Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse – Alabama’s 1940s congressional delegation

   Recently I came across a copy of an old congressional directory from 1942. It is always fun for me to read about this era in American political history.

  Franklin Delano Roosevelt was first elected in 1932 in the depths of the Great Depression. He would go on to be reelected in 1936, 1940, and 1944 and would have been reelected into perpetuity. However, he died in Warm Springs, Georgia in April of 1945, only four months into his fourth term. He was the closest thing we Americans have ever had to having a king. Nobody has or ever will serve four terms as president. After FDR's omnipotent reign, the U.S. Constitution was changed to limit our presidents to two four-year terms.

60 years after JFK, Biden as second Catholic president offers a refresh in church’s political role

  Running to become the first Catholic president of the United States in 1960, Sen. John F. Kennedy told an audience of wary Protestant ministers that “if the time should come … when my office would require me to violate my conscience or violate the national interest, then I would resign the office.”

  Sixty years later, Joe Biden has become the second Roman Catholic to win the White House, and some prominent Catholics and bishops now appear to believe that the only way a Catholic should hold office is if putting conscience before what the law says about culture war issues like abortion. Five decades of abortion politics have taken a toll.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse - Legendary U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black was from Alabama

  The most enduring legacy a president will have is an appointment to the United States Supreme Court. A lifetime appointment to the high tribunal is the ultimate power. The nine Justices of the Supreme Court have omnipotent, everlasting power over most major decisions affecting issues and public policy in our nation. President Trump has had two SCOTUS appointments and confirmations. This is monumental. These appointments may be his lasting legacy.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse – Alabama’s 1940s congressional delegation

  Recently I came across a copy of an old congressional directory from 1942. It is always fun for me to read about this era in American political history.

  Franklin Delano Roosevelt had been first elected in 1932 in the depths of the Great Depression. He would go on to be reelected in 1936, 1940, and 1944 and would have been reelected into perpetuity. However, he died in Warm Springs, Georgia in April of 1945, only four months into his fourth term. He was the closest thing we Americans have ever had to having a king. Nobody has or ever will serve four terms as President. After FDR's omnipotent reign, the Constitution was changed to limit our presidents to two four-year terms.