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George Norris: Accomplished Congressman


In 1889, he married Pluma Lashley, daughter of the town's most esteemed banker and businessman, and they had three daughters. (Lowitt 557) .
             George's career in politics began in 1892 when he was elected prosecuting attorney in his county. A loyal Republican, in 1895 he defeated the Populist incumbent in a prominent Populist area and served eight years as judge of the fourteenth judicial district. In 1900, he moved the family from Beaver City to McCook, Nebraska. In 1901, while there, his wife Pluma died after the birth of their third daughter, and soon after, in 1903, George married Ellie Leonard, a McCook schoolteacher. (Lowitt 558) .
             George was elected to his first term in the House of Representatives in 1902. Although he agreed with many Populist beliefs and liberal domestic policies, he identified with the Old Guard Republicans until he supported federal intervention of the railroads. This alienated the conservative Republicans who had earlier endorsed him. With this, he openly sided with House insurgents and became an advocate for progressive legislation. (Lowitt 558) .
             Darland 3.
             In 1910 George was the main figure in arguable the most important procedural reform in the history of the House of Representatives. He supported a revolution against the power of the Speaker of the House, and after a heated, thirty-six hour debate, Norris's proposal was adopted, creating a Rules Committee on which the Speaker was not allowed to sit. This greatly curbed the power of the Speaker. Because of this role in the House revolution, George was catapulted to the scene as a prominent progressive figure. He was easily elected to a fifth term in the House in 1910 and decided to turn his attention instead to the Senate. (Lowitt 558) .
             George became a Senator of Nebraska in 1913, and throughout his thirty years in the Senate, he increasingly gained in stature. During the Woodrow Wilson administration, he was one of only three non-Democratic Senators to vote in support of the nomination of Louis Brandeis to the Supreme Court.


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