Absalom Willis Robertson was born on 27 May 1887 in Martinsburg, West Virginia, one of six children of Franklin Pierce Robertson, a Baptist minister and home missionary, and Josephine Ragland. Robertson was descended from several illustrious southern families--the Diggses, Gordons, Harrisons, and Willises.
He went to public schools in Lynchburg and Rocky Mount, Virginia, before attending the University of Richmond, where he played varsity football. Robertson received a Bachelor of Arts (B. A. ) degree in 1907 and an Bachelor of Laws (LL. B. ) degree in 1908.
Robertson practiced law with the firm of Willis and Robertson in Buena Vista, Rockbridge County, and began serving in the Virginia senate in 1916. During World War I, Robertson served in the adjutant general's office, rising to the rank of major. In 1919, he moved to Lexington.
Robertson resigned from the Virginia Senate in 1922 to become the commonwealth's attorney for Rockbridge County. In 1926, he became Virginia's Commissioner of Game and Inland Fisheries.
Robertson was elected (at large) to the United States House of Representatives in 1932. He sponsored a resolution to establish a Select Committee on Conservation of Wildlife Resources in 1934 and was reelected to Congress that year for Virginia's seventh district. In 1937, he became a member of the Ways and Means Committee. As chairman of the Wildlife Conservation Committee, Robertson took public interest in his committee's work as "proof that the Nation is gradually becoming more and more 'conservation conscious. '
He was cochairman of the Joint Committee on Defense Production (1957-1958, 1961 - 1962, and 1965-1966).
A member of the Appropriations Committee, Robertson resisted the expansion of federal power and spending (with the exception of defense).
In 1959, he became chairman of the Senate Banking and Currency Committee.
President John F. Kennedy found Robertson to be a leading opponent of his legislation. Robertson was a leader of the Senate Wednesday prayer breakfast.
After the Supreme Court decision of 1962 banning prayer from public schools, Robertson introduced a resolution in the Senate challenging it. Noting on June 26, 1962, that Supreme Court sessions began with the prayer, "God save the United States and this honorable Court, " Robertson asked Congress to tell the justices, "You have usurped your constitutional authority. " But he was unsuccessful.
In 1963, Robertson opposed President Kennedy's Area Redevelopment Act; he believed more jobs would be created by lower taxes and lower spending. He also voted against the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1963. During President Lyndon B. Johnson's administration, Robertson continued to oppose civil rights bills and social-welfare spending. Some of Robertson's criticism of welfare programs--especially his warning that they created dependence on government--would (when made by others a generation later) receive a better hearing.
Robertson supported a revision of the Bank Merger Act of 1960, which became law in 1966 and made it easier for large banks to merge.
At seventy-nine, Robertson was defeated in the Democratic primary in July 1966, losing to William B. Spong, Jr. , by 611 votes.
The growth of urban areas in Virginia hurt Robertson. He resigned from the Senate on Dec. 30, 1966, giving Spong seniority over other freshmen, because the governor of Virginia was able to appoint Spong to Robertson's seat before the new members entered the Senate in January. From 1966 to 1968, Robertson was a consultant for the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
He died where he had lived, in Lexington, Virginia.
Roberts sponsored the Pittman-Robertson Act in 1937, which returned millions of dollars in federal taxes on guns and ammunition to the states for their game and conservation programs. A son of the Shenandoah Valley, Robertson had worked to preserve the nation's land and water long before conservation became a popular cause.
devoted Christian
An authority on taxation, tariffs, and foreign trade, he was a pillar of conservatism who feared for the country's fiscal safety.
He was an eloquent spokesman for conservation, stressing the need for cooperation between federal and state agencies.
Although Robertson increasingly voted against New Deal legislation, he usually supported President Roosevelt's foreign and defense policies, voting for the peacetime draft in 1940 and for Lend-Lease aid in 1941, which helped Britain in World War II. Elected to the United States Senate in 1946 to fill the vacancy created by the death of his mentor, Carter Glass, Robertson won reelection in 1948, 1954, and 1960.
Robertson supported the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947 and other legislation to restrict union power.
He voted for aid to Greece and Turkey in 1947 and for the Marshall Plan the next year. Robertson endorsed President Harry Truman in 1948 but criticized the civil rights plank in the Democratic platform.
Quotations: Describing the requirements for a national wildlife program, Robertson said, "The first essential is land. . Birds cannot nest on the wing, nor can animals reproduce on the run. "
He saw himself as a financial and constitutional watchdog of government and was appalled by the size of federal deficits and the growth of debt. Robertson himself lived the spartan, frugal life he tried to impose on government.
He was an orator of the old school, gesturing frequently and often quoting from the Bible.
Quotes from others about the person
President Franklin D. Roosevelt thanked Robertson in a letter of Oct. 5, 1938, for his report on the conservation activities of regular and emergency federal agencies--including the Civilian Conservation Corps--saying, "This is a subject in which I have a very deep concern. "
Senator Clinton P. Anderson observed, "Senator Robertson had the ability to differ without being contentious. " Few Democrats supported President Dwight D. Eisenhower as enthusiastically as Robertson.
He enjoyed hunting and fishing trips, on which he was often accompanied by other senators, who, as a result, perhaps became more sympathetic to Robertson's concern for preserving pure mountain streams and forests.
During the Korean War, Robertson was a member of a Congressional quartet that sang for hospitalized servicemen.
Robertson married Gladys Churchill on October 19, 1920; they had two children. Gladys Robertson would become devout, turning down invitations to Washington parties (including the White House), and preferring to spend her time in Lexington, where she handed out religious tracts to students.
His younger son, Marion Gordon ("Pat") Robertson, would be a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 1988.
Conversely, President John F. Kennedy found Robertson to be a leading opponent of his legislation.
Although they were born in the same town a couple of weeks apart, and lived within a few blocks of each other, he was no longer close to the senior senator from Virginia, Harry Byrd, because he refused simply to follow Byrd's direction.
