Dick Dabney

5648. A Good Man The Life of Sam J. Ervin, by Dick Dabney (read 9 Sep 2019) I have read a lot of biographies of Senators but I hesitated to read this book because it was published in 1970--well before Senator Ervin died on 23 April 1985, and its title suggested that it was non-critical and fawning in regard to its subject. But at least in its early part I found it engaging and good reading. Sam Ervin was born 27 Sep 1896. He attended the University of North Carolina during the time Thomas Wolfe was a student there. (Ervin did not like Wolfe.) He graduated from college in 1917 and became an Army officer. He went to France as an Army officer,but flubbed up and was discharged as an officer. He then enlisted as a private and did heroic work in the war, ending up as an officer again. He then in 1919 was admitted to the bar in North Carolina and then went to Harvard law School where he graduated.. He practiced law in his home town of Morganton, N.C , served as a judge both in Superior Court and on the North Carolina Supreme Court. In 1954 Clyde Hoey, a United States Senator from North Carolina, died and Ervin was appointed to succeed him. He served as Senator till almost the end of 1974, when he resigned, having not run for re-election in 1974 because he thought he was too old to serve well for another six years. In the Senate he served on the committee which recommended the reprimand of Joe McCarthy in 1953 and in 1973 he was the chairman of the Watergate committee and became famous for his role thereon. The book does not cover the Watergate committee work very well. Ervin was a segregationist and saw nothing wrong with Jim Crow laws. His biographer did not agree with Ervin's view of civil rights and Ervin complained about the biography's treatment of that issue and submitted an argument in favor of segregation which is printed in the notes in the book. I suspect there are better biographies of Sam Ervin but I had this one and am glad I read it.… (mais)