State

THE STATE Page Twenty-one November 11,1 933 LEGISLATIVE PERSONALITIES MANY legislators have spoken their pieces on the North Car¬ olina legislative stage in the current generation, but none has etched himself more clearly in the pub¬ lic mind than has Alleghany’s grand old man, Rufus A. Dough ton. When I first sat. down at the press table in the 11)27 State Senate and began to chronicle the work of the North Carolina General Assembly, Mr. Doughton — “Governor” Houghton to everyone who knows him — was serving as the State’s Revenue Com¬ missioner, having succeeded the late Col. A. I). Watts in 1923. Revenue legislation enacted by the Legislature for more than 40 years has home the Houghton imprint. For many terms he served as chairman of that all-important finance committee of the House— the committee that de¬ cides -or tries to decide— just how much of a tax load John Q. Public will carry without getting mad. I have stood in the lobbies and talked with Governor Doughton many times during the past four sessions of the Legislature — three of which found him as a State official ; first as Reve¬ nue Commissioner and then us chair¬ man of the old State Highway Com¬ mission, and the fourth when he was a member of the House in 1933. His remarks were much more interesting at times than were those being spoken by some inflated legislator on the floor of the House. At the age of 7*>, Mr. Houghton al¬ most worked some of the younger legislators to death with his prodigious labors on the sales tax-infested reve¬ nue bill. He helped defend his legisla¬ tive child from the many attacks his long-time friend, Tam Bowie, and others made on it for weeks. On many occasions during the hec¬ tic 1931 session of 141 days, I would watch Mr. Houghton stand in the lob¬ by of the House anil strain at the leash. Apparently, he wanted to jump out on the floor and shout: “Mr. Speaker!” — but, in tin ' main, that is not the Houghton way of legislating. Alleghany’s Houghton docs not at¬ tempt to sway more timid legislators with oratory as does his neighbor, Tam Bowie, of Ashe, but it is with kindly THE grand old man of North Carolina legislation. Governor Doughton, despite his 76 years, is still going strong and con¬ tinues to be one of the most forceful political figures in the western part of the state. - ★ - words — words a father might use in speaking to his erring son — that Mr. Houghton has won votes for legislation he is backing. “I am somewhat disappointed with your vote on this bill; I never thought you would vote like that,” is a sample of what this veteran legislator has said on more than one occasion to legisla¬ tors of my acquaintance. Mr. Hough¬ ton just simply makes some of the younger fellows feel like they have robbed their poor neigh lior’s hen house and this strategy — if one can call it that — often causes the "erring" legis¬ lator to do an about face in order to be favored with the Hougluou blessing. Without doubt. Governor Houghton is one of the most politically-minded men ever to answer a roll call in the history-studded legislative halls inside the State Capitol. He eomi“s from a county where Republicans are more numerous than in most counties and No. 5 Governor “Rufe” Doughton By Wade II. Lucas he is a Democrat of the Andrew Jack- son type. His relegation to private life follow¬ ing the 1931 General Assembly, which reorganized the State Highway Com¬ mission, is said to have been one of the hardest things ever to befall Mr. Houghton. Many thought it was the end, politically, of the man who served his first legislative term in 1S87, when Max Gardner was still wearing romp¬ ers, but it was not. He came back ns a member of the 1933 House after a ten-year lapse in his sittings as a legis¬ lator and this past legislative session has the Houghton stamp on it. Maybe Mr. Houghton will come back to the next Legislature. He comes of a hardy family and his mother is still living at the age of 95. If his brother, Congressman Robert L. Houghton, runs for and is electeil Gov¬ ernor in 103«>. it is not at all unlikely that “Rufe" will bo in the House put¬ ting through his brother’s legislative program. For those Doughton “1юу.«” are smart politicians. Make no mis¬ take about that. As member of the State Advisory Budget Commission, Governor Hough¬ ton is again helping to chart a finan¬ cial course for the State of North Car¬ olina and it fan be said without fear of contradiction that Governor Khring- haue regards him as an extremely capable meml«T of what is known n- thc “Brain Trust" that which over so often sits in judgment on Capitol Hill. HITCH-HIKING GOVERNOR (Continued from page six) twice private cars were borrowed for the return to Raleigh. Last week "Old Ninety-Six” took to a garage and even the substitute balked. The story of the Fayetteville incident made press association wires and that night nn announcer of the largest and most powerful radio station in the South was giving North Carolina the well-known razzberrics tliusly : "Here's the State that boasts it is the most progressive in Dixie and one of the most progressive in the nation and it cannot afford even a tin-lizzie to cart its Governor about." or words to that effect.