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Aug 30, 2008
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History and GovernmentCongressional BiographiesKentucky

BARKLEY, Alben William

(1877—1956)

Senate Years of Service: 1927-1949; 1955-1956
Party: Democrat; Democrat

BARKLEY, Alben William, a Representative and a Senator from Kentucky and a Vice President of the United States; born near Lowes, Graves County, Ky., November 24, 1877; attended the public schools and graduated from Marvin College, Clinton, Ky., in 1897; attended Emory College, Oxford, Ga., and the University of Virginia Law School, Charlottesville, Va.; admitted to the bar in 1901 and commenced practice in Paducah, McCracken County, Ky.; prosecuting attorney for McCracken County, Ky. 1905-1909; judge of McCracken County Court 1909-1913; elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-third and to the six succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1913-March 3, 1927); did not seek renomination in 1926, having become a candidate for United States Senator; elected to the United States Senate in 1926; reelected in 1932, 1938, and again in 1944, and served from March 4, 1927, until his resignation on January 19, 1949; majority leader 1937-1947; minority leader 1947-1949; elected Vice President of the United States on the Democratic ticket with President Harry S. Truman in 1948; inaugurated January 20, 1949, for the term ending January 20, 1953; again elected to the United States Senate and served from January 3, 1955, until his death in Lexington, Va., April 30, 1956; interment in Mount Kenton Cemetery, on Lone Oak Road, near Paducah, Ky.


Bibliography

Dictionary of American Biography ; Barkley, Alben. That Reminds Me. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1954; Davis, Polly. Alben Barkley: Senate Majority Leader and Vice President . New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1979.

Barkley, Alben W. “The Majority Leader in the Legislative Process.” In The Process of Government , by Simeon S. Willis, et al., pp. 36-48. Lexington: Bureau of Government Research, University of Kentucky, 1949.

___. That Reminds Me. Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Co., 1954.

Barkley, Jane R. I Married the Veep . New York: Vanguard Press, 1958.

Clevenger, Theodore, Jr. “Alben W. Barkley’s Use of Humor in Public Speaking.” Western Speech 20 (Winter 1956): 15-22.

Davis, Polly Ann. Alben W. Barkley, Senate Majority Leader and Vice President . New York: Garland Publishing, 1979.

___. “Alben W. Barkley’s Public Career in 1944.” Filson Club History Quarterly 51 (April 1977): 143-57.

___. “Alben W. Barkley: Vice President.” Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 76 (April 1978): 112-32.

___. “Court Reform and Alben W. Barkley’s Election as Majority Leader.” Southern Quarterly 15 (October 1976): 15 31.

Finch, Glenn. “The Election of United States Senators in Kentucky: The Barkley Period.” Filson Club History Quarterly 45 (July 1971): 286-304.

Grant, Philip A. “Editorial Reaction to the Harrison-Barkley Senate Leadership Contest, 1937.” Journal of Mississippi History 36 (May 1974): 127-41.

Grinde, Gerald S. “The Early Political Career of Alben W. Barkley, 1877-1937.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1976.

___. “The Emergence of the ‘Gentle Partisan’: Alben W. Barkley and Kentucky Politics, 1919.” Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 78 (Summer 1980): 243-58.

___. “Politics and Scandal in the Progressive Era: Alben W. Barkley and the McCracken County Campaign of 1909.” Filson Club History Quarterly 50 (April 1976): 36-51.

Hatcher, John Henry. “Alben Barkley, Politics in Relief and the Hatch Act.” Filson Club History Quarterly 40 (July 1966): 249-64.

Hixson, Walter L. “The 1938 Kentucky Senate Election: Alben W. Barkley, ‘Happy’ Chandler, and the New Deal.” Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 80 (Summer 1982): 309-29.

Leistner, Charley August. “The Political Campaign Speaking of Alben W. Barkley.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Missouri, 1958.

Libbey, James K. “Alben W. Barkley: The Making of the ‘Paducah Politician.’” Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 96 (Summer 1998): 249-68.

___. “Alben Barkley’s Rise from Courthouse to Congress.” Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 98 (Summer 2000): 261-78.

___. “Alben Barkley’s Clinton Days.” Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 78 (Autumn 1980): 343-61.

___. Dear Alben: Mr. Barkley of Kentucky . Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1979.

Moreman, John S. “First Person History Alben W. Barkley: The End of a Speech.” Filson Club History Quarterly 69 (October 1995): 421-6.

Neelley, Ewing Edward, Jr. “Alben W. Barkley: The Image of the Southern Political Orator.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1987.

Reichert, William O. “The Political and Social Thought of Alben W. Barkley.” Master’s thesis, University of Kentucky, 1950.

Ritchie, Donald A. “Alben W. Barkley: The President’s Man.” In First Among Equals: Outstanding Senate Leaders of the Twentieth Century , edited by Richard A. Baker and Roger H. Davidson, pp. 127-62. Washington: Congressional Quarterly, 1991.

Robinson, George W. “Alben Barkley and the 1944 Tax Veto.” Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 67 (July 1969): 197-210.

___. “The Making of a Kentucky Senator: Alben W. Barkley and the Gubernatorial Primary of 1923.” Filson Club History Quarterly 40 (April 1966): 123-35.

U.S. Congress. Memorial Services Held in the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States, Together with Remarks Presented in Eulogy of Alben William Barkley, Late a Senator from Kentucky . 84th Cong., 2d sess., 1956. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1956.

U.S. Senate. Vice Presidents of the United States, 1789-1993 , by Mark O. Hatfield with the staff of the U.S. Senate Historical Office. S.Doc. 104-26, 104th Congress, 2d sess., 1997.

Wallace, H. Lew. “Alben Barkley and the Democratic Convention of 1948.” Filson Club History Quarterly 55 (July 1981): 231-52.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present

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