LOUISIANA: A New Face

The civic reformer was older now, with thinning hair, but he had lost none of his bounce. His was still the challenger’s zeal as he confronted the voters of the State of Louisiana and announced that he in tended to run for governor. “The people have told me from one end of Louisiana to the other,” said Mayor deLesseps (“Chep”). Morrison of New Orleans, “that they want a new face, that they seek capable, energetic leadership.”

Chep Morrison, reform mayor, was getting into what looked like a tight and noisy fight. Earl K. Long, brother to the late Huey and governor of the state from 1948 to 1952, had prepared for the 1956 Democratic primary by having all his teeth out. Other candidates (announced or probable) included Colonel Francis Grevemberg, Louisiana’s able and respected police superintendent, and Jimmie H. Davis, a former governor who delights the crowds on the hustings by caroling his own compositions, You Are My Sunshine and It Makes No Difference Now.

Handsome lawyer and World War II colonel, Chep Morrison has a formidable big-city record. He first beat the Long organization in the 1946 New Orleans mayoralty election. In 1950 he was re-elected by the biggest majority in the city’s history, getting 121,000 votes. In 1954 Morrison won a third four-year term, taking 60% of the popular vote against eight other candidates. But Chep Morrison has political liabilities: he is both a New Orleanian and a Catholic, facts that count against him in rural and heavily Protestant north Louisiana. Last week Chep Morrison was at pains to emphasize that he was a “native of Pointe Coupee parish,” and that he had “lived and worked in the central, southern and northern sections of Louisiana.” He found a quaint way to discount any religious prejudice that might militate against him. Said he: “During my administration as mayor for the past ten years, religion has not entered in any way into my administration of the city’s public business.”