George Smith Houston was a governor of Alabama and United States senator.
Background
Houston was born in 1811 in Franklin, Tennessee. Houston was born in Williamson County, