Carter Glass
Carter Glass | |
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President pro tempore of the United States Senate | |
In office July 11, 1941 – January 3, 1945 | |
Preceded by | Pat Harrison |
Succeeded by | Kenneth McKellar |
Chair of theSenate Appropriations Committee | |
In office March 4, 1933 – May 28, 1946 | |
Preceded by | Frederick Hale |
Succeeded by | Kenneth McKellar |
United States Senator fromVirginia | |
In office February 2, 1920 – May 28, 1946 | |
Preceded by | Thomas S. Martin |
Succeeded by | Thomas G. Burch |
47thUnited States Secretary of the Treasury | |
In office December 16, 1918 – February 1, 1920 | |
President | Woodrow Wilson |
Preceded by | William McAdoo |
Succeeded by | David F. Houston |
Chair of theHouse Banking Committee | |
In office March 4, 1913 – December 16, 1918 | |
Preceded by | Ar sắc ne Pujo |
Succeeded by | Michael Francis Phelan |
Member of theU.S. House of Representatives fromVirginia's6thdistrict | |
In office November 4, 1902 – December 16, 1918 | |
Preceded by | Peter J. Otey |
Succeeded by | James P. Woods |
Member of theVirginia Senate from the20thdistrict | |
In office December 6, 1899 – November 4, 1902 | |
Preceded by | Adam Clement |
Succeeded by | Don P. Halsey |
Personal details | |
Born | Lynchburg, Virginia,U.S. | January 4, 1858
Died | May 28, 1946 Washington, D.C.,U.S. | (aged 88)
Political party | Democratic |
Signature | ![]() |
Carter Glass(January 4, 1858 – May 28, 1946) was an Americannewspaper publisherandDemocraticpolitician fromLynchburg,Virginia.He represented Virginia in both houses ofCongressand served as theUnited States Secretary of the Treasuryunder PresidentWoodrow Wilson.He played a major role in the establishment of the U.S.financial regulatorysystem, helping to establish theFederal Reserve Systemand theFederal Deposit Insurance Corporation.
After working as a newspaper editor and publisher, Glass won election to theSenate of Virginiain 1899. He was a delegate to theVirginia Constitutional Convention of 1902,where he was an influential advocate forsegregationistpolicies. Historian J. Douglas Smith described him as “the architect of disenfranchisement in the Old Dominion.”[1]He also promotedprogressivefiscal and regulatory reform but these contributions were often superficial since Glass generally opposed the most reformist aspects of federal legislation and was a New Deal critic.[2]Glass won election to theUnited States House of Representativesin 1902 and became Chairman of theHouse Committee on Banking and Currencyin 1913. Working with President Wilson, he passed theFederal Reserve Act,which established acentral bankingsystem for the United States. Glass served as Secretary of the Treasury from 1918 until 1920, when he accepted an appointment to represent Virginia in theUnited States Senate.Glass was a favorite son candidate for the presidential nomination at the1920 Democratic National Convention.
Glass served in the Senate from 1920 until his death in 1946, becoming Chairman of theSenate Appropriations Committeein 1933. He also served aspresident pro temporeof the Senate from 1941 to 1945. He co-sponsored the1933 Banking Act,also known as the Glass–Steagall Act, which created the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and enforced the separation ofinvestment bankingfirms andcommercial banks.An ardent supporter ofstates' rights,Glass opposed much of theNew Dealand clashed with PresidentFranklin D. Rooseveltover the control of federal appointments in Virginia.
