The 1950 election was without question an ideological election…the nation shifted right. This was reflected in both general and primary elections. For the latter, Congressman George Smathers’ defeat of the staunchly liberal Senator Claude Pepper was of particular note. Also of note was Senator Glen Taylor of Idaho’s defeat by former Senator D. Worth Clark in a rematch. Republican Herman Welker, who had focused his fire on Taylor as had all other candidates as well as the Idaho Statesman, probably was disappointed that it was not him to defeat Taylor. After all, Taylor had been such a massive mismatch for the state of Idaho ideologically as he was extremely liberal and had run for vice president on the Progressive Party ticket, the party organization which was dominated by actual communists and speeches written for Henry Wallace had communist authorship and they basically spouted Moscow’s position. However, the mood in Idaho was quite Republican and the GOP had a clean sweep of the state, including winning Idaho’s 1st district, which contained the state’s panhandle and at the time was a bastion of organized labor in the state. Welker defeated Clark’s attempted comeback by a whopping 23 points. His campaign planks included anti-communism, his opposition to the proposed Columbia Valley Authority (TVA for the west), reducing income taxes, a balanced budget, and opposition to deficit spending (The Burley Herald). Welker also had some star power behind him. When he worked as an attorney in Los Angeles as a young man, he befriended Bing Crosby, and for 15 years Crosby would go on vacations to Idaho and hunt pheasant with Welker (Hill). Crosby hosted a fundraiser for him, and with considerable momentum in his and Republicans’ direction, Welker won with 61% of the vote, with D. Worth Clark only taking 38%.
Senator Welker
Welker’s tenure in the Senate was highly controversial, with him pulling no punches in his approach. Indeed, this is what he promised when he announced his bid for the Senate, with him stating, “I will not engage in velvet glove technique. I will call a spade a spade and will never be vague or uncertain by giving nervous endorsement or pussyfooting, just to get votes” (The Burley Hearld). However, although certainly among some Idaho voters his approach was refreshing, he wore out his welcome during his term. Welker was so attached to Senator Joseph McCarthy as part of his inner circle that he was known as “Little Joe from Idaho”. As McCarthy’s reputation worsened nationwide, so did his in Idaho. Columnist Holmes Alexander, a conservative, listed some major issues with Welker that were impacting his prospects for reelection, “the senator’s absenteeism was high, prestige low among colleagues and the press corps, his office a haven for political hacks from back home, his payroll loaded with ‘do-nothing relatives’ and had ‘made a sorry spectacle of himself as a ranter … and a bully of witnesses in committee” (Hill). However, this assessment of his faults does not include the most shameful episode in his tenure. He spearheaded the effort, with Senator Styles Bridges (R-N.H.), in attempting to blackmail Senator Lester Hunt (D-Wyo.) into resigning over his son’s arrest in Washington D.C. for propositioning an undercover officer. The margin of the Republican majority in the Senate was tight, and the GOP figured that a Republican could win Hunt’s Senate seat, but not if Hunt was the incumbent. A cleaner effort to get Hunt out of the way was pursued by the Eisenhower Administration, which offered Hunt a financially lucrative post on the US Tariff Commission if he resigned his seat and agreed not to run for the Senate again (Storrow). Hunt would subsequently shoot himself in his office. As Ray Hill (2024) notes, “There is good reason to believe Styles Bridges was at least human enough to have suffered both shame and guilt for what was a vile episode. Bridges, once one of the most prominent GOP senators, retained his influence, but largely confined himself to the shadows on Capitol Hill. Unfortunately, Herman Welker did not seem as affected by the incident as his colleague, although those close to the Idaho senator noted his paranoia seemed to be increasing”. In 1954, Welker led the defense for McCarthy on the question of censure, but because Senator McCarthy would not apologize for his conduct before the Watkins Committee, he was censured 67-22 on December 2nd. Reportedly Welker was among the senators who encouraged McCarthy not to apologize (Johnson).
1956: Frank Church Steps Up
In 1956, Democrat Frank Church narrowly won the Democratic primary to challenge Welker over former Senator Glen Taylor, managing to convince Democratic voters that they shouldn’t lose again by picking Taylor. Church’s campaign was one of positivity and he favorably contrasted with Welker on the right and Taylor on the left. He also refused to use the blackmail story against Welker, having all pamphlets surrounding the matter burned in a bonfire (Hill). Church wanted to defeat Welker on the issues, and he pointed out contrasts between his stances and Welker’s positions. Church declared in the weeks before the election that “in recent years Idaho has gone from one extreme to the other in its senators. I have spoken of the extremist views and deplorable voting record of my opponent, Herman Welker, during this campaign, and I will undertake to describe it for what it is – a record so bad that now even leading Republicans are disclaiming it” (The Idaho Statesman). Indeed, from a liberal perspective no senator had a worse record than Welker. He was the only senator for the duration of a full Senate term in the 1950s who managed to side with Americans for Democratic Action on zero votes. He sided with Americans for Constitutional Action 83% of the time, with them marking him down for his votes for mineral subsidies in 1955, the agriculture bill in 1956 (although he voted in a free market direction on amendments), and against a reduction in an increase in air force funding in 1956. Welker’s DW-Nominate score was a 0.493, being one of the most conservative senators in his day. He also notably opposed the Eisenhower Administration on some key issues, including foreign aid and on a few important judicial nominations. This included being one of four Republicans to vote against the confirmation of Simon Sobeloff, a moderate who the Eisenhower Administration knew would rule against segregation and had opposed the use of paid informants in national security cases, as well as being one of two to vote against the confirmation of John Marshall Harlan II to the Supreme Court. The only other opponents were notorious maverick Republican William Langer of North Dakota and a group of Southern Democrats. After the Committee for an Effective Congress announced their endorsement of Church, Welker denounced them as a “radical bunch of pinks and punks” (Hill). Welker was also a critic of Brown v. Board of Education (1954). He went as far as to claim that communists literally wrote the court’s decision (Johnson). Although President Eisenhower won Idaho resoundingly in the 1956 election, Welker did as well this time as Clark had done in 1950. This was despite the fact that there was a third candidate in the race to potentially drain from Church’s vote in Taylor, who would recall that he was paid to run as an Independent in the race by Welker supporters to the tune of $35,000 (Johnson). Welker’s health deteriorated after the end of his term, with him having increasingly poor balance. In one incident, he twice fell off a ladder while trying to paint the roof of his house before giving up (Hill). It was discovered in October that he had a malignant brain tumor, and although two operations were performed, he died on October 31st. Although we cannot be sure how far the brain tumor impacted Welker’s mind, it is hard to imagine that it didn’t play at least a major role in his erratic behavior in his last years in office that contributed to his loss.
References
Frank Church Raps Record of Opponent. (1956, October 16). The Idaho Statesman.
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https://www.newspapers.com/image/723828900/
Herman Welker States Candidacy For U.S. Senator. (1950, May 4). The Burley Herald.
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https://www.newspapers.com/image/567484623/
Hill, R. (2024). Idaho’s Conservative: Herman Welker. The Knoxville Focus.
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https://www.knoxfocus.com/archives/this-weeks-focus/idahos-conservative-herman-welker/
Johnson, M.C. (2016, June 17). The McCarthy Era in Idaho. Boise State University.
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https://www.boisestate.edu/bluereview/mccarthy-era-idaho/
Storrow, B. (2013, April 14). A Death Untold: The Suicide of Wyoming Sen. Lester Hunt. Casper Star-Tribune.
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Welker, Herman. Voteview.
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Mad Politics: The Bizarre, Fascinating, and Unknown of American Political History 