedia
Horace Jeremiah "Jerry" Voorhis (April 6, 1901 – September 11, 1984) was a Democratic
politician
from California
. He served five terms in the United States House of Representatives
from 1937 to 1947, representing the 12th Congressional district
in Los Angeles County
. He was the first political opponent of Richard Nixon
, who defeated Voorhis for re-election in 1946 in a campaign cited
as an example of Nixon's use of red-baiting
during his political rise.
Voorhis was born in Kansas
, but the family relocated frequently in his childhood. He earned a bachelor's degree from Yale University
(where he was elected to the academic honor society Phi Beta Kappa) and a master's degree in education from Claremont Graduate School. In 1928, he founded the Voorhis School for Boys and became its headmaster. He retained the post into his congressional career.
In the House of Representatives, Voorhis was a loyal supporter of the New Deal
and compiled a liberal voting record. His major legislative achievement was the Voorhis Act of 1940 requiring registration of certain organizations controlled by foreign powers. After being re-elected by comfortable margins four times, he faced Nixon in 1946 in a bitter campaign in which Voorhis's supposed endorsement by groups linked to the Communist Party
was made into a major issue. Nixon won the Republican
-leaning district by over 15,000 votes and Voorhis refused to run against Nixon in 1948.
During a writing career spanning a half-century, Voorhis penned several books. Following his defeat by Nixon, he retired from politics and worked for almost twenty years as an executive in the cooperative
movement. He died in a California retirement home in 1984 at the age of 83.
, on April 6, 1901, to Charles Brown Voorhis, of Dutch descent, and Ella Ward (Smith) Voorhis. Jerry was the grandson (and future biographer) of Aurelius Lyman Voorhis, who had "ventured out to the frontier in western Kansas" as merchant, land agent, and self-taught lawyer, and had scraped to send his son to college until he was forced, halfway through, to give his son the only two dollars he could spare and advise him to get a job. Charles Voorhis took work in an investment company and as a semi-professional baseball player and rose to become an executive of the Kingman Plow Company. When that company dissolved, Charles Voorhis became an executive of the Oakland Motor Car Company, which became the Pontiac division of General Motors
, and finally of the Nash Motor Company
before his 1925 retirement. Jerry Voorhis began school in Ottawa, but also attended school in Oklahoma City
, Peoria, Illinois
and Pontiac, Michigan
. He attended The Hotchkiss School, an elite boys' boarding school in Connecticut with close ties to Yale University, and subsequently attended Yale, graduating in 1923. Voorhis was elected as a member of Phi Beta Kappa, was president of the Christian Association, and was greatly influenced by the Social Gospel
movement.
Voorhis resisted all encouragement toward a business or management career, much to his father's disappointment. While attending Yale, he came to believe that "the Christian Gospel is to be taken seriously, and that needless poverty and suffering on the one hand and special privilege and inordinate power on the other are entirely contrary to its precepts". He later stated that he lacked the faith in his own judgment to leave Yale and get a job in "the real world[which] lay beyond the college walls". However, once he graduated, Voorhis engaged a room at a boarding house and went to work as a receiving clerk, a job he soon exchanged for one as a freight handler. Later in 1923, he was laid off. In 1923 and 1924, he served as a traveling representative for the YMCA
in Germany, though his stay was cut short by illness. Suffering from pneumonia
, Voorhis spent six weeks recovering in a London nursing home.
Charles Voorhis's job with Nash had taken him to a new home in Kenosha, Wisconsin
; Jerry Voorhis joined his parents there on his return from Europe. As part of his recovery from his illness, he spent several weeks in northwestern Wyoming, working on a ranch. In Kenosha, he met a social worker named Alice Louise Livingston and married her on November 27, 1924, in her hometown of Washington, Iowa
. Resuming his blue-collar career after his marriage, Voorhis moved to North Carolina with his wife and went to work in a Ford
plant in Charlotte
until being offered work as a teacher in an Illinois school for underprivileged boys, teaching three grades, coaching sports, and giving religious talks in the school's chapel each morning. This was followed by a year in Laramie, Wyoming
, where the Voorhises founded and ran an orphanage for boys.
In 1927, the now-retired Charles Voorhis offered his son an opportunity to found a boys academy near the elder Voorhis's home in Pasadena, California
. Jerry Voorhis responded by moving to California. In 1928, he founded and became headmaster of the Voorhis School for Boys in San Dimas, California
, a post he retained after his election to Congress. In addition to academic tutelage, the Voorhis School's boys received training in farming, mechanical work, and other manual vocations. Charles and Jerry Voorhis would put much of the family fortune into the school. After Voorhis's election to Congress, the school would be closed down, with the land and buildings donated to California State Polytechnic University, Pomona
(Cal Poly Pomona), later serving as the university's Southern California
campus until it moved in 1950 to Pomona
. Voorhis remained in close touch with his school's alumni.
Voorhis also involved himself in the local community. He organized cooperatives among the local ranchers and farmers. When strikes occurred, he would walk the picket lines with the workers. Voorhis gave lectures at Pomona College
from 1930 until 1935. He began publishing articles, writing in 1933, "We could produce plenty for all, but we don't do it ... we will do it only when all producing wealth is owned publicly. ... Incidentally, we would then be living in the kingdom of God."
Voorhis was a candidate for the California State Assembly in 1934, changing his registration from Socialist to Democrat, but was defeated by popular incumbent Herbert Evans despite receiving the backing of writer and Democratic gubernatorial candidate Upton Sinclair
. Two years later, he challenged incumbent John Hoeppel for the 12th district Democratic nomination. Hoeppel was weakened by a recent conviction for attempting to sell a nomination to West Point
and Voorhis won the Democratic nomination, with Hoeppel finishing in third place. Running as a "Progressive Roosevelt-Democrat", Voorhis easily defeated Republican nominee Frederick F. Houser
in the general election.
Voorhis was reelected to Congress four times and had one of Congress's most liberal voting records. He supported New Deal initiatives, including Franklin Roosevelt's controversial court packing
plan.
In January 1937, Voorhis's first legislative initiative was to propose a dramatic increase in spending for the Works Progress Administration
in order to increase employment. While this effort was unsuccessful, Congress, faced with an economic downturn the following year, increased WPA spending beyond the level which Voorhis had sought. While the 75th Congress
had in excess of 300 Democrats, many of them were conservative, and Voorhis emerged as a leader of a progressive caucus of some 50 representatives. Voorhis advocated the purchase by the Federal Government of the stock in the Federal Reserve Bank
s, which was held by the member banks, as a way of financing government expenditures and briefly got President Roosevelt to support the measure until the President's advisers caused Roosevelt to change his mind. Voorhis later allied with future House Banking Committee
chairman Wright Patman
to force Federal Reserve Banks to pay most of the interest they earned on federal securities
to the U.S. Government, rather than to the bank stockholders.