Early life and education
[edit]Carter Glass was born on January 4, 1858, inLynchburg, Virginia,the last child born to Robert Henry Glass and his first wife, the former Augusta Elizabeth Christian. His mother died on January 15, 1860, when Carter was only two years old, so his sister Nannie, ten years older (and Elizabeth's only daughter), became his surrogate mother. Carter, a slight boy, got his nickname, "Pluck", for his pugnacious willingness to stand up to bullies.[3]
His father,Robert Henry Glass,was Lynchburg's postmaster beginning in 1853, and in 1858 bought theLynchburg Daily Republicannewspaper (where he had worked since 1846). The city's other newspaper was theLynchburg Daily Virginian,then published by Joseph Button, who on June 23, 1860, (while R. H. Glass was out of town) died in a duel with Glass's editor at the time, George W. Hardwicke, over accusations that Glass used his postal office to disadvantage the rival paper.[4]
When theAmerican Civil War(1861–1865) broke out, Lynchburg was pro-Union but also pro-slavery, since its economy depended on the manufacture of tobacco as well as slave-trading and the new railroads. R. H. Glass volunteered and joined the Virginia forces in 1861, and then joined theConfederate Army,where he became a major on the staff of Brigadier GeneralJohn B. Floyd,a formerGovernor of Virginia.Major Glass ultimately remarried and had seven more children, includingMeta Glass(president ofSweet Briar College) and Edward Christian Glass (Lynchburg's school superintendent for five decades).
In poverty-stricken Virginia during the post-War period, Glass received only a basic education at a private school run by one-legged former Confederate Henry L. Daviess.[5]However, his father kept an extensive library. He became an apprentice printer to his father (and Hardwicke) when he was 13 years old, and continued his education through readingPlato,Edmund BurkeandWilliam Shakespeare,among others who stimulated his lifelong intellectual interest. He thought that Shakespeare's works were not written by William Shakespeare, refusing to accept that their author could have risen from humble origins.[6]In 1876, Major Glass accepted an offer to edit thePetersburg News,and Carter joined him as a journeyman printer. Not long afterward, Major Glass accepted the editorship of theDanville Post,but Carter did not join him, instead returning to Lynchburg.[7]
Early career
[edit]When Glass was 19 years old, he moved with his father toPetersburg.However, when young Glass could not find a job as a newspaper reporter in Petersburg, he returned to Lynchburg, and went to work for former Confederate General (and future U.S. Senator)William Mahone'sAtlantic, Mississippi and Ohio Railroad(AM&O), which was in receivership from 1877 to 1880. Glass was a clerk in the auditor's office at the railroad's headquarters. Several years later, under new owners and with headquarters relocated toRoanoke,the railroad became theNorfolk and Western(N&W). However, by then Glass had found the newspaper job he had initially wanted. His formative years as Virginia struggled to resolve a large pre-War debt (Mahone being a leading figure in theReadjuster Party) and dealing with boom-and-bust economic cycles (some linked with stock speculation), helped mold Glass' conservative fiscal thinking, much as it did many other Virginia political leaders of his era.
![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/cd/Young_Carter_Glass.jpg/170px-Young_Carter_Glass.jpg)
At the age of 22, Glass finally became a reporter, a job he had long sought, for theLynchburg News.He rose to become the morning newspaper's editor by 1887. The following year, the publisher retired and offered Glass an option to purchase the business. Desperate to find financial backing, Glass received the unexpected assistance from a relative who loaned him enough for a $100 down payment on the $13,000 deal.[8]Free to write and publish whatever he wished, Glass wrote bold editorials and encouraged tougher reporting in the morning paper, which increased sales. Soon, Glass was able to acquire the afternoonDaily Advance,then to buy out the competingDaily Republican.Thus he became Lynchburg's solenewspaper publisher;the modern-dayLynchburg News and Advanceis the successor publication to his newspapers.
Entry into politics
[edit]As a prominent and respected newspaper editor, Glass often supported candidates who ran against Virginia's Democrats of the post-Reconstructionperiod, who he felt were promoting bad fiscal policy. In 1896, the same year his father died, Glass attended theDemocratic National Conventionas a delegate, and heardWilliam Jennings Bryanspeak.[9]Glass was elected to theSenate of Virginiain 1899, and was a delegate to theVirginia constitutionalconvention of 1901–1902.He was one of the most influential members of the convention, which instituted measures associated withthe Progressive movement,such as the establishment of theState Corporation Commissionto regulate railroads and other corporations, replacing the formerVirginia Board of Public Works.[10]
Advocacy of segregation and disenfranchisement
[edit]The 1902 Constitution required that to be eligible to vote a man prove that he had paid apoll taxofUS$1.50(equivalent to about $51 in 2023) in each of the past three years,[11]making voting a luxury. The Constitution also required that voters pass aliteracy testwith their performance graded by the registrar. When questioned as to whether these measures were potentially discriminatory, Glass exclaimed, "Discrimination! Why that is exactly what we propose. To remove every negro voter who can be gotten rid of, legally, without materially impairing the numerical strength of the white electorate."[12]Indeed, the number of African-Americans qualified to vote dropped from 147,000 to 21,000 immediately.[13]Carter Glass remained one of the strongest advocates of segregation and continued to dedicate much of his political career to the perpetuation of Jim Crow laws in the South.[14]
Congress, Secretary of the Treasury
[edit]![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/52/TIMEMagazine9Jun1924.jpg/220px-TIMEMagazine9Jun1924.jpg)
Glass was elected to theUnited States House of Representativesas aDemocratin 1902, to fill a vacancy. In 1913, he became Chairman of theHouse Committee on Banking and Currency,where he worked with PresidentWoodrow Wilsonto pass the Glass-OwenFederal Reserve Act.In 1918, Wilson appointed himSecretary of the Treasury,succeedingWilliam Gibbs McAdoo.His signature as Secretary of the Treasury can be found on series 1914 Federal Reserve Notes, issued while he was in office. At the1920 Democratic National ConventionGlass was nominated for President as afavorite soncandidate from Virginia.
Glass served at the Treasury until 1920, when he was appointed to theUnited States Senateto fill the vacancy caused by the death of Virginia's senior senator,Thomas Staples Martin.Martin had been widely regarded as the head of Virginia's Democratic Party, a role filled during the 1920s byHarry Flood Byrdof Winchester, another Virginia newspaperman who shared many of Glass's political views and who headed the political machine ofConservative Democratsknown as theByrd Organization,which dominated Virginia's politics until the 1960s. In 1933, Byrd became Virginia's junior Senator, joining Glass in the Senate after former Governor and then-senior U.S. SenatorClaude A. Swansonwas appointed asU.S. Secretary of the Navyby PresidentFranklin Roosevelt.Both Glass and Byrd were opposed to Roosevelt'sNew Dealpolicies. Each was a strong supporter of fiscal conservatism andstates' rights.Glass and Byrd invoked senatorial courtesy to defeat Roosevelt's nomination ofFloyd H. Robertsto a federal judgeship, as part of a broader conflict over control of federal patronage in Virginia.
Glass served in the U.S. Senate for the remainder of his life, turning down the offer of a new appointment as Secretary of the Treasury from President Roosevelt in 1933. When the Democrats regained control of the Senate that year, Glass became Chairman of theAppropriations Committee.He wasPresident pro temporefrom 1941 to 1945, being succeeded as such byKenneth McKellarat the start of the custom of giving that post to the senior senator of the majority party. As a Senator, Glass's most notable achievement was passage of theGlass–Steagall Act,which separated the activities of banks and securities brokers and created theFederal Deposit Insurance Corporation.Glass, however, opposed the concept of bank deposit insurance and was “very unhappy” about this reform.[15]A less successful minor legislative initiative from Glass was a 1930 resolution to ban dial telephones[16]from the Senate, a measure that was successfully resisted by younger senators who favored dial telephony.
Electoral history
[edit]- 1902;Glass was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives with 79.41% of the vote, defeating Republican Aaron Graham, Independent James S. Cowdon, and Socialist Labor H.D. McTier.
- 1904;Glass was re-elected with 69.07% of the vote, defeating Republican Samuel H. Hoge and Socialist Elory R. Spencer.
- 1906;Glass was re-elected unopposed.
- 1908;Glass was re-elected with 65.92% of the vote, defeating Republicans M. Hartman and John M. Parsons and Independent Jacob Harvey.
- 1910;Glass was re-elected with 87.64% of the vote, defeating Republican William F. Allison.
- 1912;Glass was re-elected with 72.84% of the vote, defeating Populist James S. Browning and Independents Adon A. Yoder and Jacob Harvey.
