by Ray Hill | Aug 16, 2015 | Archives, Columnist, Hill, Ray Hill's Archives
By Ray Hill Luke Lea had not only survived the intense political wars in Tennessee, but had profited from them. Elected to the United States Senate in 1911, Lea’s alliance with “Independent” Democrats and Republicans had created a “fusionist” combine that held the...
by Ray Hill | Aug 9, 2015 | Archives, Columnist, Hill, Ray Hill's Archives
By Ray Hill The pages of Tennessee’s history is littered with colorful characters, but the life of Luke Lea is one right out of a novel; handsome, urbane, highly intelligent and successful, Lea climbed to the heights of financial and political accomplishment. ...
by Ray Hill | Aug 2, 2015 | Archives, Columnist, Hill, Ray Hill's Archives
By Ray Hill Percy Priest was an unlikely candidate for Congress and faced daunting odds to get to the House of Representatives in the first place. Yet once there, he remained there until the day he died. Percy Priest was once described by William “Fishbait”...
by Ray Hill | Jul 26, 2015 | Archives, Columnist, Hill, Ray Hill's Archives
By Ray Hill For two decades there was no politician in the Second Congressional district more popular than John James Duncan. John Duncan had hitchhiked to Knoxville with five dollars in his pocket to attend the University of Tennessee and remained, rising to...
by Ray Hill | Jul 19, 2015 | Archives, Columnist, Hill, Ray Hill's Archives
By Ray Hill For twenty years, James Willis Taylor was the Congressman from Tennessee’s Second Congressional district. J. Will Taylor, popularly known to many of his constituents as “Hillbilly Bill,” was a power in both the national Republican Party and the...
by Ray Hill | Jul 12, 2015 | Archives, Columnist, Hill, Ray Hill's Archives
By Ray Hill Long forgotten by most, John Ridley Mitchell was a member of Congress for eight years and twice a viable candidate for statewide office in Tennessee. J. Ridley Mitchell was a formidable politician and a wily practitioner of the art of politics....
