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Senate Years of Service: 1915-1927 Party: Democrat
UNDERWOOD, Oscar Wilder, (grandson of Joseph Rogers Underwood),
a Representative and a Senator from Alabama; born in Louisville,
Jefferson County, Ky., May 6, 1862; attended the common schools, the Rugby
School, Louisville, Ky., and the University of Virginia at Charlottesville;
studied law; admitted to the bar in 1884 and commenced practice in Birmingham,
Ala.; presented credentials as a Democratic Member-elect to the Fifty-fourth
Congress and served from March 4, 1895, to June 9, 1896, when he was succeeded
by Truman H. Aldrich, who contested his election; elected as a Democrat to the
Fifty-fifth and to the eight succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1897-March 3,
1915); did not seek renomination in 1914, having become a candidate for
Senator; minority whip (Fifty-sixth Congress); majority leader 1911-1915;
chairman, Committee on Ways and Means (Sixty-second and Sixty-third
Congresses); unsuccessful candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination
in 1912 and 1924; elected as a Democrat to the United States Senate in 1914;
reelected in 1920, and served from March 4, 1915, to March 3, 1927; declined to
be a candidate for reelection in 1926; minority leader and Democratic caucus
chairman 1920-1923; chairman,
Committee on Cuban Relations (Sixty-fourth and Sixty-fifth Congresses);
represented the United States as a member of the Conference on Limitation of
Armament in 1921 and 1922; represented the United States as a delegate to the
Sixth International Conference of American States at Havana, Cuba, in 1928;
retired to his estate, Woodlawn Mansion, near Accotink, Fairfax County, Va.,
and engaged in literary pursuits until his death there on January 25, 1929;
interment in Woodlawn Cemetery, Birmingham, Ala.
BibliographyAmerican National Biography;
Dictionary of American Biography; Johnson, Evans.
Oscar W. Underwood: A Political Biography. Baton Rouge: Louisiana
State University Press, 1980; Underwood, Oscar W.
Drifting Sand of Party Politics. New York: The Century Co.,
1928.
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