- 1914;Glass was re-elected with 90.72% of the vote, defeating Socialist B.F. Ginther.
- 1916;Glass was re-elected unopposed.
- 1918;Glass was re-elected unopposed.
- 1924;Glass was elected to the Senate.
- 1930;Glass was re-elected to the Senate.
- 1936;Glass was re-elected to the Senate.
- 1942;Glass was re-elected to the Senate.[17]
Family, decline, death
[edit]![Gravestone of Carter Glass, U.S. politician.](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/87/CarterGlassGrave.jpg/200px-CarterGlassGrave.jpg)
Carter Glass was a Methodist.[18]When he was twenty-eight, Glass married Aurelia McDearmon Caldwell, a school teacher. They had four children. She died of a heart ailment in 1937.[19]Glass remarried in 1940 at the age of 82. His second wife, Mary Scott, was his constant companion as his health began to fail over the next few years. They lived at theMayflower HotelApartments in Washington, D.C. Starting in 1942, Glass began suffering from various age-related illnesses and could not attend Senate meetings after that time. However, he refused to resign from the Senate, despite many requests that he do so, and even kept his committee chairmanship. Many visitors were also kept away from him by his wife.[20]
A confidential 1943 analysis of theSenate Foreign Relations CommitteebyIsaiah Berlinfor the BritishForeign Officestated that Glass[21]
"...is very old and frail and something of a legend in the South. The fruit-growing interests of his State make him an opponent of thereciprocal trade pacts,but on all other questions he has loyally supported the President's anti-Isolationist policy. He cannot have many years of active service before him. "
Glass died ofcongestive heart failurein Washington, D.C., on May 28, 1946. He is interred at Spring Hill Cemetery in Lynchburg. His fellow sponsor of the Glass-Owen Act, SenatorRobert Latham Owen,lies nearby.
Legacy
[edit]"Montview", also known as the "Carter Glass Mansion", was built in 1923 on his farm outside of the-then boundaries of Lynchburg inCampbell County.It is listed on theNational Register of Historic Placesand now serves as a museum on the grounds ofLiberty University.It lies within the expanded city limits of Lynchburg. The front lawn of "Montview" is the burial site of Dr.Jerry Falwell,founder ofLiberty University.[22]
TheVirginia Department of Transportation'sCarter Glass Memorial Bridgewas named in his honor in 1949. It carries the Lynchburg bypass ofU.S. Route 29,the major north–south highway in the region, across theJames Riverbetween Lynchburg andAmherst County.[23]
A chair in the Department of Government was created in Glass's honor atSweet Briar College.It has been held by notable faculty including Dr.Barbara A. Perry.
An administrative building atHarvard Business Schoolwas named for Glass in the late 1920s. In 2020, the name Glass was removed from this building due to the efforts by Glass to "strip Black citizens of their voting rights through means such as a poll tax and literacy test — efforts that intentionally disenfranchised Blacks and promulgated segregation, with pernicious and long-lasting effects." In a letter to the Harvard community, Dean Nitin Nohria said, "We therefore cannot allow the Glass name to remain at the School." The building was renamed as Cash House, in honor ofJames Cash Jr.,a distinguished Professor who served at Harvard for 36 years beginning in 1976.
Glass is one of the few Americans to appear on a U.S. coin during his lifetime. As a very prominent citizen of the city of Lynchburg, the 1936Lynchburg Sesquicentennial commemorative half dollarhas his image and name on the obverse. Only 20,000 were minted as they were not intended for regular circulation.[24]
See also
[edit]Works
[edit]- Glass, Carter (1927).An Adventure in Constructive Finance.Doubleday, Page & Co. p. 448.
References
[edit]- ^Smith, J. Douglas (2002).Managing White Supremacy: Race, Politics, and Citizenship in Jim Crow Virginia.Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. p. 67.
- ^Shaw 2020.
- ^Palmer 1938,pp. 15–20.
- ^Palmer 1938,pp. 14–15.
- ^Palmer 1938,p. 20.
