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Senate Years of Service: 1920-1931 Party: Democrat
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HEFLIN, James Thomas, (nephew of Robert Stell Heflin and uncle of Howell Thomas Heflin),
a Representative and a Senator from Alabama; born in Louina, Randolph County,
Ala., April 9, 1869; attended the common schools of Randolph County, Southern University,
Greensboro, Ala., and Alabama Agricultural and Mechanical College (later Auburn University),
Auburn, Ala.; studied law, admitted to the bar in 1893, and commenced practice in Lafayette, Ala.;
mayor of Lafayette 1893-1894; register in chancery from 1894 to 1896, when he resigned; member,
State house of representatives 1896-1900; member of the State constitutional convention in 1901;
secretary of State 1902-1904, when he resigned; elected as a Democrat to the Fifty-eighth Congress
to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Charles W. Thompson; reelected to the Fifty-ninth and to
the seven succeeding Congresses and served from May 19, 1904, until November 1, 1920, when he
resigned, having become a candidate for Senator; chairman, Committee on Industrial Arts and
Expositions (Sixty-second Congress); elected to the United States Senate as a Democrat on
November 2, 1920, to fill the vacancy caused by the death of John H. Bankhead [1842-1920], in the
term ending March 3, 1925; reelected in 1924 and served from November 3, 1920, to March 3,
1931; unsuccessful candidate for reelection in 1930, and for election to the House and Senate on
several other occasions; special assistant to the United States Attorney General in Alabama
1936-1937; appointed special representative of the Federal Housing Administration 1935-1936,
1939-1942; retired; died in Lafayette, Ala., April 22, 1951; interment in Lafayette Cemetery.
BibliographyAmerican National Biography; Dictionary of American Biography; Tanner, Ralph M. James Thomas Heflin: United
States Senator, 1920-1931. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Alabama, 1967; Thornton, J.
Mills. Alabama Politics, J. Thomas Heflin, and the Expulsion Movement in 1929. Alabama
Review 21 (April 1968): 83-112.
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