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Image courtesy of the Office of the Clerk, U.S. House of Representatives |
RANKIN, John Elliott, a Representative from Mississippi; born near Bolanda, Itawamba
County, Miss., March 29, 1882; attended the common and high schools; was
graduated from the law department of the University of Mississippi at Oxford in
1910; was admitted to the bar the same year and commenced practice in West
Point, Clay County, Miss.; moved to Tupelo, Miss., the following November and
continued the practice of law; prosecuting attorney of Lee County 1911-1915;
also engaged as a lecturer and newspaper writer; served in the United States
Army during the First World War; delegate to the Democratic National
Conventions in 1932, 1936, and 1940; elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-seventh
and to the fifteen succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1921-January 3, 1953);
chairman, Committee on World War Veterans Legislation (Seventy-second through
Seventy-ninth Congresses), Committee on Veterans Affairs (Eighty-first and
Eighty-second Congresses); coauthor of bill to create the Tennessee Valley
Authority; unsuccessful candidate for renomination in 1952; was an unsuccessful
candidate for the Democratic nomination for United States Senator in 1947;
resumed the practice of law; also interested in farming and real estate; died
in Tupelo, Miss., November 26, 1960; interment in Greenwood Cemetery, West
Point, Miss.
BibliographyVickers, Kenneth Wayne. John Rankin: Democrat and Demagogue. M.
A. Thesis, Mississippi State University, 1993.
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