John S. Hunt, III

John Smoker Hunt, III
Louisiana Public Service Commissioner
In office May 1964 – December 31, 1972
Preceded by	John Julian McKeithen
Succeeded by	Francis Edward Kennon, Jr.
Personal details
Born	(1928-06-21)June 21, 1928 Ruston, Louisiana, USA
Died	January 14, 2001(2001-01-14) (aged 72) Monroe, Louisiana, USA
Nationality	American
Political party	Democratic Party
Spouse(s)	Rosemary Hunt
Children	Stewart T., Lucy, and Mary
Occupation	Attorney

John Smoker Hunt, III (June 21, 1928 – January 14, 2001), was a nephew of Governors Huey Pierce Long, Jr., and Earl Kemp Long who served on the elected Louisiana Public Service Commission from May 1964, to December 31, 1972. He was unseated in the September 30, 1972, Democratic runoff by Francis Edward Kennon, Jr. (born 1938), then of Minden in Webster Parish in northwestern Louisiana.

Early years, family, education

Hunt was born in Ruston, the seat of Lincoln Parish in north Louisiana, to the former Lucille Long (1899–1985) and Stewart Smoker Hunt (1895–1966), a forester. Apparently, Hunt's grandfather was John S. Hunt, II. Lucille Long, a native of Winn Parish, was the last of the nine children born to Huey Pierce Long, Sr. (1852–1937), and the former Caledonia Palestine Tison (1860–1913). Lucille Hunt was formerly a teacher in Shreveport, the seat of Caddo Parish, and was a prominent civic leader thereafter in Ruston. Hunt also had a sister, Martha, who died in 1965.

Hunt graduated from Ruston High School and the Tulane University Law School in New Orleans. He and his wife, Rosemary, had three children, including Stewart T. Hunt (born September 9, 1960) of Lake Charles and two daughters named Lucy and Mary. Hunt practiced law in Monroe, the seat of Ouachita Parish in northeastern Louisiana. He surfaced to public attention in 1964, when he was appointed by Governor John J. McKeithen to fill the remaining year and a half of McKeithen's term in the then District 3 (since District 5) seat on the PSC, a position originally held by Hunt's uncle, Huey Long. In February 1965, the two other commissioners named Hunt as the chairman because the presiding officer is traditionally the member whose seat is up for election in the next calendar year."

The election of 1966

In August 1966, Hunt won a full six-year term on the regulatory body by defeating in a heated party runoff his fellow Democrat, then State Representative John Sidney Garrett of Haynesville in northern Claiborne Parish just south of the Arkansas state line. While McKeithen endorsed Hunt for a PSC term of his own, he also had a good relationship with Garrett, whom he later tapped to be Speaker of the Louisiana House from 1968-1972.

In the 1966 campaign, Hunt stressed that he had worked closely with the Louisiana Department of Commerce and Industry to create "thousands of new jobs" within Louisiana. After an inconclusive first primary in which four candidates, including State Representative Parey Branton of Shongaloo and former lawmaker Wellborn Jack of Shreveport, were eliminated, Hunt and Garrett met in the September 24 runoff election. Hunt had enjoyed a considerable plurality in the primary.

Garrett claimed after the primary that Hunt had received 93.1 percent of the votes of African Americans in nine selected precincts throughout the district, which then embraced a third of the state., but the runoff results were much closer. Hunt and Garrett each carried fourteen parishes ; there were then twenty-eight parishes in the district. Hunt prevailed by 9,896 votes: 91,971 (52.5 percent) to 83,075 (47.5 percent). Hunt led in the more populous parishes of Rapides, Natchitoches, and three others where he had resided at one time or the other: Caddo, Lincoln, and Ouachita. Garrett won the entire northern tier of parishes which borders Arkansas except for Caddo on the west and East Carroll on the far northeast. He also won several parishes in north central and northeastern Louisiana: Grant, La Salle, Catahoula, Franklin, Richland, and Winn, the ancestral home of the Longs, who had traditionally remained loyal Democrats.

In the campaign, Hunt defended his two-year record on the PSC, which regulates all interstate transportation and utility services within the state except those owned by a municipality. He said that utility companies should make a "fair profit but no more." He listed his goals in a full term as providing parishwide toll-free telephone service and to reduce intrastate tolls on calls.".

A self-described "conservative Democrat", Hunt had endorsed Republican presidential nominee U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona in 1964. Hunt's cousin, U.S. Senator Russell B. Long, however, had worked unsuccessfully to carry Louisiana for U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson. Garrett, a member of the state House since 1948, was the chairman of the former Joint Legislative Committee on Segregation, a panel once chaired by legendary State Senator William M. Rainach, also of Claiborne Parish. This particular runoff election was the first significant test in Louisiana politics between party factions since President Johnson had signed the Voting Rights Act into law the preceding year. The new law, which enforced the Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution led to the registration of large numbers of African-American voters throughout the Deep South. Many of these newer voters provided crucial support to Hunt, who was seen as more moderate on the racial issue than the segregationist Garrett. In fact, Garrett, who won the backing of three of the eliminated primary candidates, had claimed that Hunt was dependent on the "black bloc vote". Some even accused Hunt of having catered to "black power" elements.

In his victory statement, Hunt said that he had "overcome a slanderous campaign, and by winning I have tremendously enhanced the image of this state. . . . I was known by my opponent and his associates to be a conservative, but in spite of this, they attacked my character and made charges that I was a liberal, despite my public record to the contrary."

The 1972 campaign

Hunt sought a second term in 1972. He told voters that he had never missed a PSC meeting during his eight years on the panel and had handled more than two thousand cases. He ran into serious opposition from Edward Kennon, the man who had placed third in the Democratic primary for lieutenant governor in 1971. In a first primary in August, Hunt trailed Kennon, 106,212 (40.8 percent) to 122,573 (47.1 percent). Another 31,692 votes (12.2 percent) were cast for a Long kinsman, "Huey P. Long" (1929–2004), then of Pineville in Rapides Parish Hunt won only ten of the then thirty-three parishes in the district, including his home bases of Lincoln and Ouachita. Hunt accused Kennon of having recruited Long into the race to split Hunt's pro-Long backing. Kennon led in twenty-three parishes in the sprawling district, which then stretched as far south as West Baton Rouge Parish. He won 58 percent in his native Webster Parish and also procured pluralities in Natchitoches, La Salle, De Soto, Avoyelles, St. Landry, and the Long traditional stronghold of Winn, which Hunt had also lost despite his family connections in 1966 to Garrett. Hunt's strongest parishes were Caddo, Bossier, Lincoln, Ouachita, and Jackson.

In the September 30 party runoff, Kennon easily defeated Hunt, 125,877 votes (58 percent) to 90,833 (42 percent), having procured twenty-nine parishes to Hunt's four. Hunt lost his native Lincoln Parish in the runoff by 176 votes and held his home base, Ouachita Parish, by a single vote, 15,502 to 15,501, presumably his own. Kennon was unopposed in the November 7 general election because, as in 1966, no Republican candidate qualified for the ballot. Kennon was a nephew of a former Louisiana governor, Robert F. Kennon, who served from 1952 to 1956. Three Louisiana governors, Long, McKeithen, and James Houston "Jimmie" Davis all served on the PSC prior to having been elected to the state's top political position. A fourth, Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, served on the PSC prior to having become lieutenant governor.

References

Preceded by John Julian McKeithen

Louisiana Public Service Commissioner from District 3 John Smoker Hunt, III 1964–1972

Succeeded by Francis Edward Kennon, Jr.