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Senate Years of Service: 1913-1931 Party: Democrat
RANSDELL, Joseph Eugene, a Representative and a Senator from Louisiana; born in Alexandria, Rapides Parish,
La., October 7, 1858; attended the public schools and graduated from Union College, Schenectady,
N.Y., in 1882; studied law; admitted to the bar in 1883 and practiced at Lake Providence, La.,
1883-1889; district attorney for the eighth judicial district of Louisiana 1884-1896; interested in
cotton planting and pecan groves; member of the levee board, fifth levee district 1896-1899; member
of the State constitutional convention in 1898; elected as a Democrat to the Fifty-sixth Congress to fill
the vacancy caused by the death of Samuel T. Baird; reelected to the Fifty-seventh and to the five
succeeding Congresses and served from August 29, 1899, to March 3, 1913; was not a candidate for
renomination in 1912, having become a candidate for the United States Senate; elected as a
Democrat to the United States Senate in 1912, reelected in 1918 and 1924 and served from March 4,
1913, to March 3, 1931; unsuccessful candidate for renomination in 1930; chairman, Committee on
Public Health and National Quarantine (Sixty-third through Sixty-fifth Congresses), Committee on
Mississippi River and Its Tributaries (Sixty-sixth Congress); in 1920 founded a printing firm in
Washington, D.C., and served as a director until 1931 when he returned to Lake Providence, La.;
engaged in the real estate business, cotton planting, and pecan growing; member of the board of
supervisors, Louisiana State University and Agricultural College at Baton Rouge 1940-1944; died in
Lake Providence, La., July 27, 1954; interment in Lake Providence Cemetery.
BibliographyAmerican National Biography; Flynn,
George Q. A Louisiana Senator and the Underwood Tariff. Louisiana History 10
(Winter 1969): 5-34; LaBorde, Andras. A National Southerner: Ransdell of Louisiana. New York: Benziger, 1951.
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