State

February 24, 1934 THE STATE LEGISLATIVE PERSONALITIES Page Twenty-one No. 20 Col. T. I.. Kirkpatrick By Wade П. Lucas ★ “He’s the only ninn I know who can strut while sitting down." The speaker was Fire Chief Hen¬ dricks Palmer of Charlotte and he was talking about that ever delightful per¬ sonality, Senator T. LeKoy Kirkpat¬ rick, of Mecklenburg, than whom there was none more vocative in the group composing the membership of the 19:5.'$ General Assembly. Chief Palmer, who by now in all probability is accustomed to hearing the Mecklenburgers orate and who in all likelihood has become hardened to the brand of oratory as exemplified by the majority of those sent from Meck¬ lenburg to the North Carolina Legis¬ lature, had just finished discussing Senator Kirkpatrick's candidacy for Governor in 1936 when he delivered himself of his remark about the Senator being able to strut while sitting down. Short of stature but gifted with a ready command of the English lan¬ guage, Senator Kirkpatrick, probably better known as Colonel Kirkpatrick, in all probability talked as much if not more than any other member of the 1933 Generul Assembly. And the House had some members who liked to hear themselves talk out loud, too. The great Woodrow Wilson well knew Colonel Kirkpatrick’s penchant for talking and it was an incident oc¬ curring in Charlotte on May 20, 1916, I believe, when the good burghers of Mecklenburg gathered to hear the late president deliver a speech on the sign¬ ing of the Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence that served to enhance Colonel Kirkpatrick’s fame as an or¬ ator. The colonel was then mayor of Char¬ lotte and, as Tom Host relates the story with a typical Bostian chuckle even now, the man who was to represent Mecklenburg in the State Senate 17 I years later decided to make the speech introducing Mr. Wilson. As Tom tells it, the good colonel must have been brimming over with oratory that great day in Mecklenburg for he used up about 45 minutes in introduc¬ ing the then President of the United COLONEL KIRKPATRICK AND ONE OF HIS PETS - ★ - States and when lie had finished the President spoke about half as long as his introducer. Gifted with a certain amount of showmanship, Colonel, according to Mr. Host, once sent Kaiser Wilhelm, of Germany, a Christmas card while he was Charlotte's mayor in 1916 and thus in addition to all his other titles became known also as “the Internation¬ al Mayor.” Wearing a talisman rose daily in his coat lapel, Colonel Kirkpatrick was a familiar figure on the floor of the 1933 Senate. Crowded galleries seemed to imbue him with a desire to orate, and orate he did to the delight of the tax¬ payers who came to watch their law¬ makers earn their $10 a day. At this point I venture the assertion that if oratory could have balanced the budget of the state without resort to a sales tax, Senator Kirkpatrick, together with the aid of Senator John Sprunt Hill, of Durham, and a number of others, would have come very near accomplishing that feat. Like the House members from Meck¬ ★ lenburg, Senator Kirkpatrick fulmi¬ nated against the Ehringhaus-spon- sored sales tax day in and day out. He is not the type to beat about the bush in registering his opposition to legis¬ lation he does not like. If a spade were n spade, he called it a spade and not a shovel. The colonel would have had considerable trouble mastering the art of camouflage, to be sure. A meticulous dresser, the doughty colonel— and doughty he was too, gentle readers — always appeared on the Sen¬ ate floor freshly shaven and wearing clothes with as much eclat as any clothes-conscious college youth out for the title of being the best dressed among his fellows. Like, many probably more famous statesmen, the colonel also af¬ fected a cane and could he handle that cane? Folks, he could. The newspaper reporters liked the Mecklenburger and the colonel liked the scribes. As a result he got his name in the papers quite often for the things he said and did in the Senate. There were days in the Senate when nothing relatively important was up for disposal when this or that senator would set out apparently to enhance his reputation by orating. Now orating about nothing in particular tires even the lmrd-crustcd scribes and they set out to see what could be done. They learned the Mecklenburg Senator also got bored by hearing many of his fellow members ami when such practice was being in¬ dulged in it was a fairly easy matter to get Colonel Kirkpatrick to make a motion to adjourn the Senate. Where¬ fore, there is good reason to believe the 1933 Senate scribes will be kind to the good colonel in 1936. I realize this sketch of Colonel Kirk¬ patrick would be amiss if it did not say that for years he has been a good roads partisan and if the writer failed to pre¬ dict that in 1936 the voters of this state are going to witness a display of showmanship if the colonel runs for Governor that will make some of Sena¬ tor Robert R. Reynolds' performances in 1932 resemble the tabloid variety of that art.