Hugh L. White

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This article is about the 20th century Mississippi politician; for the 19th century Tennessee politician, see Hugh Lawson White.

Hugh Lawson White (August 19, 1881–September 20, 1965) was an American politician from Mississippi. A Democrat, he served two non-consecutive terms as Governor of Mississippi (1936–1940, 1952–1956).

White was a wealthy industrialist and had been mayor of Columbia when he was first elected to the governorship. In 1936 he established the Balance Agriculture With Industry (BAWI) program that sought to develop an industrial base that matched the state's agricultural base. Under BAWI, advertising and incentives were deployed in hopes of enticing industries to locate to the state. Local governments could issue bonds to construct factories that could be leased to companies (who were also offered tax breaks).

After leaving office due to term limits, White was a delegate representing Mississippi at the 1948 Democratic National Convention.

In 1951, White won a second term, during which the issue of school segregation was a main issue. During the 1940s and early 1950s, federal courts made a series of decisions that indicated that the notion of "separate but equal" schools would soon be declared unconstitutional. Governor White and the state legislature prepared for that possibility by creating plans that sought to improve black schools. Among the proposals were increasing black teacher salaries to match white teachers' and building black schools on par with white schools. White called together one hundred of the state's black leaders to the capital to ask for their support of the plan. Much to his surprise, they overwhelmingly rejected his "voluntary" segregation plan and instead stated that they wanted only an integrated school system. In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court made the famous Brown v. Board of Education decision that declared the practice of "separate but equal" to be unconstitutional.

On August 28, 1955, the infamous murder of Emmett Till occurred during White's reign as governor. Earlier that year, the African American minister George W. Lee had been shot in the face and killed by a gang of whites in an automobile, on May 7th. Vice president of the Regional Council of Negro Leadership and an NAACP worker, Lee had been urging blacks in the Mississippi Delta to vote. The killers were never found as White refused to order an investigation. The Till murder, in particular, ignited a national scandal over the state of Mississippi's race relations.

[edit] Trivia

Hugh White State Park, a state park in Mississippi, is named after him.

Preceded by Martin Sennett Conner	Governor of Mississippi 1936–1940	Succeeded by Paul B. Johnson, Sr.
Preceded by Fielding L. Wright	Governor of Mississippi 1952–1956	Succeeded by James P. Coleman