- ^Shaw 2020,p. 313.
- ^Palmer 1938,pp. 22–24.
- ^Current Biography 1941,pp. 321–23.
- ^"Carter Glass – The Region – Publications & Papers | Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis".Minneapolisfed.org. Archived fromthe originalon May 16, 2008.RetrievedOctober 17,2010.
- ^Shannon, Preston C. (March 1973)."The Evolution of Virginia's State Corporation Commission".William & Mary Law Review.14(3): 533.
- ^Tarter, Brent."Early History of the Poll Tax".Encyclopedia Virginia.RetrievedJune 8,2022.
- ^Damon W. Root,When bigots become reformers: the Progressive Era's shameful record on race,May 2006.
- ^Wilkinson III 1968,p. 38.
- ^"Editorial: Is it time to reappraise Carter Glass?".The Roanoke Times.November 23, 2019.RetrievedJune 29,2020.
- ^Shaw 2019,p. 194.
- ^"U.S. Senate: Senate Considers Banning Dial Phones".senate.gov.RetrievedNovember 27,2019.
- ^""Glass, Carter"".Biograhical Directory of the United States Congress.United States Congress.RetrievedMay 6,2023.
- ^Woodrow Wilson: A Medical and Psychological Biography. Supplementary Volume to the Papers of Woodrow Wilson.Princeton University Press. July 14, 2014.ISBN9781400857494.
- ^"Milestones, Jun. 14, 1937".Time.June 14, 1937. Archived fromthe originalon March 7, 2008.RetrievedOctober 17,2010.
- ^"Elder Statesman".Time.February 19, 1945. Archived fromthe originalon September 30, 2007.RetrievedOctober 17,2010.
- ^Hachey, Thomas E. (Winter 1973–1974)."American Profiles on Capitol Hill: A Confidential Study for the British Foreign Office in 1943"(PDF).Wisconsin Magazine of History.57(2): 141–153.JSTOR4634869.Archived fromthe original(PDF)on October 21, 2013.
- ^"National Register of Historical Places – VIRGINIA (VA), Lynchburg County".Nationalregisterofhistoricplaces.RetrievedOctober 17,2010.
- ^"Designated Interstate and Primary Route Numbers, Named Highways, Named Bridges and Designated Virginia Byways"(PDF).Virginia Department of Transportation. Archived fromthe original(PDF)on July 1, 2015.RetrievedOctober 17,2010.
- ^Silver Commemoratives 1936 LYNCHBURG 50C MS
Bibliography
[edit]- Palmer, James E. (1938).Carter Glass: Unreconstructed Rebel.Roanoke, Va.: Institute of American Biography. p. 370.
- Shaw, Christopher W.(2020). "The Politics of Elite Anxiety: Carter Glass and American Financial Policy".The Historian.82(3): 308–327.doi:10.1080/00182370.2020.1773753.S2CID225353965.
- Shaw, Christopher W.(2019).Money, Power, and the People: The American Struggle to Make Banking Democratic.Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
- Wilkinson III, J. Harvie(1968).Harry Byrd and the Changing Face of Virginia Politics, 1945–66.Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia.
Further reading
[edit]- Katz, Bernard S.; Vencill, C. Daniel, eds. (1996).Biographical Dictionary of the United States Secretaries of the Treasury, 1789-1995.Greenwood Press.ISBN9780313280122.
- Smith, Rixey (1939).Carter Glass: A Biography.Longman, Greens & Co.ISBN0836954467.,by Glass's former aide
External links
[edit]![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
- 1858 births
- 1946 deaths
- 20th-century American politicians
- United States secretaries of the treasury
- Candidates in the 1920 United States presidential election
- Candidates in the 1924 United States presidential election
- Democratic Party Virginia state senators
- Presidents pro tempore of the United States Senate
- Delegates to Virginia Constitutional Convention of 1901
- Democratic Party United States senators from Virginia
- Woodrow Wilson administration cabinet members
- Democratic Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Virginia
- Politicians from Lynchburg, Virginia
- People from Dupont Circle
- American segregationists