![]() Uncle Earl, as his supporters called him, had just gone through an bizarre odyssey: Committed to a federal mental institution in Texas by his wife, having his allies transfer him to a state facility in Louisiana, and finally, still as sitting governor, pulling strings to get himself released. In 1959, attracted by the story of Governor Earl Long, he chose Louisiana. ![]() His reporting on American and world politics as a staff writer for New Yorker magazine gave him the freedom to cover any story, anywhere in the world. He also wrote about boxing and dining-his reports from Paris introduced American readers to French haute cuisine. ![]() Liebling, the preeminent American political reporter of his era, made his reputation as a World War II correspondent. It is arguably among the best accounts ever written about any episode of American political history. Liebling’s The Earl of Louisiana, chronicles the end of Longism through the story of the 1959 Louisiana governor’s election. Established by Huey Long, whose assassination in 1935 prevented it from going national, and kept alive in Louisiana by his brother Earl, Longism did much to elevate the lives of poor people-while lining the pockets of well-connected elites-and made the state weirdly progressive in an era of reactionary dominance in the South.Ī.J. ![]() "Longism" was the populist, pragmatic and corrupt political idea that dominated Louisiana politics from the mid 1920s through 1960. ![]()
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