Joseph T. Robinson
• Born: Aug. 26, 1872, Lonoke, Ark.
• Political party: Democrat
• Education: University of Arkansas; law department of the University of Virginia
• Representative from Arkansas: 1903–13
• Senator from Arkansas: 1913–37
• Senate minority leader: 1923–33
• Senate majority leader: 1933–37
• Died: July 14, 1937, Washington, D.C.
As Democratic majority leader during the first years of the New Deal, Joe Robinson got the Senate's usually slow machinery to work with amazing speed. He personally served as floor manager of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's emergency banking bill and drove it through the Senate in one afternoon. Robinson similarly volunteered to manage other New Deal bills. Many committee chairmen were happy to give up this responsibility because they were conservative Southern Democrats who felt uncomfortable with liberal New Deal proposals but did not want to stand in the way of ending the depression. Most senators liked and trusted Robinson and willingly followed his lead. But if they crossed him, Robinson would bellow and bang his fist on his desk until he whipped the Senate into line. A big, bluff, tough man, he gave the impression of “brute animal strength,” said one reporter, “and a willingness to use it.”
When President Roosevelt proposed expanding the Supreme Court in 1937, in order to add more liberal justices, Robinson reluctantly went along. Against strong opposition from members of his own party, he put together a slim majority in favor of the bill. But during an intense fight Robinson died of a heart attack. Without his leadership, the court plan col-lapsed and the Democratic majority split badly for the remainder of the New Deal years.
See also Court-Packing Plan (1937); “First hundred days”; Majority leader
Sources
- Donald C. Bacon, “Joseph Taylor Robinson: The Good Soldier”,” in First among Equals: Outstanding Senate Leaders of the Twentieth Century, edited by Richard A. Baker and Roger H. Davidson (Washington, D.C.: Congressional Quarterly, 1991)
