JACK, WELLBORN SR.

JACK, WELLBORN SR. (1907-1991) was a Louisiana State Representative representing Caddo Parish from 1940-1964. Jack was a Shreveport attorney and the son of Emily Roberta Jack (nee Pegues) and George Whitfield Jack, Sr., judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana in Shreveport from 1917 until his death in 1924.

Jack was born November 26, 1907, in Shreveport, Louisiana. He received a bachelor of arts degree from Centenary College and a law degree from Tulane University. He practiced law with his brother, George Whitfield Jack, Jr., and later with his son, Wellborn Jack, Jr., in the firm of Jack & Jack. Another brother, Stuart Jack, lived in Las Vegas, Nevada. Jack married Martha Elizabeth DeWitt, and the couple had three children, Wellborn Jack, Jr., Savannah Elizabeth Jack, and Patricia Jack.

Jack was known for his fervent support of racial segregation. In 1956, he opposed a bill which would have exempted the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans from the state ban on "interracial activities". He also supported a bill to require the labeling of blood by race of the donor. In 1962, Jack co-sponsored a change in the method by which Louisiana allocates its electoral votes under a plan calling for one elector to be allotted for each congressional district to the winner by plurality in that district and two at-large electoral votes to be assigned to the top vote-getter statewide, plurality or majority. The plan was not adopted. It could have enabled Louisiana to choose split electors.

During his long career in the Louisiana House of Representatives, Jack served alongside many of the most influential men in state politics, including Taddy Aycock, Bill Dodd, C. H. "Sammy" Downs, John McKeithen, Louis J. Michot, deLesseps Story Morrison, Sr., Dave L. Pearce, and William M. Rainach, along with his Caddo colleagues Algie D. Brown, Frank Fulco, and James C. Gardner. A lifelong Democrat, he lost his seat to a Republican in 1964. He ran unsuccessfully for the Louisiana Public Service Commission in 1966. From 1976 to 1984, he was elected to the final two terms of the former Caddo Parish Police Jury (now the Caddo Parish Commission). He died of heart failure in 1991.

Bibliography: Wellborn Jack Papers, 1876-1990, Collection 425, Northwest Louisiana Archives, Noel Memorial Library, Shreveport: Louisiana State University.

Citation

The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this article.

"JACK, WELLBORN SR." Handbook of North Louisiana Online (http://www…….), accessed …………. Published by LSU-Shreveport.