Changes

He won in politics because of forcefulness and originality, and his perception that the governmental practices of Louisiana had become obsolete. He kept most of his promises and built roads, bridges, schools (including LSU) and other improvements which Louisiana needed. Flagrantly corrupt, he was primarily a coalition builder who used corruption to buy supporters. His improvement program was administered with relative efficiency. His success was in proportion to the weakness and confusion of his enemies, who were chiefly petty office-seekers, more decorous, but scarcely more ethical, than he. He was essentially a spokesman of a long-standing agrarian discontent that was much amplified and extended by the social and economic conditions of the great depression period.  

He won in politics because of forcefulness and originality, and his perception that the governmental practices of Louisiana had become obsolete. He kept most of his promises and built roads, bridges, schools (including LSU) and other improvements which Louisiana needed. Flagrantly corrupt, he was primarily a coalition builder who used corruption to buy supporters. His improvement program was administered with relative efficiency. His success was in proportion to the weakness and confusion of his enemies, who were chiefly petty office-seekers, more decorous, but scarcely more ethical, than he. He was essentially a spokesman of a long-standing agrarian discontent that was much amplified and extended by the social and economic conditions of the great depression period.  

Southern historian T. Harry Williams, the leading expert on Long, has a mixed evaluation that is mostly positive. Williams argues that Long stands without a rival as the greatest of Southern mass leaders. He asked the Southern United States to turn its gaze from "nigger" devils and take a long, hard look at itself. He asked people to forget the past, the glorious past and the sad past, and address themselves to the present. There is something wrong here, he said, and we can fix it up ourselves. Bluntly, forcibly, even crudely, he injected an element of realism into Southern politics. As Williams notes, not without reason did one of his unfavorable critics say that Long was the first Southerner since Calhoun to have an original idea, the first to extend the boundaries of political thought. Above all, Williams argues, he gave the Southern masses hope. He did some foolish things and some wrong things. There is a tragedy in the story, and perhaps it is not entirely his fault that he did not become the South's peerless Progressive. Perhaps the lesson of Long, says Williams, is that if in a democracy needed changes are denied too long by an interested minority, the changes, when they come, will come with a measure of repression and revenge. Perhaps the gravest indictment that can be made of Southern politics in recent times is that the urge for reform had to be accomplished by pressures that left in leaders like Long a degree of cynicism about the democratic process.<ref>T. Harry Williams, "The Gentleman from Louisiana: Demagogue or Democrat." ''Journal of Southern History'' 1960 26(1): 3-21.</ref>  

Southern historian T. Harry Williams, the leading expert on Long, has a mixed evaluation that is mostly positive. Williams argues that Long stands without a rival as the greatest of Southern mass leaders. He asked the Southern United States to turn its gaze from "n*****" devils and take a long, hard look at itself. He asked people to forget the past, the glorious past and the sad past, and address themselves to the present. There is something wrong here, he said, and we can fix it up ourselves. Bluntly, forcibly, even crudely, he injected an element of realism into Southern politics. As Williams notes, not without reason did one of his unfavorable critics say that Long was the first Southerner since Calhoun to have an original idea, the first to extend the boundaries of political thought. Above all, Williams argues, he gave the Southern masses hope. He did some foolish things and some wrong things. There is a tragedy in the story, and perhaps it is not entirely his fault that he did not become the South's peerless Progressive. Perhaps the lesson of Long, says Williams, is that if in a democracy needed changes are denied too long by an interested minority, the changes, when they come, will come with a measure of repression and revenge. Perhaps the gravest indictment that can be made of Southern politics in recent times is that the urge for reform had to be accomplished by pressures that left in leaders like Long a degree of cynicism about the democratic process.<ref>T. Harry Williams, "The Gentleman from Louisiana: Demagogue or Democrat." ''Journal of Southern History'' 1960 26(1): 3-21.</ref>  

===Long in American literature===

===Long in American literature===