Edward Gurney

Edward John Gurney
United States Senator from Florida
In office January 3, 1969 – December 31, 1974
Preceded by	George Smathers
Succeeded by	Richard Stone
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida's 5th district
In office January 3, 1967 – January 3, 1969
Preceded by	Albert S. Herlong, Jr.
Succeeded by	Louis Frey, Jr.
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida's 11th district
In office January 3, 1963 – January 3, 1967
Preceded by	New district
Succeeded by	Claude Pepper
Personal details
Born	(1914-01-12)January 12, 1914 Portland, Maine
Died	Winter Park, Florida
Political party	Republican
Alma mater	Colby College Harvard Law School Duke Law School
Religion	Congregationalist
Military service
Service/branch	United States Army
Years of service	1941-1946
Rank	Lieutenant Colonel
Battles/wars	World War II

Edward John Gurney (January 12, 1914 – May 14, 1996) was an American politician from Florida, where he served as a Representative and a United States Senator. He was the first Republican Senator elected from Florida since Reconstruction. He was also only the second member of his party to represent Florida in the United States House of Representatives in the 20th century.

Background

Gurney was born in Portland, Maine. He attended public schools and graduated in 1935 from Colby College in Waterville, Maine, and in 1938 from Harvard Law School. He was admitted to the Bar of New York the following year and began practicing law in New York City.

After the United States entered World War II, Gurney enlisted as a private in the United States Army and saw action in the European Theatre of conflict. In 1946, he was discharged as a lieutenant colonel. Gurney entered Duke Law School, and he received a degree in 1948. He then moved to Winter Park in Orange County in central Florida.

In 1952, Gurney was elected city commissioner and served until his election as city attorney for Maitland. He completed his career in local office with service as mayor from 1961 to 1962.

On November 2, 1968, Gurney was initiated as an Honorary brother of Alpha Phi chapter of Alpha Kappa Psi at the University of Florida.

House and Senate service

Gurney was elected to the United States Congress in 1962, 1964, and 1966. In 1968, he was elected to the United States Senate for the seat of retiring Democrat George Smathers. The election coincided with Richard Nixon's victory in the presidential race that year. Gurney's victory can be attributed to the Republican campaign's Southern Strategy. Gurney defeated his opponent, former Governor Leroy Collins, with 55.9 percent of the vote to Collins' 44.1 percent. Many supporters of third-party presidential candidate George C. Wallace, voted for Gurney and hence provided him a coalition of growing Republicans in Florida allied with a declining number of conservative Democrats.

Gurney ran on a record that included votes against civil rights legislation, foreign aid, and that "expensive boondoggle," the War on Poverty.

Future U.S. President George W. Bush worked as a traveling aide for Gurney during that campaign. Bush was placed on inactive duty status from the Air National Guard so that he could volunteer.

In 1973, Gurney was named to the Senate select committee under Sam J. Ervin of North Carolina, which investigated the Watergate scandal. He was the Nixon administration's strongest supporter on the panel in contrast to the ranking Republican member, Howard Baker of Tennessee.

Federal prosecutors accused Gurney and political aides of trying to enrich Gurney's campaign coffers by collecting payoffs from Florida builders in return for federal housing contracts, though he was never convicted on these charges.

Dispute with Bill Cramer

In 1970, Congressman William C. "Bill" Cramer of St. Petersburg ran as the Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate seat vacated by the retiring Democrat Spessard Holland. Gurney and then Governor Claude R. Kirk, Jr., opposed Cramer's nomination and supported an intraparty rival, former U.S. Supreme Court nominee George Harrold Carswell, who stepped down from the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit to make the race. Cramer easily defeated Carswell for the Senate nomination but then lost in the fall, when a divided GOP worked to the benefit of the Democratic senatorial nominee, then State Senator Lawton Chiles of Lakeland.

Cramer and Gurney had been prospective primary opponents in 1968, until Cramer yieled to Gurney, with the understanding that Gurney would back Cramer for the other Senate seat, which Holland was expected to vacate in 1970. According to Cramer, Gurney "pledged his support to me, and I did to him, and we shook hands."

Cramer's former law partner, Herman Goldner, a former mayor of St. Petersburg and a Moderate Republican who had refused in 1964 to support Barry M. Goldwater against U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson or Richard Nixon against Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey in 1968, ran against Gurney in 1968, but underfunded and distrusted by many Republican voters in the closed primary, Goldner received few votes. Gurney then carried all but four counties in the race against Democrat LeRoy Collins, a former governor. Thereafter, Gurney and Cramer criscrossed the state in various party-building ventures. In the fall of 1969, Cramer declared his candidacy for the Senate, and Holland soon announced his expected retirement. President Nixon encouraged Cramer's candidacy: "Bill, the Senate needs you, the country needs you, the people need you -- now, run."

The Cramer-Gurney "gentlemen's agreement" unraveled after April 8, 1970, when the U.S. Senate rejected Judge Carswell, Nixon's second consecutive conservative nominee to the high court. Gurney and Holland, both Carswell supporters, were dismayed when a bipartisan coalition rejected the jurist, fifty-five to forty-five on allegations of "mediocrity and past "racism."

Cramer and Gurney had worked well enough as colleagues, but were not friends. "In looking back on it," recalled Cramer, "I realize that Gurney was very much his own man and apparently was not comfortable with my being the ranking Republican in the Florida delegation."

Gurney declined to discuss the "gentlemen's agreement" with Cramer, but said that he and Cramer had "totally different opinions on this. That is ancient history, and I see no point in reviving things. ... If I told my complete version of the matter, Cramer would not believe me, and I don't want Bill angry at me."

Meanwhile, Governor Kirk tried to isolate Gurney from Cramer by naming Gurney's Orlando law firm the counsel for the Florida Turnpike Authority at a $100,000 annual retainer. Cramer's firm received no state business.

Legal troubles

Gurney soon became embroiled in an influence peddling scandal in 1974, which led him not to seek re-election that year. His party instead nominated Jack Eckerd, the drugstore magnate, who was defeated by the Democrat Richard Stone. Gurney was indicted and tried on seven counts of bribery and related offenses. During the first trial, he was found not guilty of five counts, and the jury could not reach a verdict on two counts. Later, he was retried on those two counts and was also found not guilty.

In 1978, Gurney ran again for Congress but was handily defeated by Bill Nelson, a Democrat elected in 2000 to the U.S. Senate.

Gurney retired to resume the practice of law in Winter Park, where he subsequently died.

External links

• Biographical Directory of the US Congress

United States House of Representatives
New district	Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida's 11th congressional district 1963 – 1967	Succeeded by Claude Pepper
Preceded by Albert S. Herlong, Jr.	Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida's 5th congressional district 1967 – 1969	Succeeded by Louis Frey, Jr.
United States Senate
Preceded by George Smathers	U.S. Senator (Class 3) from Florida 1969–1974 Served alongside: Spessard Holland, Lawton Chiles	Succeeded by Richard Stone