Fred George Aandahl was an American Republican politician. He served as the 23rd Governor of North Dakota from 1945 to 1951 and as a U. S. Representative from 1951 to 1953.
Background
Fred George Aandahl was born on April 9, 1897 in Litchville, Barnes County, North Dakota, the son of Soren (Americanized to Sam) Jurgen Aandahl, a Norwegian immigrant farmer, and Mamie C. Lawry, a teacher. His mother, a daughter of English immigrants, taught school and insisted on high standards of education for her family.
In 1906 the Aandahls moved to Kingsbury, California, where they owned and operated a five-acre fruit farm. Returning to Barnes County in 1909, Sam Aandahl constructed a farmhouse on 960 acres and engaged successfully in diversified agriculture. From 1916 to 1920 he served two terms as railroad commissioner, elected on the Republican ticket with the support of the Nonpartisan League. Disillusioned with the league as an unselfish political movement concerned with the plight of the North Dakota farmers, Sam Aandahl retired from public life.
Education
Aandahl attended a one-room country school in Litchville and completed three years at Litchville High School.
In 1916 he enrolled at the model high school of the University of North Dakota and entered the university in 1917. He won a position on the debating team and gained widespread campus recognition. In June 1921 he received his Bachelor of Arts degree.
Career
After college Aandahl returned to Barnes County and entered into a farming partnership with his father (who died in 1922). This was the outset of what has been called North Dakota's "Years of Despair, " the period between the two world wars when agricultural crises and economic depression destabilized farm life.
From 1922 to 1927, Aandahl taught school in the county, served as principal of the Svea Township Consolidated School, and spent three years as superintendent of schools in Litchville. Aandahl and his wife continued as teachers until June 1927, when they moved permanently to the Aandahl livestock and grain farm.
Aandahl supplemented his income in the 1930s by serving on Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA) boards.
In 1930, Aandahl won a seat in the state senate, defeating a twelve-year incumbent who had Nonpartisan League backing. Two years later, in a recall election, the league won and Aandahl lost his seat. In 1934, Aandahl failed to regain his seat, losing to a league candidate by eleven votes. The 1938 contest for the seat was also close, but this time Aandahl won by twenty-one votes.
To break the authority exercised by the Nonpartisan League in the Republican party, Aandahl and other Republicans formed the Republican Organizing Committee (ROC) in 1943.
Aandahl became the first ROC governor in 1944 and was reelected by impressive majorities in 1946 and 1948. His victories marked the decline of the Nonpartisan League and Republican senator William Langer, a former league official.
In 1950, running on his six-year record as governor, Aandahl won a seat in the United States House of Representatives. His victory enabled him to challenge incumbent William Langer in the June 1952 Republican primary for the United States senatorial nomination. While the ROC had taken power away from the Nonpartisan League, Langer himself seemed invincible. Appointed to the influential House Appropriations Committee, Aandahl was at first reluctant to run for the Senate. When drafted by the ROC executive board, however, he agreed to challenge Langer. Aandahl proved a surprisingly weak candidate and lost decisively (107, 905 to 78, 359).
Dwight D. Eisenhower's victory in 1952 and the support of Milton R. Young (whom Aandahl, when governor, had appointed to the United States Senate) led to Aandahl's appointment as assistant secretary of the interior for water and power development in 1953. He held that post until the end of the Eisenhower administration. Aandahl now supervised the Bureau of Reclamation as well as the Bonneville, Southwestern, and Southeastern power administrations, which were the marketing agencies for the sale of surplus power generated at federal dams. By 1957 this office enjoyed a $10 million appropriation, and Aandahl claimed it had reduced the cost of converting salt water to sixty cents a thousand gallons.
At the end of the Eisenhower administration, Aandahl returned to his farm near Litchville. He died in Fargo, North Dakota.
Achievements
During Aandahl's work as a Governor, conservation programs were promoted and the state's natural resources were protected, North Dakota benefited from wartime prosperity and adequate rainfall. He was also one of the first officials to see the possibilities of desalting and using seawater, utilizing the Office of Saline Water for this purpose.
Politics
Aandahl was a leading member of the Republican Organizing Committee (ROC). The ROC was created to unite all Republicans opposed to William Langer and the Nonpartisan League.
Conservative in outlook, Aandahl consistently voted against legislation favoring one group or segment of the population over another. He thus opposed most Nonpartisan league-sponsored measures to ease the plight of farm families. He argued that he had entered the legislature "with no thought of revolutionizing the state government or immediately curing all the ills that confronted the people. "
Aandahl concerned himself with agricultural matters, implementing federal farm legislation, improving relations between farmers and businessmen, and seeking new ways to finance public education. Allying himself with Milton R. Young, the individual most responsible for the political success of the ROC, Aandahl led the fight for a bill for more-equitable distribution of education funds among school districts, many of which had assessed valuations so low that it was impossible to maintain schools at minimum standards. He also secured an initial appropriation of more than $4 million to support the state equalization fund.
While Aandahl was governor, following his conservative bent, Aandahl insisted upon legislative restraint, vetoing some appropriations endorsed by ROC legislators. His approach, he explained, was "to bring efficiency into government in caring for the common welfare, to use government so that free enterprise can thrive, and to make the advantages of free enterprise available to all of the people. "
He had been an enthusiastic supporter of Senator Robert A. Taft in Taft's bid for the 1952 Republican presidential nomination.
As a congressman Aandahl had voted to cut appropriations to the Tennessee Valley Authority and favored state control of offshore oil drilling.
Aandahl advocated granting private companies a larger role in distributing power from government-built projects.
Aandahl was also a strong opponent of the "preference clause" in government power contracts; the clause favored municipalities, public corporations or agencies, and rural electric cooperatives in purchasing power from federal installations. In the Department of the Interior he had an opportunity to press his views, but in 1955 an opinion by Attorney General Herbert Brownell Jr. , suggested that the government was obliged to uphold the preference clause.
Interests
Politicians
Robert A. Taft
Connections
On June 28, 1926, Aandahl married a fellow teacher, Luella Brekke; they had three children.
