Customer Reviews

Kingfish: The Reign of Huey P. Long

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I thoroughly enjoyed "Kingfish." White provides a wonderfully written and marvelously concise book that reads more like a novel than some dreary historical tome. The story of Huey Long, Louisiana's power-hungry governer and senator, is fast paced, to the point, and refreshingly free of long-winded academic analysis and ten-dollar words. White does not fall into the trap of attempting a psyco-history where he tries to "channel" Huey and read his thoughts. He also doesn't speculate about Huey's real killer or whether or not he was a great democrat or a great dictator. Instead, he uses solid research lay Huey bare and expose his many strengths and weaknesses. For the most part, White steps back and lets the colorful Kingfish tell his own story through his own purple words and scrappy behavior. And what a story it is. Long was loved by thousands and hated by thousands more and did more good - and more harm - to an American state than any leader in our history. Every American should know the story of Huey Long, our country's most outrageous and dangerous politician. For those who know little of the turbulent Kingfish, White's solid biography is the place to start.

Mr. White's book is a solid condensation of the saga of Huey Long, but as I read this book I couldn't shake the feeling that the book was often just a Cliff Notes version of T. Harry Williams' Pulitzer Prize winning opus. The details that White omits for brevity sake are what makes Williams' book great. Mr. White includes all the major information, but he omits the color that illuminates the players around Huey and by doing so diminishes Huey Long's strengths and weaknesses.

I was not impressed by Mr. White taking a shot at Mr. Williams in the booknotes section...unnecessary and tasteless.

Good but not great. Read this, then go read T. Harry Williams book.

Mr. White has written for the causal reader an introduction to the political career of Huey Long. Focusing on his nine years of domination of Louisiana's politics, the biography forgoes an analysis of his formative years to joining the story when Mr. Long was already in his early 30's. The good Mr. Long did early in his career by breaking the power of the corrupt, entrenched power structure in Baton Rouge was undone by his metamorphose into the very evil he had crushed.

This is not the definitive life of Huey Long -- that honor goes to the nearly 1,000 page account by T. Harry Williams nearly a generation ago. And "Kingfish" lacks the poetic license of "All The King's Men" by Robert Penn Warren. But for the reader who desires a readable story and wants the controversial aspects of Huey Long's life laid out, this book will do.

Huey P. Long is my favorite political figure of all time. Since I read T. Harry Williams' masterful bio of Long, I've tried to read any and everything about Huey that I can get my hands on. When I saw "Kingfish," I scooped it right up. Admittedly, I may be biased because I think Williams' book is the best political biography ever written and may hold Long bios to a very high standard. In the end, after reading through this book pretty fast - it is less than 300 pages - I liked "Kingfish", and would recommend it to anyone interested in learning about Huey but without the time to read Williams' large text. Further, whereas Williams' book is fairly pro-Long, this book is mostly anti-Huey. Nevertheless, it doesn't hold a candle to "Huey Long" by Williams. It isn't even close.

The book doesn't spend much attention on Huey's early years (he was born in 1893), and focuses on the period from his successful gubernatorial run in 1928, to his Senate election two years late, to his ascension as a national figure, to his assassination in 1935. In between, it provides delicious detailed stories and tidbits of many of Huey's often unbelievable exploits as he ruthlessly conquered every inch of Louisiana and came close to running for President and perhaps endangering FDR's re-election chances in 1936. Beyond that, the book perfectly captures the political and social mood in the Pelican State in Long's day: the sweltering heat, the unrest and bitter hatred Huey engendered in the elite and ruling classes and the equal love and hope he inspired in the long-ignored rural masses, and of course Long's larger than life persona and even bigger ambitions. I also loved the author's use of all of the classic insults Huey and his enemies hurled at each other that seem to appear on every page ("demagogic screech owl from the swamps of Louisiana").

"Kingfish" is a very good book and a quick and fun read for anyone interested in learning about Huey's life and exploits. However, if you want to read a great book, do yourself a favor and buy "Huey Long" by T. Harry Williams. Still, the two books could work well together - as "Kingfish" covers a few areas Williams' book does not - so it might be a good idea to check out "Kingfish" as an appetizer, and move on to "Huey Long" as the main course. You won't be disappointed.

A biography of Huey Long is going to be dominated by one thing: his megalomaniacal desire for power. It makes for interesting reading in political tactics, but that's really all there was to his life. White is even-handed in his handling with his treatment of Long's excesses, but his prose is a little clunky and repetitive. The problem with a biography on Long (or perhaps just this biography on Long) is that there is little to texture the overally picture of a power-hungry man. There is no underlying complex character to understand. A recommended read for those seeking to understand the dangers of power to excess or people with a romantic attachment to the state of Louisiana or the 1930s.

Writing while the gap between rich and poor widens, and from Southern California, recently identified by researchers from Wayne State U. as the nation's most economically segregated region, I was naturally drawn to the new biography of one of the last politicians to show serious concern over the way wealth is distributed in the U.S. This is the abridged version of The Huey Long Story, less exhaustive than T. Harry Williams' bio but almost certainly more readable.

Huey was a politician the likes of which we'll probably not see again. He traveled widely throughout his state pressing the flesh and remembering names. He delivered on promises to build roads, hospitals, and schools; to provide free textbooks and make LSU a first-class institution; to challenge Standard Oil and other major economic interests in order to bring some dignity to impoverished people. For all that he was equally loved and reviled. Can anybody outside of Cuba or Venezuela imagine listening -- sometimes on a hot, humid afternoon -- to a politician speak for three hours? We nowadays give that kind of attention only to rock, sports and film stars, but Huey Long commanded it in the '20s & '30s.

