Robert S. Kerr

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

credited to the United States Senate Historical Office

For other persons named Robert Kerr, see Robert Kerr (disambiguation).

Robert S. Kerr, born September 11, 1896 in what is now Ada, Oklahoma and died on January 1, 1963 in Washington, D.C., first held elective office when he became Governor of Oklahoma in 1942.

A year after leaving the governor's office, he was successful in his first attempt at the United States Senate in 1948. Kerr was reelected to two more terms, and served in the United States Senate from 1949 until 1963, as a member of the Democratic Party. After he failed at winning the 1952 Democratic Presidential nomination, Kerr thereafter devoted his energies to building his Senate career.

Kerr served on several key Senate committees, most notably the Finance and Public Works committees. He also forged alliances to key senators, such as Lyndon B. Johnson, who led the Democrats' Senate forces. A partner in Kerr-McGee, Kerr increasingly became known as a key champion of southwestern oil and gas interests.

[edit] Scholarly secondary sources

Morgan, Anne Hodges. Robert S. Kerr: The Senate Years (1977).
Salter, J. T. Public Men in and out of Office(1946) ch 25.

[edit] Primary sources

The Kerr Collection mainly consists of materials generated during the Senate years. However, there are several cubic feet of documents that relate to his years as Oklahoma's governor. There is a significant amount of documentation on both Oklahoma and non-Oklahoma projects. As with so many of Oklahoma's lawmakers, there is a large amount of material regarding agriculture and Native Americans.

chairman, Select Committee on National Water Resources (Eighty-sixth Congress).

A junior high school in Del City, Oklahoma bears his name.

Preceded by Leon C. Phillips	Governor of Oklahoma 1943–1947	Succeeded by Roy J. Turner
Preceded by Edward H. Moore	United States Senators from Oklahoma 1949–1963	Succeeded by J. Howard Edmondson