In the run-up to World War II
, Voorhis urged neutrality. He proposed enactment of a law which would require a national referendum on whether to go to war. According to Voorhis, laws banning the sale of munitions to foreign nations and forbidding Americans from making loans to other nations for war preparations would keep the United States out of war. In September 1939, when interviewed by The New York Times for his reaction to the President calling Congress into special session to consider amendments to the Neutrality Act, Voorhis stated that a special session should quickly increase relief to the working poor. In early November 1939, however, Voorhis announced his support for repealing the arms embargo mandated by the Act, at the same time urging that the country remain neutral. Voorhis also opposed a peacetime draft, and supported "lend-lease
" legislation.
Once war was declared, Voorhis supported the internment
of Japanese-Americans, though he suggested that the evacuations be done in as voluntary a manner as possible and that officials be appointed to administer their property to avoid forced sales at bargain prices. During the war, Voorhis advocated more efficiently taxing higher incomes and war profits, planning against postwar unemployment, and planning for the nutritional needs of Americans. Voorhis also opposed dominance of big business in the war effort. Congress, for the most part, ignored Voorhis's pleas.
Voorhis often opposed the petroleum industry, questioning the need for the oil depletion
allowance. In 1943, he was told by a Pasadena attorney that the Navy Department
was planning to grant Standard Oil
exclusive free drilling rights in the vast Elk Hills
naval reserve in central California, then thought to be the richest oil reserve outside the Arabian Peninsula
. The congressman in a speech from the House floor in May 1943 exposed the deal, which was soon cancelled. The Washington Post hailed him as a hero, and House Naval Affairs Committee Chairman Carl Vinson
of Georgia stated that Voorhis had performed "the greatest kind of service". However, the Los Angeles Times
suggested that Voorhis had harmed the war effort by depriving the people of California of gasoline. In 1945, Voorhis fought a bill which would have given oil companies offshore drilling rights. The petroleum industry journal Second Issue blamed the defeat of the bill on Voorhis. Nixon biographer Roger Morris
suggested that these stands led oil companies to give Nixon substantial, but surreptitious, financial assistance during the 1946 campaign against Voorhis.
Voorhis "temperamentally and philosophically loathed" Communism. He sponsored the Voorhis Act of 1940, which required political organizations which were controlled by a foreign power or which engaged in military activities to subvert the American government to register with the Justice Department. Voorhis also served as a member of the House Un-American Activities Committee
(HUAC) though Time magazine stated he could be "counted upon ... to temper rightist blasts for leftist lambs".
Voorhis was generally highly regarded by his colleagues and others in Washington. Senator Paul Douglas
of Illinois considered Voorhis "a political saint", and said of Voorhis that "[d] riven by conscience, he had a compulsion to master every subject that came before the House, and having mastered it, he spoke his mind." Voorhis would make five minute speeches in the House of Representatives at any opportunity, on matters ranging from local concerns in his district to international monetary issues. The press nicknamed him "Kid Atlas
", seeming to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders. The press corps also voted him the most honest congressman, and the fifth most intelligent. However, Interior Secretary
Harold Ickes
described Voorhis's 1943 resignation from HUAC as the representative being "[w] obbly as usual".
Voorhis's 12th district leaned Republican, the more so after Voorhis survived an attempt, in 1941, to gerrymander him out of office by removing strong Democratic precincts from the 12th during the decennial redistricting. Nevertheless, Voorhis was re-elected by 13,000 votes in 1942, and by a similar margin two years later. Despite the Republican leanings of his district, Voorhis had not faced any strong opposition prior to 1946. Elected as part of the Roosevelt landslide of 1936, in 1938 he faced an opponent so shy that Voorhis had to introduce him to the crowd at a joint appearance. In 1940, he faced a military school principal, and his 1942 opponent, radio preacher and former Prohibition Party gubernatorial candidate Robert P. Shuler
, "even embarrassed GOP regulars". In 1944, the 12th district Republicans were bitterly divided, and Voorhis easily triumphed.
Voorhis was a conscientious congressman towards his constituents, careful to remember births, anniversaries, and in-district events. In fact, after the birth of Tricia Nixon near the start of the 1946 campaign, Voorhis's office sent the Nixon family a copy of a government publication called Infant Care, of which congressmen received 150 a month. On April 1, 1946, Richard Nixon sent Voorhis a thank you letter for the pamphlet.
But aside from the act named for him, Voorhis succeeded in enacting few new laws, a fact Nixon used against him in 1946 when he argued that Voorhis's legislation had only "transferred jurisdiction over the raising of rabbits from one government department to another". The New York Times wrote of him in 1947, "He was ineffectual in terms of practical results."
As Voorhis served his fifth term in the House, local Republicans searched for a candidate capable of defeating him. Richard Nixon answered the call. Nixon, who was still in the Navy when approached, wrote of Voorhis, "His 'conservative' reputation must be blasted. But my main efforts are being directed toward building up a positive, progressive group of speeches that tell what we want to do, not what the Democrats have failed to do ... I'm really hopped up over this deal, and I believe we can win." However, "wheelhorse" Republicans deemed Nixon's campaign hopeless.
As was usual in California at the time, both Nixon and Voorhis cross-filed
in the other party's primary, a practice Voorhis had long adopted. Winning both primaries virtually assured election. Each candidate won his own party's primary, with Voorhis garnering a considerable number of votes in the Republican primary, and outpolling Nixon by 7,000 votes overall. Nixon gained momentum, however, when the newspapers pointed out that Voorhis's total percentage of the vote had decreased from 60% in 1944 to 53.5%.
Voorhis had the advantage of incumbency, but this was balanced by other factors favoring Nixon. Due to the press of Congressional business, Voorhis was able to devote only two months to the campaign, while Nixon campaigned in the district for ten months. Voorhis's time was further limited when, while en route to California from Washington D.C. in August, he was forced to have surgery for hemorrhoids in Ogden, Utah
. He spent two weeks in an Ogden hotel recuperating from the operation.
Nixon alleged that a vote against Voorhis was "a vote against the P.A.C. Political Action Committee
, affiliated with the Congress of Industrial Organizations
(CIO), its Communist principles, and its gigantic slush fund." The Nixon campaign distributed 25,000 thimbles labeled "Nixon for Congress/Put the needle in the P.A.C."
Voorhis's supposed involvement with and endorsement by the CIO's P.A.C., which was believed to be a Communist front organization, was a major issue in the campaign. Nixon's campaign manager claimed to have proof of Voorhis's involvement with the group. On September 13, the two candidates met at a debate at South Pasadena Junior High School. When Nixon was challenged to produce proof of the allegation, Nixon took from his pocket a local bulletin of the National Citizens Political Action Committee that contained an endorsement of Voorhis. This was a different group, also affiliated with the CIO. While Voorhis's staff was aware of this endorsement, no one had told the representative. Voorhis, confronted with the bulletin, noted that these were two different groups. Nixon responded by reading the names of the boards of directors of the two groups, with many names in common. After the debate, Voorhis asked Congressman Chester E. Holifield
for his view of how it had gone, and Holifield responded, "Jerry, he cut you to pieces." Voorhis had been successfully linked with "the PAC", though he had refused to accept the endorsement of any PAC unless it renounced Communist influence. Nixon defeated Voorhis by over 15,000 votes and Time magazine praised the future president for "politely avoid[ing] personal attacks on his opponent".
The day after the election, Voorhis issued a concession statement, "I have given the best years of my life to serving this district in Congress. By the will of the people, that work is ended. I have no regrets about the record I have written." In his 1947 book, Confessions of a Congressman, Voorhis attributed his defeat to tremendous amounts of money supposedly spent by the Nixon forces. When Nixon read the book, he commented, "What I am wondering is where all the money went that we were supposed to have had!"
Nixon's defeat of Voorhis has been cited as the start of a number of red-baiting campaigns by the future president that later elevated him to the Senate and the Vice-Presidency and eventually put him in position to run for president. Voorhis later deemed himself "the first victim of the Nixon-Chotiner
formula for political success." In 1958, Voorhis alleged that voters had received anonymous phone calls alleging that he was a Communist, that newspapers had stated that he was a fellow traveler, and that when Nixon got angry, he would "do anything".
In spite of any hard feelings, Voorhis sent Nixon a letter of congratulations in early December 1964. The two men met for an hour at Voorhis's office and parted, according to Voorhis, friends. Voorhis's final letter as a congressman, on December 31, was to his father, who had been his political adviser throughout his congressional career, "It has been primarily due to your help, your confidence, your advice ... above all to a feeling I have always had that your hand was on my shoulder. Thanks ... God bless you."
, house, completing his book, Confessions of a Congressman. In early 1947, he was offered the job of executive director of the Cooperative League of the USA
. The Voorhis family relocated to Winnetka, Illinois
, near the League's Chicago headquarters. The League, which included both consumer and producer cooperatives, had fallen on hard times in the postwar period. Under his leadership, the League's financial position gradually improved and some major cooperatives that had remained aloof from the League were persuaded to join. The League expanded its purview, founding the Group Health Association of America and the National Association of Housing Cooperatives.
Voorhis was urged to run again for Congress against Nixon in 1948 by Stephen Zetterberg
, who, when Voorhis declined (in part due to health reasons), himself ran in the Democratic primary. Nixon, facing no opposition in the Republican primary, entered and won the Democratic poll, eliminating Zetterberg from the race and ensuring his re-election.
In 1954, the former congressman led the U.S. delegation to the International Cooperative Association congress in Paris, successfully opposing Soviet plans to give greater representation to Eastern European countries, which was seen as a means of eventual communist control of the organization. Voorhis occasionally testified before Congressional committees, usually in opposition to bills which would tax cooperatives. He shut down the League's moribund New York office and opened an office in Los Angeles. Voorhis encouraged the forming of cooperatives in Latin America
and in 1963, the first hemisphere-wide conference of cooperatives took place in Montevideo
, Uruguay
. Stanley Dreyer, Voorhis's eventual successor as executive director, was put in charge of these international operations. In January 1967, Voorhis retired from the League.
Five days after Nixon's defeat in the 1962 California gubernatorial election, Voorhis appeared on TV as a Nixon detractor, with Murray Chotiner and Gerald Ford
defending the former vice-president on Howard K. Smith
's ABC
News and Comment
program, "The Political Obituary of Richard M. Nixon". Voorhis complained about the way Nixon had conducted himself in the 1946 race. but was overshadowed by fellow detractor and Nixon nemesis Alger Hiss
. Hiss's participation led to such an uproar that sponsors pulled back from underwriting the program, and News and Comment left the air in the spring of 1963.
Having spent 23 years in Winnetka, Voorhis moved back with his wife to the old 12th district to an apartment in Claremont. After almost a quarter century of silence on his defeat by Nixon, he wrote The Strange Case of Richard Milhous Nixon, a book in which he stated that Nixon was "quite a ruthless opponent" whose "one cardinal and unbreakable rule of conduct" was "to win, whatever it takes to do it". "I did not expect my loyalty to America's constitutional government to be attacked," he wrote.
As the Nixon presidency slowly collapsed, Voorhis spoke out more frequently. In 1972, he said, "Sour grapes to criticize the man who beat me, but I just wouldn't be human if I said I liked spending the second half of my life as 'the man who Nixon beat'". After Nixon resigned as President, Voorhis, noted, "Here is the philosophy of doing-anything-to-win receiving its just and proper reward." Voorhis, believing he had been labeled a subversive by Nixon, "took some satisfaction" in stating that Nixon himself had been the subversive, seeking, according to Voorhis, to impose "a virtual dictatorship" on the country.
In 1972, Voorhis and his wife entered a retirement home in Claremont. Nonetheless, he continued to work on a number of committees and advisory boards. His activities ranged from the California Commission on Aging (appointed by Governor Jerry Brown
) to working as a teacher's aide to Tom Hayden
's Campaign for Economic Democracy. Voorhis died at the retirement home from emphysema on September 11, 1984. In addition to his widow, he left two sons and a daughter. Fellow Nixon opponent and former California governor Pat Brown
eulogized him, saying, "He was a great man. Not many like him these days." Voorhis rests in Mountain View Cemetery in Altadena, California
. His papers are held by the Claremont Colleges
' Honnold-Mudd Library Special Collections.
An elementary school in El Monte, California
, is named for the former congressman. Cal Poly Pomona considers Voorhis one of its founders and has named a park and an ecological reserve for him.
Democratic Party (United States)
The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...
politician
Politician
A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...
from California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
. He served five terms in the United States House of Representatives
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...
from 1937 to 1947, representing the 12th Congressional district
California's 12th congressional district
California's 12th congressional district is a congressional district in the U.S. state of California that spans from the southwestern portions of San Francisco in the north down to San Mateo in the south, and from Moss Beach in the west to the edge of San Mateo in the east, where it borders...
in Los Angeles County
Los Angeles County, California
Los Angeles County is a county in the U.S. state of California. As of 2010 U.S. Census, the county had a population of 9,818,605, making it the most populous county in the United States. Los Angeles County alone is more populous than 42 individual U.S. states...
. He was the first political opponent of Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...
, who defeated Voorhis for re-election in 1946 in a campaign cited
California's 12th congressional district election, 1946
An election for a seat in the United States House of Representatives took place in California's 12th congressional district on November 5, 1946, the date set by law for the elections for the 80th United States Congress...
as an example of Nixon's use of red-baiting
Red-baiting
Red-baiting is the act of accusing, denouncing, attacking or persecuting an individual or group as communist, socialist, or anarchist, or sympathetic toward communism, socialism, or anarchism. The word "red" in "red-baiting" is derived from the red flag signifying radical left-wing politics. In the...
during his political rise.
Voorhis was born in Kansas
Kansas
Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...
, but the family relocated frequently in his childhood. He earned a bachelor's degree from Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
(where he was elected to the academic honor society Phi Beta Kappa) and a master's degree in education from Claremont Graduate School. In 1928, he founded the Voorhis School for Boys and became its headmaster. He retained the post into his congressional career.
In the House of Representatives, Voorhis was a loyal supporter of the New Deal
New Deal
The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the United States between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the U.S. Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt's responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians call...
and compiled a liberal voting record. His major legislative achievement was the Voorhis Act of 1940 requiring registration of certain organizations controlled by foreign powers. After being re-elected by comfortable margins four times, he faced Nixon in 1946 in a bitter campaign in which Voorhis's supposed endorsement by groups linked to the Communist Party
Communist Party USA
The Communist Party USA is a Marxist political party in the United States, established in 1919. It has a long, complex history that is closely related to the histories of similar communist parties worldwide and the U.S. labor movement....
was made into a major issue. Nixon won the Republican
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
-leaning district by over 15,000 votes and Voorhis refused to run against Nixon in 1948.
During a writing career spanning a half-century, Voorhis penned several books. Following his defeat by Nixon, he retired from politics and worked for almost twenty years as an executive in the cooperative
Cooperative
A cooperative is a business organization owned and operated by a group of individuals for their mutual benefit...
movement. He died in a California retirement home in 1984 at the age of 83.
Early career
Voorhis was born in Ottawa, KansasOttawa, Kansas
Ottawa is a city situated along the Marais des Cygnes River in the central part of Franklin County, located in east-central Kansas, 50 miles southwest of Kansas City, Mo., in the central United States. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 12,649. It is the county seat and most populous...
, on April 6, 1901, to Charles Brown Voorhis, of Dutch descent, and Ella Ward (Smith) Voorhis. Jerry was the grandson (and future biographer) of Aurelius Lyman Voorhis, who had "ventured out to the frontier in western Kansas" as merchant, land agent, and self-taught lawyer, and had scraped to send his son to college until he was forced, halfway through, to give his son the only two dollars he could spare and advise him to get a job. Charles Voorhis took work in an investment company and as a semi-professional baseball player and rose to become an executive of the Kingman Plow Company. When that company dissolved, Charles Voorhis became an executive of the Oakland Motor Car Company, which became the Pontiac division of General Motors
General Motors
General Motors Company , commonly known as GM, formerly incorporated as General Motors Corporation, is an American multinational automotive corporation headquartered in Detroit, Michigan and the world's second-largest automaker in 2010...
, and finally of the Nash Motor Company
Nash Motors
Also see: Kelvinator and American Motors CorporationNash Motors was an automobile manufacturer based in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in the United States from 1916 to 1938. From 1938 to 1954, Nash was the automotive division of the Nash-Kelvinator Corporation...
before his 1925 retirement. Jerry Voorhis began school in Ottawa, but also attended school in Oklahoma City
Oklahoma city
Oklahoma City is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma.Oklahoma City may also refer to:*Oklahoma City metropolitan area*Downtown Oklahoma City*Uptown Oklahoma City*Oklahoma City bombing*Oklahoma City National Memorial...
, Peoria, Illinois
Peoria, Illinois
Peoria is the largest city on the Illinois River and the county seat of Peoria County, Illinois, in the United States. It is named after the Peoria tribe. As of the 2010 census, the city was the seventh-most populated in Illinois, with a population of 115,007, and is the third-most populated...
and Pontiac, Michigan
Pontiac, Michigan
Pontiac is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan named after the Ottawa Chief Pontiac, located within the Detroit metropolitan area. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 59,515. It is the county seat of Oakland County...
. He attended The Hotchkiss School, an elite boys' boarding school in Connecticut with close ties to Yale University, and subsequently attended Yale, graduating in 1923. Voorhis was elected as a member of Phi Beta Kappa, was president of the Christian Association, and was greatly influenced by the Social Gospel
Social Gospel
The Social Gospel movement is a Protestant Christian intellectual movement that was most prominent in the early 20th century United States and Canada...
movement.
Voorhis resisted all encouragement toward a business or management career, much to his father's disappointment. While attending Yale, he came to believe that "the Christian Gospel is to be taken seriously, and that needless poverty and suffering on the one hand and special privilege and inordinate power on the other are entirely contrary to its precepts". He later stated that he lacked the faith in his own judgment to leave Yale and get a job in "the real world
YMCA
The Young Men's Christian Association is a worldwide organization of more than 45 million members from 125 national federations affiliated through the World Alliance of YMCAs...
in Germany, though his stay was cut short by illness. Suffering from pneumonia
Pneumonia
Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung—especially affecting the microscopic air sacs —associated with fever, chest symptoms, and a lack of air space on a chest X-ray. Pneumonia is typically caused by an infection but there are a number of other causes...
, Voorhis spent six weeks recovering in a London nursing home.
Charles Voorhis's job with Nash had taken him to a new home in Kenosha, Wisconsin
Kenosha, Wisconsin
Kenosha is a city and the county seat of Kenosha County in the State of Wisconsin in United States. With a population of 99,218 as of May 2011, Kenosha is the fourth-largest city in Wisconsin. Kenosha is also the fourth-largest city on the western shore of Lake Michigan, following Chicago,...
; Jerry Voorhis joined his parents there on his return from Europe. As part of his recovery from his illness, he spent several weeks in northwestern Wyoming, working on a ranch. In Kenosha, he met a social worker named Alice Louise Livingston and married her on November 27, 1924, in her hometown of Washington, Iowa
Washington, Iowa
Washington is a city in and the county seat of Washington County, Iowa, United States. It is part of the Iowa City, Iowa Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 7,047 at the 2000 census.-History:...
. Resuming his blue-collar career after his marriage, Voorhis moved to North Carolina with his wife and went to work in a Ford
Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company is an American multinational automaker based in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. The automaker was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. In addition to the Ford and Lincoln brands, Ford also owns a small stake in Mazda in Japan and Aston Martin in the UK...
plant in Charlotte
Charlotte, North Carolina
Charlotte is the largest city in the U.S. state of North Carolina and the seat of Mecklenburg County. In 2010, Charlotte's population according to the US Census Bureau was 731,424, making it the 17th largest city in the United States based on population. The Charlotte metropolitan area had a 2009...
until being offered work as a teacher in an Illinois school for underprivileged boys, teaching three grades, coaching sports, and giving religious talks in the school's chapel each morning. This was followed by a year in Laramie, Wyoming
Laramie, Wyoming
Laramie is a city in and the county seat of Albany County, Wyoming, United States. The population was 30,816 at the . Located on the Laramie River in southeastern Wyoming, the city is west of Cheyenne, at the junction of Interstate 80 and U.S. Route 287....
, where the Voorhises founded and ran an orphanage for boys.
In 1927, the now-retired Charles Voorhis offered his son an opportunity to found a boys academy near the elder Voorhis's home in Pasadena, California
Pasadena, California
Pasadena is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Although famous for hosting the annual Rose Bowl football game and Tournament of Roses Parade, Pasadena is the home to many scientific and cultural institutions, including the California Institute of Technology , the Jet...
. Jerry Voorhis responded by moving to California. In 1928, he founded and became headmaster of the Voorhis School for Boys in San Dimas, California
San Dimas, California
San Dimas is a city located in the San Gabriel Valley, in Los Angeles County, California. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 33,371. The city historically took its name from San Dismas Canyon in the San Gabriel Mountains above the northern section of present day San Dimas...
, a post he retained after his election to Congress. In addition to academic tutelage, the Voorhis School's boys received training in farming, mechanical work, and other manual vocations. Charles and Jerry Voorhis would put much of the family fortune into the school. After Voorhis's election to Congress, the school would be closed down, with the land and buildings donated to California State Polytechnic University, Pomona
California State Polytechnic University, Pomona
California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, or Cal Poly Pomona, is a public university located in Pomona, California, United States...
(Cal Poly Pomona), later serving as the university's Southern California
Southern California
Southern California is a megaregion, or megapolitan area, in the southern area of the U.S. state of California. Large urban areas include Greater Los Angeles and Greater San Diego. The urban area stretches along the coast from Ventura through the Southland and Inland Empire to San Diego...
campus until it moved in 1950 to Pomona
Pomona, California
-2010:The 2010 United States Census reported that Pomona had a population of 149,058, a slight decline from the 2000 census population. The population density was 6,491.2 people per square mile...
. Voorhis remained in close touch with his school's alumni.
Voorhis also involved himself in the local community. He organized cooperatives among the local ranchers and farmers. When strikes occurred, he would walk the picket lines with the workers. Voorhis gave lectures at Pomona College
Pomona College
Pomona College is a private, residential, liberal arts college in Claremont, California. Founded in 1887 in Pomona, California by a group of Congregationalists, the college moved to Claremont in 1889 to the site of a hotel, retaining its name. The school enrolls 1,548 students.The founding member...
from 1930 until 1935. He began publishing articles, writing in 1933, "We could produce plenty for all, but we don't do it ... we will do it only when all producing wealth is owned publicly. ... Incidentally, we would then be living in the kingdom of God."
Congressional service
Upton Sinclair
Upton Beall Sinclair Jr. , was an American author who wrote close to one hundred books in many genres. He achieved popularity in the first half of the twentieth century, acquiring particular fame for his classic muckraking novel, The Jungle . It exposed conditions in the U.S...
. Two years later, he challenged incumbent John Hoeppel for the 12th district Democratic nomination. Hoeppel was weakened by a recent conviction for attempting to sell a nomination to West Point
United States Military Academy
The United States Military Academy at West Point is a four-year coeducational federal service academy located at West Point, New York. The academy sits on scenic high ground overlooking the Hudson River, north of New York City...
and Voorhis won the Democratic nomination, with Hoeppel finishing in third place. Running as a "Progressive Roosevelt-Democrat", Voorhis easily defeated Republican nominee Frederick F. Houser
Frederick F. Houser
Frederick Francis Houser served as the 34th Lieutenant Governor of California under governor Earl Warren between 1943 and 1947. He made several other attempts running for political offices including 1932 House of Representatives for the California 12th district running against John H...
in the general election.
Voorhis was reelected to Congress four times and had one of Congress's most liberal voting records. He supported New Deal initiatives, including Franklin Roosevelt's controversial court packing
Judiciary Reorganization Bill of 1937
The Judicial Procedures Reform Bill of 1937, frequently called the court-packing plan, was a legislative initiative proposed by U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt to add more justices to the U.S. Supreme Court. Roosevelt's purpose was to obtain favorable rulings regarding New Deal legislation that...
plan.
In January 1937, Voorhis's first legislative initiative was to propose a dramatic increase in spending for the Works Progress Administration
Works Progress Administration
The Works Progress Administration was the largest and most ambitious New Deal agency, employing millions of unskilled workers to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media, and literacy projects...
in order to increase employment. While this effort was unsuccessful, Congress, faced with an economic downturn the following year, increased WPA spending beyond the level which Voorhis had sought. While the 75th Congress
75th United States Congress
The Seventy-fifth United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, DC from January 3, 1937 to January 3, 1939, during the first two years...
had in excess of 300 Democrats, many of them were conservative, and Voorhis emerged as a leader of a progressive caucus of some 50 representatives. Voorhis advocated the purchase by the Federal Government of the stock in the Federal Reserve Bank
Federal Reserve Bank
The twelve Federal Reserve Banks form a major part of the Federal Reserve System, the central banking system of the United States. The twelve federal reserve banks together divide the nation into twelve Federal Reserve Districts, the twelve banking districts created by the Federal Reserve Act of...
s, which was held by the member banks, as a way of financing government expenditures and briefly got President Roosevelt to support the measure until the President's advisers caused Roosevelt to change his mind. Voorhis later allied with future House Banking Committee
United States House Committee on Financial Services
The United States House Committee on Financial Services is the committee of the United States House of Representatives that oversees the entire financial services industry, including the securities, insurance, banking, and housing industries...
chairman Wright Patman
Wright Patman
John William Wright Patman was a U.S. Congressman from Texas in Texas's 1st congressional district and chair of the United States House Committee on Banking and Currency .-Early life:...
to force Federal Reserve Banks to pay most of the interest they earned on federal securities
Security (finance)
A security is generally a fungible, negotiable financial instrument representing financial value. Securities are broadly categorized into:* debt securities ,* equity securities, e.g., common stocks; and,...
to the U.S. Government, rather than to the bank stockholders.
In the run-up to World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Voorhis urged neutrality. He proposed enactment of a law which would require a national referendum on whether to go to war. According to Voorhis, laws banning the sale of munitions to foreign nations and forbidding Americans from making loans to other nations for war preparations would keep the United States out of war. In September 1939, when interviewed by The New York Times for his reaction to the President calling Congress into special session to consider amendments to the Neutrality Act, Voorhis stated that a special session should quickly increase relief to the working poor. In early November 1939, however, Voorhis announced his support for repealing the arms embargo mandated by the Act, at the same time urging that the country remain neutral. Voorhis also opposed a peacetime draft, and supported "lend-lease
Lend-Lease
Lend-Lease was the program under which the United States of America supplied the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, China, Free France, and other Allied nations with materiel between 1941 and 1945. It was signed into law on March 11, 1941, a year and a half after the outbreak of war in Europe in...
" legislation.
Once war was declared, Voorhis supported the internment
Japanese American internment
Japanese-American internment was the relocation and internment by the United States government in 1942 of approximately 110,000 Japanese Americans and Japanese who lived along the Pacific coast of the United States to camps called "War Relocation Camps," in the wake of Imperial Japan's attack on...
of Japanese-Americans, though he suggested that the evacuations be done in as voluntary a manner as possible and that officials be appointed to administer their property to avoid forced sales at bargain prices. During the war, Voorhis advocated more efficiently taxing higher incomes and war profits, planning against postwar unemployment, and planning for the nutritional needs of Americans. Voorhis also opposed dominance of big business in the war effort. Congress, for the most part, ignored Voorhis's pleas.
Voorhis often opposed the petroleum industry, questioning the need for the oil depletion
Oil depletion
Oil depletion occurs in the second half of the production curve of an oil well, oil field, or the average of total world oil production. The Hubbert peak theory makes predictions of production rates based on prior discovery rates and anticipated production rates. Hubbert curves predict that the...
allowance. In 1943, he was told by a Pasadena attorney that the Navy Department
United States Department of the Navy
The Department of the Navy of the United States of America was established by an Act of Congress on 30 April 1798, to provide a government organizational structure to the United States Navy and, from 1834 onwards, for the United States Marine Corps, and when directed by the President, of the...
was planning to grant Standard Oil
Standard Oil
Standard Oil was a predominant American integrated oil producing, transporting, refining, and marketing company. Established in 1870 as a corporation in Ohio, it was the largest oil refiner in the world and operated as a major company trust and was one of the world's first and largest multinational...
exclusive free drilling rights in the vast Elk Hills
Elk Hills
The Elk Hills are a low mountain range in the Transverse Ranges, in western Kern County, California.They are near and east of the Elkhorn Hills in San Luis Obispo County, California...
naval reserve in central California, then thought to be the richest oil reserve outside the Arabian Peninsula
Arabian Peninsula
The Arabian Peninsula is a land mass situated north-east of Africa. Also known as Arabia or the Arabian subcontinent, it is the world's largest peninsula and covers 3,237,500 km2...
. The congressman in a speech from the House floor in May 1943 exposed the deal, which was soon cancelled. The Washington Post hailed him as a hero, and House Naval Affairs Committee Chairman Carl Vinson
Carl Vinson
Carl Vinson was a United States Representative from Georgia. He was a Democrat and the first person to serve for more than 50 years in the United States House of Representatives...
of Georgia stated that Voorhis had performed "the greatest kind of service". However, the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
suggested that Voorhis had harmed the war effort by depriving the people of California of gasoline. In 1945, Voorhis fought a bill which would have given oil companies offshore drilling rights. The petroleum industry journal Second Issue blamed the defeat of the bill on Voorhis. Nixon biographer Roger Morris
Roger Morris (American writer)
Roger Morris, born 1937, is an American public servant, historian, and political writer.-Biography:Roger Morris earned his doctorate in government from Harvard University. He entered government service in 1966 as an aide to former United States Secretary of State Dean Acheson. He first joined the...
suggested that these stands led oil companies to give Nixon substantial, but surreptitious, financial assistance during the 1946 campaign against Voorhis.
Record and campaigns
House Un-American Activities Committee
The House Committee on Un-American Activities or House Un-American Activities Committee was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. In 1969, the House changed the committee's name to "House Committee on Internal Security"...
(HUAC) though Time magazine stated he could be "counted upon ... to temper rightist blasts for leftist lambs".
Voorhis was generally highly regarded by his colleagues and others in Washington. Senator Paul Douglas
Paul Douglas
Paul Howard Douglas was an liberal American politician and University of Chicago economist. A war hero, he was elected as a Democratic U.S. Senator from Illinois from in the 1948 landslide, serving until his defeat in 1966...
of Illinois considered Voorhis "a political saint", and said of Voorhis that "
Atlas (mythology)
In Greek mythology, Atlas was the primordial Titan who supported the heavens. Although associated with various places, he became commonly identified with the Atlas Mountains in north-west Africa...
", seeming to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders. The press corps also voted him the most honest congressman, and the fifth most intelligent. However, Interior Secretary
United States Secretary of the Interior
The United States Secretary of the Interior is the head of the United States Department of the Interior.The US Department of the Interior should not be confused with the concept of Ministries of the Interior as used in other countries...
Harold Ickes
Harold L. Ickes
Harold LeClair Ickes was a United States administrator and politician. He served as United States Secretary of the Interior for 13 years, from 1933 to 1946, the longest tenure of anyone to hold the office, and the second longest serving Cabinet member in U.S. history next to James Wilson. Ickes...
described Voorhis's 1943 resignation from HUAC as the representative being "
Voorhis's 12th district leaned Republican, the more so after Voorhis survived an attempt, in 1941, to gerrymander him out of office by removing strong Democratic precincts from the 12th during the decennial redistricting. Nevertheless, Voorhis was re-elected by 13,000 votes in 1942, and by a similar margin two years later. Despite the Republican leanings of his district, Voorhis had not faced any strong opposition prior to 1946. Elected as part of the Roosevelt landslide of 1936, in 1938 he faced an opponent so shy that Voorhis had to introduce him to the crowd at a joint appearance. In 1940, he faced a military school principal, and his 1942 opponent, radio preacher and former Prohibition Party gubernatorial candidate Robert P. Shuler
Robert P. Shuler
Robert Pierce "Fighting Bob" Shuler, Sr. , was an American evangelist and political figure. His radio broadcasts from his Southern Methodist church in Los Angeles, California, during the 1920s and early 1930s attracted a large audience and also drew controversy with his attacks on politicians,...
, "even embarrassed GOP regulars". In 1944, the 12th district Republicans were bitterly divided, and Voorhis easily triumphed.
Voorhis was a conscientious congressman towards his constituents, careful to remember births, anniversaries, and in-district events. In fact, after the birth of Tricia Nixon near the start of the 1946 campaign, Voorhis's office sent the Nixon family a copy of a government publication called Infant Care, of which congressmen received 150 a month. On April 1, 1946, Richard Nixon sent Voorhis a thank you letter for the pamphlet.
But aside from the act named for him, Voorhis succeeded in enacting few new laws, a fact Nixon used against him in 1946 when he argued that Voorhis's legislation had only "transferred jurisdiction over the raising of rabbits from one government department to another". The New York Times wrote of him in 1947, "He was ineffectual in terms of practical results."
1946 campaign
As was usual in California at the time, both Nixon and Voorhis cross-filed
Cross-filing
In American politics, cross-filing occurs when a candidate runs in the primary election of not only his own party, but also that of one or more other parties, generally in the hope of reducing or eliminating his competition at the general election...
in the other party's primary, a practice Voorhis had long adopted. Winning both primaries virtually assured election. Each candidate won his own party's primary, with Voorhis garnering a considerable number of votes in the Republican primary, and outpolling Nixon by 7,000 votes overall. Nixon gained momentum, however, when the newspapers pointed out that Voorhis's total percentage of the vote had decreased from 60% in 1944 to 53.5%.
Voorhis had the advantage of incumbency, but this was balanced by other factors favoring Nixon. Due to the press of Congressional business, Voorhis was able to devote only two months to the campaign, while Nixon campaigned in the district for ten months. Voorhis's time was further limited when, while en route to California from Washington D.C. in August, he was forced to have surgery for hemorrhoids in Ogden, Utah
Ogden, Utah
Ogden is a city in Weber County, Utah, United States. Ogden serves as the county seat of Weber County. The population was 82,825 according to the 2010 Census. The city served as a major railway hub through much of its history, and still handles a great deal of freight rail traffic which makes it a...
. He spent two weeks in an Ogden hotel recuperating from the operation.
Nixon alleged that a vote against Voorhis was "a vote against the P.A.C. Political Action Committee
Political action committee
In the United States, a political action committee, or PAC, is the name commonly given to a private group, regardless of size, organized to elect political candidates or to advance the outcome of a political issue or legislation. Legally, what constitutes a "PAC" for purposes of regulation is a...
, affiliated with the Congress of Industrial Organizations
Congress of Industrial Organizations
The Congress of Industrial Organizations, or CIO, proposed by John L. Lewis in 1932, was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 required union leaders to swear that they were not...
(CIO), its Communist principles, and its gigantic slush fund." The Nixon campaign distributed 25,000 thimbles labeled "Nixon for Congress/Put the needle in the P.A.C."
Chester E. Holifield
Chester Earl Holifield was a United States Representative from California. He was born in Mayfield, Graves County, Kentucky. He moved with his family to Springdale, Arkansas in 1912. He attended the public schools and moved to Montebello, California in 1920 where he engaged in the manufacture and...
for his view of how it had gone, and Holifield responded, "Jerry, he cut you to pieces." Voorhis had been successfully linked with "the PAC", though he had refused to accept the endorsement of any PAC unless it renounced Communist influence. Nixon defeated Voorhis by over 15,000 votes and Time magazine praised the future president for "politely avoid
The day after the election, Voorhis issued a concession statement, "I have given the best years of my life to serving this district in Congress. By the will of the people, that work is ended. I have no regrets about the record I have written." In his 1947 book, Confessions of a Congressman, Voorhis attributed his defeat to tremendous amounts of money supposedly spent by the Nixon forces. When Nixon read the book, he commented, "What I am wondering is where all the money went that we were supposed to have had!"
Nixon's defeat of Voorhis has been cited as the start of a number of red-baiting campaigns by the future president that later elevated him to the Senate and the Vice-Presidency and eventually put him in position to run for president. Voorhis later deemed himself "the first victim of the Nixon-Chotiner
Murray Chotiner
Murray M Chotiner was an American political strategist, attorney, government official, and close associate and friend of President Richard Nixon during much of the 37th President's political career...
formula for political success." In 1958, Voorhis alleged that voters had received anonymous phone calls alleging that he was a Communist, that newspapers had stated that he was a fellow traveler, and that when Nixon got angry, he would "do anything".
In spite of any hard feelings, Voorhis sent Nixon a letter of congratulations in early December 1964. The two men met for an hour at Voorhis's office and parted, according to Voorhis, friends. Voorhis's final letter as a congressman, on December 31, was to his father, who had been his political adviser throughout his congressional career, "It has been primarily due to your help, your confidence, your advice ... above all to a feeling I have always had that your hand was on my shoulder. Thanks ... God bless you."
Later life
After leaving office, Voorhis remained in his Alexandria, VirginiaAlexandria, Virginia
Alexandria is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia. As of 2009, the city had a total population of 139,966. Located along the Western bank of the Potomac River, Alexandria is approximately six miles south of downtown Washington, D.C.Like the rest of northern Virginia, as well as...
, house, completing his book, Confessions of a Congressman. In early 1947, he was offered the job of executive director of the Cooperative League of the USA
National Cooperative Business Association
Founded in 1916 as the Cooperative League of America, the National Cooperative Business Association is a United States membership organization for cooperatives, businesses that are jointly-owned and democratically-controlled....
. The Voorhis family relocated to Winnetka, Illinois
Winnetka, Illinois
Winnetka is an affluent North Shore village located approximately north of downtown Chicago in Cook County, Illinois. Winnetka was featured on the list of America's 25 top-earning towns and "one of the best places to live" by CNN Money in 2011...
, near the League's Chicago headquarters. The League, which included both consumer and producer cooperatives, had fallen on hard times in the postwar period. Under his leadership, the League's financial position gradually improved and some major cooperatives that had remained aloof from the League were persuaded to join. The League expanded its purview, founding the Group Health Association of America and the National Association of Housing Cooperatives.
Voorhis was urged to run again for Congress against Nixon in 1948 by Stephen Zetterberg
Stephen Zetterberg
Stephen Ingersoll Zetterberg was an American attorney and Democratic activist. Zetterberg was best known for being defeated by Congressman Richard Nixon in the 1948 Democratic primary, as Nixon, having no Republican primary opposition, entered the Democratic primary to ensure he would have no...
, who, when Voorhis declined (in part due to health reasons), himself ran in the Democratic primary. Nixon, facing no opposition in the Republican primary, entered and won the Democratic poll, eliminating Zetterberg from the race and ensuring his re-election.
In 1954, the former congressman led the U.S. delegation to the International Cooperative Association congress in Paris, successfully opposing Soviet plans to give greater representation to Eastern European countries, which was seen as a means of eventual communist control of the organization. Voorhis occasionally testified before Congressional committees, usually in opposition to bills which would tax cooperatives. He shut down the League's moribund New York office and opened an office in Los Angeles. Voorhis encouraged the forming of cooperatives in Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...
and in 1963, the first hemisphere-wide conference of cooperatives took place in Montevideo
Montevideo
Montevideo is the largest city, the capital, and the chief port of Uruguay. The settlement was established in 1726 by Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, as a strategic move amidst a Spanish-Portuguese dispute over the platine region, and as a counter to the Portuguese colony at Colonia del Sacramento...
, Uruguay
Uruguay
Uruguay ,officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay,sometimes the Eastern Republic of Uruguay; ) is a country in the southeastern part of South America. It is home to some 3.5 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area...
. Stanley Dreyer, Voorhis's eventual successor as executive director, was put in charge of these international operations. In January 1967, Voorhis retired from the League.
Five days after Nixon's defeat in the 1962 California gubernatorial election, Voorhis appeared on TV as a Nixon detractor, with Murray Chotiner and Gerald Ford
Gerald Ford
Gerald Rudolph "Jerry" Ford, Jr. was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974...
defending the former vice-president on Howard K. Smith
Howard K. Smith
Howard Kingsbury Smith was an American journalist, radio reporter, television anchorman, political commentator, and film actor. He was one of the original Edward R. Murrow boys.-Early life:...
's ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
News and Comment
Howard K. Smith: News and Comment
Howard K. Smith: News and Comment was a half-hour ABC news and documentary program hosted by commentator Howard K. Smith , which aired from February 14, 1962, to June 16, 1963...
program, "The Political Obituary of Richard M. Nixon". Voorhis complained about the way Nixon had conducted himself in the 1946 race. but was overshadowed by fellow detractor and Nixon nemesis Alger Hiss
Alger Hiss
Alger Hiss was an American lawyer, government official, author, and lecturer. He was involved in the establishment of the United Nations both as a U.S. State Department and U.N. official...
. Hiss's participation led to such an uproar that sponsors pulled back from underwriting the program, and News and Comment left the air in the spring of 1963.
Having spent 23 years in Winnetka, Voorhis moved back with his wife to the old 12th district to an apartment in Claremont. After almost a quarter century of silence on his defeat by Nixon, he wrote The Strange Case of Richard Milhous Nixon, a book in which he stated that Nixon was "quite a ruthless opponent" whose "one cardinal and unbreakable rule of conduct" was "to win, whatever it takes to do it". "I did not expect my loyalty to America's constitutional government to be attacked," he wrote.
In 1972, Voorhis and his wife entered a retirement home in Claremont. Nonetheless, he continued to work on a number of committees and advisory boards. His activities ranged from the California Commission on Aging (appointed by Governor Jerry Brown
Jerry Brown
Edmund Gerald "Jerry" Brown, Jr. is an American politician. Brown served as the 34th Governor of California , and is currently serving as the 39th California Governor...
) to working as a teacher's aide to Tom Hayden
Tom Hayden
Thomas Emmet "Tom" Hayden is an American social and political activist and politician, known for his involvement in the animal rights, and the anti-war and civil rights movements of the 1960s. He is the former husband of actress Jane Fonda and the father of actor Troy Garity.-Life and...
's Campaign for Economic Democracy. Voorhis died at the retirement home from emphysema on September 11, 1984. In addition to his widow, he left two sons and a daughter. Fellow Nixon opponent and former California governor Pat Brown
Pat Brown
Edmund Gerald "Pat" Brown, Sr. was the 32nd Governor of California, serving from 1959 to 1967, and the father of current Governor of California Jerry Brown.-Background:...
eulogized him, saying, "He was a great man. Not many like him these days." Voorhis rests in Mountain View Cemetery in Altadena, California
Altadena, California
Altadena is an unincorporated area and census-designated place in Los Angeles County, California, United States, approximately from the downtown Los Angeles Civic Center, and directly north of the city of Pasadena, California...
. His papers are held by the Claremont Colleges
Claremont Colleges
The Claremont Colleges are a prestigious American consortium of five undergraduate and two graduate schools of higher education located in Claremont, California, a city east of downtown Los Angeles...
' Honnold-Mudd Library Special Collections.
An elementary school in El Monte, California
El Monte, California
El Monte is a residential, industrial, and commercial city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. The city's slogan is "Welcome to Friendly El Monte," and historically is known as "The End of the Santa Fe Trail." As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 113,475,...
, is named for the former congressman. Cal Poly Pomona considers Voorhis one of its founders and has named a park and an ecological reserve for him.
Books by Jerry Voorhis
- The Education of the Institution Boy (M.A. thesis) 1928
- The Story of Voorhis School for Boys. 1932
- The Morale of Democracy. 1941
- Out of Debt, Out of Danger. Proposals for War Finance and Tomorrow's Money. 1943
- Beyond Victory. 1944
- Confessions of a Congressman, 1947
- The Christian in Politics. 1951
- American Cooperatives. Where They Come From, What They Do, Where They are Going. 1961 (Reprint 1973)
- Credit Unions. Basic Cooperatives. 1965
- The Strange Case of Richard Milhous Nixon. 1972 (Reprint 1973)
- Cooperative Enterprise: The Little People's Chance in a World of Bigness. 1975
- The Life and Times of Aurelius Lyman Voorhis. 1976
- Confession of Faith. 1978