Apps

Bob Bartlett — news, coverage & facts — IJR

Career

Shortly after his graduation, Bartlett began his career in politics. A reporter for the Fairbanks Daily News from 1924 until 1933, he accepted the position of secretary to Delegate Anthony Dimond of Alaska, serving in that role for a year. Three years later, he became the chairman of the Unemployment Compensation Commission of Alaska, serving from 1937 to 1939.

Bartlett's father died in 1935, so he returned to Fairbanks to run his family's mining business. However, Bartlett wasn't a big fan of mining and looked back to the political arena in 1938.

On January 30, 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed him secretary of the Alaska Territory, serving under Governors John Weir Troy in 1939 and Ernest Gruening from 1939 to 1944. Bartlett served as acting Governor multiple times, such as during the opening of the Alaska-Canada Highway.

In 1945, following the retirement of Anthony Dimond, Bartlett was elected as the delegate from Alaska to the 79th and the six succeeding Congresses, with the backing of Dimond. It was in this capacity that his greatest work on Alaskan statehood was completed, such as the introduction of the Alaska Statehood Act to the House. Continuing his civic service, he was president of the Alaska Tuberculosis Association and served as a member of the Alaska War Council, from 1942 to 1944.

Bartlett labored constantly for statehood, being a member of the Alaska Statehood Committee. Bartlett, as delegate, was the one who introduced the Alaska Statehood Act into Congress, being key in shepherding its passage.

Upon Alaska's admission to the Union in 1959, Bartlett became the senior inaugural U.S. senator from Alaska, along with junior Senator Ernest Gruening, with their senior-junior status determined by a coin flip. Bartlett served in this role until his death in office in 1968. He was succeeded by State Representative Ted Stevens, appointed by Governor Hickel, who had lost the Republican primary for Alaska's other Senate seat that year to former Anchorage Mayor Elmer Rasmuson. Stevens had also previously been the 1962 Republican nominee.

Bartlett possessed the reputation of a quiet man of achievement. The Library of Congress estimates that he had more bills passed into law than any other member in congressional history. Before statehood, he was writing legislation (sponsored by other congressional representatives), such as the Alaska Mental Health Enabling Act of 1956. Some of his bills included the Radiation Safety Bill and the Bartlett Act, requiring all federally funded buildings to be accessible to disabled people.

Fight for Alaskan Statehood

Bartlett first introduced the Alaska Statehood Act in 1947, although the bill was defeated.

Bartlett re-introduced the Alaska Statehood Act in 1950, with the backing of President Harry Truman, although, after passing the House of Representatives by a 40-vote margin, it was killed in committee in the Senate. Bartlett remained unfazed, and he called on Alaskans to join his fight for statehood. Alaskans responded with the 1956 constitutional convention, which elected Shadow U.S. Senators William A. Egan and Ernest Gruening, as well as Shadow U.S. Representative Ralph Rivers, all sworn in on October 6, 1956. The convention also created a state constitution for Alaska. The shadow Congressmen's main goal was to request or demand Alaskan statehood from the U.S. Congress. The Convention drew national attention to the fight for Alaskan Statehood. With the pressure from the convention and Bartlett, of whom members of Congress were very fond, congressmen and other federal politicians rapidly switched their opinions, most notably Sam Rayburn, the powerful Speaker of the House, Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower, all of whom had been courted by Bartlett, after previous opposition.

Bartlett was assisted by numerous Alaskans, such as Territorial Governor Mike Stepovich, who was present at the House vote, former Territorial Governor Ernest Gruening, and senior U.S. Department of the Interior official Ted Stevens, who was (illegally) using the Interior's offices to lobby for statehood. After talking to Stevens in 1958, Bartlett remarked in a letter to a friend "At a guess, I should say that many taxpayers' dollars are used for telephone calls to the Interior Department from Alaska and vice versa on matters more political than executive."

In 1958, the bill for Alaska Statehood was reintroduced, backed by Eisenhower, Johnson, and Rayburn. The main opponents of the bill were Republicans and Southern Democrats. Republicans feared that Alaska, a Democratic-leaning state, would elect Democrats to Congress. Southern Democrats feared that Alaska, a state with a high native population and that had passed one of the first laws against discrimination, would elect pro-civil rights Senators.

The bill would pass the House in April 1958, and defeat competition from powerful Virginia Representative and Chair of the House Rules Committee, Howard W. Smith, as well as Washington Representative Thomas Pelly. Bartlett used a powerful procedure, which had been omitted shortly after 1912 because Congress did not plan to add any more states after Arizona. However, the Library of Congress found that the procedure had never been formally abolished. The procedure would have allowed every single Representative to speak on the floor for an hour. Facing the possibility of more than 400 hours of debate, Smith and the other Representatives who were in opposition all backed down. Bartlett was key in shepherding the bill through the Senate, where it passed on June 30, 1958, by a vote of 64–20. Following this, the chamber broke into applause. Bartlett missed this, as he held the promise that he would call back home to Alaska if the bill passed. Bartlett was in his office, calling Alaskans, for most of the night.

President Eisenhower would sign the bill on July 7, 1958, and after the November 25th 1958 elections, in which nearly 80% of eligible Alaskans voted, Bartlett would be elected U.S. Senator, defeating R.E. Robertson. Bartlett would be inaugurated on January 3, 1959, the day that Alaska became a state. Bartlett's part in the Alaska Statehood Act was large, with Sam Rayburn summing up his change in opinion with: "Two words. Bob Bartlett."