As a U.S. Senator, Huey Long tried to take his Share Our Wealth program to a national level, rivaling FDR's New Deal. His jealousy of Roosevelt and his own presidential aspirations led him to obstruct the passage of some of the more progressive parts of the National Recovery Act, a strategy that worked against his own state's interests. With the understanding that desperate times cause people to put their faith in crooks who would exploit their fears, Roosevelt regarded Huey as a demagogue. Ultimately, Huey's sharp dealings and alienation of opponents led to his assassination.

In this bio we don't see much of what Huey said; we're told numerous times that he was mesmerizing. We get quotes that are cartoonish: "I never read a line of Marx or Henry George or any of them economists. It's all in the law of God." But LSU history professor Richard White has given a straightforward, albeit somewhat repetitious, measure of Huey P. Long.

Huey Long often described his corrupt counterparts as pie eaters. Well, Huey and his cronies were the biggest pie eaters. What Huey wanted was total power, and he set out to get it by dominating Louisiana politcs. His rule precluded all others from even having a say so in the political process. Louisiana is even now a corrupt state as witnessed by Edwin Edwards rule or by the Katrina disaster.

This is a great read. I think the definitive read was William's book, but who wants to read 700 pages on a subject. This is a better summary history of a person who could have become a dictator. Fortunately, Roosevelt became President and Huey was cut down by a assassin's bullet (or maybe one of his bodyguard's stray bullets). The author does a nice job of detailing the short rise and fall of this demagogue. Huey did some good, but also did a lot of bad. This book portrays both characteristics. I wish the author would have portrayed the assassination in more detail. Otherwise a great book.

I haven't yet read Joe Klein's "Politics Lost." But from skimming reviews and catching glimpses of interviews, I understand his thesis to be that political strategists have made today's major party candidates into inauthentic, poll-driven automatons, given to an excess of caution and risk avoidance.

If that's true (and I agree it is), then Huey P. Long was the antithesis of today's listless politicians. According to Richard White's new book, Huey was nothing if not authentic, and audacious, and bombastic, and corrupt -- and ruthless, most of all. Few politicians could deliver a rhetorical stem winder like Huey. And it did not much matter if his deeds didn't live up to his words. Even while barnstorming the country championing radical social welfare policies, White says, Huey never pushed to enact a minimum wage, establish old-age pensions or reform child labor laws back in Louisiana. He built up LSU and did much to promote higher education - only for the children of his supporters. Like most demagogues, he never let facts get in his way. He lambasted millionaires for his state's economic plight, even though no one living in Louisiana in the 1930s was earning a million dollars a year, according to White.

Nevertheless, Huey's brand of combative populism had wide resonance with sharecroppers and poor rural whites, many of whom he enfranchised by repealing the poll tax. White says Huey contemplated a third-party run against FDR in '36, hoping to siphon enough votes from the Left to allow the Republicans to re-take the White House. As the Democratic nominee in '40, Huey felt he would then be in a strong position to capture the Presidency as the nation remained mired in the Depression. A bold, perhaps fanciful, scheme -- one that an assassin's bullet prevented from being put to the test.

Beloved by half of Louisiana, reviled by the other half, there was no middle ground with Huey P. Long. The name still evokes strong feelings more than 70 years after his violent death.

Ever since Robert Penn Warren's "All The King's Men," Huey Long has owned a special place of contempt in the American consciousness. His popularity in Louisiana has given the rest of America to hold Louisiana in a special kind of contempt. Louisianans are stereotyped as ignorant, credulous "booboisie" (to use H.L.Mencken's term) because of their loyalty to a man like Long.

This grasps a very important point, though: is the highest form of democracy the ability of leadership to deliver results? Long was not just about rhetoric and image. People of his "type" are often the only politicians willing to act for regular people, and this fact is held dear by many in Louisiana who might still remember the kingfish.

He did not merely promise things like free schoolbooks and new roads, but he delivered them. The same is true for, believe it or not, free medical care. And, much contrary to the times, these resources were made available to all regardless of race or status.

After Katrina, we're eager to see Louisiana as worthless. But, incredibly, instead of blaming FEMA, majority opinion casts the people of New Orleans in the villains' role, and "All The King's Men" gives us that permission.

White's book restores a needed sense of balance to this perception. If there is any conclusion to be drawn, it might be that Long delivered too much, not too little. In so doing, he might have inadvertantly fashioned a sense of trust in the effectiveness of government which was tragically misplaced.

I understand that it's impossible to write a biography without forming an opinion on your subject, but White doesn't really make an effort to be even-handed except when, it seems, the facts force it on him. As previous reviewers have mentioned, he doesn't do a very good job of orienting Long in his milieu, and the narrative is presented in a weird, disjointed fashion, zipping back and forth between entire decades in Long's career without warning. My main complaint, however, is White's liberal use of highly-charged language. No historian-- even in a popular, non-scholarly history book-- should be quite so free with loaded words like "cruel," "honest and upstanding" etc.-- it's distracting and unprofessional. It's not that people in history aren't cruel or upstanding, but that we're asked to rely upon White's estimation without being privy to the stories that caused him to form his opinions. Additionally, some of his sentences are jaw-droppingly agrammatical, which further undermines White's authority. There are good details, but having read a bit on the subject of the Longs, I recognize those details as lifted straight from other works (with appropriate citation, but in an arcane and difficult format, although the format is a minor quibble). I agree with the earlier reviewer who objected to his shot at Williams in the notes at the end, as well. Basically, this book is fine as a pot-boiler history, full of White's colorful opinions and adjective-heavy language, but I wouldn't take it seriously as a scholarly work by any means. If you're interested in the Longs and you want an opinion piece, try A.J. Liebling's brilliant essay on Earl instead ("The Earl of Louisiana").