Wellborn Jack
| Wellborn Jack, Sr. | |
 | |
Louisiana State Representative
for Caddo Parish (at-large) | |
| In office 1940–1964 | |
| Preceded by | At-large delegation: Dr. P. T. Alexander |
|---|---|
| Succeeded by | J. Bennett Johnston, Jr. |
Member of the
Caddo Parish Police Jury | |
| In office 1976–1984 | |
| Born | November 27, 1907 Shreveport, Louisiana |
| Died | June 1, 1991 (aged 83) Shreveport, Louisiana |
| Resting place | Forest Park East Cemetery in Shreveport |
| Political party | Democrat |
| Spouse(s) | Martha Elizabeth DeWitt Jack (married 1935-1991, his death) |
| Relations | George Whitfield Jack, Jr. (brother) William Pike Hall, Sr. (first cousin) |
| Children | Wellborn Jack, Jr. Savannah Elizabeth Jack Walker |
| Alma mater | Centenary College of Louisiana Tulane University Law School |
| Occupation | Attorney |
Wellborn Jack, Sr. (November 27, 1907 – June 1, 1991),[1] was an attorney from his native Shreveport, Louisiana, who was a Democrat state representative for Caddo Parish, having served from 1940 to 1964.[2] He finished in sixth place for five at-large seats in the general election held on March 3, 1964. Winning the fifth position was J. Bennett Johnston, Jr., a fellow Democrat who subsequently served in the U.S. Senate from 1972 to 1997.
Background
Jack was descended within the United States from an Irishman, Patrick Jack, who operated a tavern in Charlotte, North Carolina, prior to the American Revolution. Jack's father, George Whitfield Jack, Sr., a native of Natchitoches, Louisiana, and lie his sons a graduate of Tulane University Law School in New Orleans, was an educator-turned-lawyer who served in Shreveport from 1917 until his death in 1924 as a judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana. He was appointed to the federal bench by then U.S. President Woodrow Wilson.[3]
Wellborn Jack practiced law with his brother, George Whitfield Jack, Jr., who served as a colonel under General Matthew Bunker Ridgway (1895-1993) in World War II. His later law partner was his son, Wellborn Jack, Jr. (1936-2023), a specialist in employment and labor law.[4] The junior Jack recalled that his father had little interest in genealogy and said, "What matters most is not what you sprang from but what you sprang at." [3]
Political career
Like virtually all of the Shreveport-area politicians during the 1950s, Jack was known for his fervent support of racial segregation. He supported a bill to require the labeling of blood by race of the donor. The raising of the Confederate flag at the Caddo Parish Courthouse embodied the sentiments of white segregationists of Jack's era.[5] That flag no longer flies at the courthouse, and a Confederate monument was removed.
In 1962, Jack joined his House colleague, Representative Parey Branton of Shongaloo in Webster Parish, in calling for a change in the method by which Louisiana allocates its electoral votes. The two urged adoption of the framework used by Maine and Nebraska under which one elector is allotted for each congressional district to the winner by plurality in that district, and two at-large electoral votes are assigned to the top vote-getter statewide, plurality or majority. The plan was not adopted. It could have enabled Louisiana to choose split electors, as Alabama did in 1960 and New Jersey in 1860.[6][7]
Jack's House tenure extended from the administrations of Governors Sam Houston Jones to the second term of Jimmie Davis. During his long career in the House, Jack served alongside numerous colleagues who reached the highest point in state politics, including Clarence C. "Taddy" Aycock (1915-1987), Bill Dodd, Crawford Hugh "Sammy" Downs, John J. McKeithen, Louis J. Michot, deLesseps Story "Chep" Morrison, Sr., Dave L. Pearce, and William Rainach, along with his Caddo colleagues Algie D. Brown, Frank Fulco, and James C. Gardner.[2]
Jack lost his House seat after twenty-four years because two Republicans, Morley Hudson and Taylor W. O'Hearn, led the field of legislative candidates in 1964. Hudson and O'Hearn, the first two Republicans to serve in the Louisiana legislature since Reconstruction benefited from Shreveport Republican Charlton Lyons, who carried the GOP gubernatorial banner in a ground-breaking but unsuccessful race against the Democrat John McKeithen of rural Caldwell Paris] south of Monroe. In addition to Jack, the other Democrat eliminated in the 1964 election was Jasper K. Smith, a lawyer from Vivian in northern Caddo Parish.
Days after U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Jack wrote a letter to the former Shreveport Journal by which he reaffirmed his own belief in segregation: "The white man and the Negro man are happy with their lot here in this area ..."[8]
In 1966, Jack was a candidate for the Louisiana Public Service Commission, a utility regulatory agency. He was part of a multiple-candidate field which sought to win the the seat held by the appointed John S. Hunt, III, of Monroe, a nephew of Governors Huey Pierce Long, Sr., and Earl Kemp Long. In that campaign Jack declared himself as one opposed to all kinds of "federal encroachment." He was joined in the race against Hunt by two of his former legislative colleagues, Parey Branton and John Sidney Garrett of Haynesville in Claiborne Parish. Though Branton finished in sixth place in the contest, he led by a plurality in his own Webster Parish.[9] Hunt and Garrett, the two leading candidates, met in a runoff election on September 24. Hunt had enjoyed a considerable plurality in the first primary round of balloting[10] and then defeated Garrett to hold on to the position.[11] John McKeithen was the previous public service commissioner from the district, and as governor had named Hunt as his own successor in 1964.
In 1972, Jack was an unsuccessful candidate in the nonpartisan race for delegate to the Louisiana Constitutional Convention of 1973, ratified in 1974.[1]
From 1976 to 1984, Jack was an elected member of the final two terms of the former Caddo Parish Police Jury. He left the police jury, the parish governing body, when it was reorganized in 1984 as the Caddo Parish Commission.[12]
Jack died of congestive heart failure and is interred, along with his wife, the former Martha Elizabeth DeWitt (1913-1995), in Forest Park East Cemetery in Shreveport.[1]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Wellborn Jack Sr. (1907-1991) - Find a Grave Memorial, accessed June 5, 2023.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Membership of the Louisiana House of Representatives, 1812-2012. legis.la.gov. Retrieved on June 5, 2023.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Jack 1730, Ireland to North Carolina. genforum.genealogy.com. Retrieved on July 29, 2013.
- ↑ Wellborn Jack, Jr.. lawyer-map.com. Retrieved on July 29, 2013.
- ↑ State of Louisiana, Plaintiff-Appelee v. Felton D. Dorsey, Defendant-Appellant, p. 10. aclu.org/files. Retrieved on July 29, 2013.
- ↑ "Branton Predicts Finances, Integration Will Top Legislative Session," Minden Press, May 14, 1962, p. 1.
- ↑ "Rep. Branton Has the Answer," Minden Herald, editorial, February 1, 1962, p. 2.
- ↑ Shreveport Journal," Letter to the Editor, July 8, 1964.
- ↑ Minden Press-Herald, August 15, 1966, p. 1.
- ↑ Minden Press-Herald, August 15, 1966, p. 1.
- ↑ Minden Press-Herald," September 26, 1966, p. 1.
- ↑ Veta Samuels, History of Caddo Parish Police Jury - Caddo parish Commission (government document.)
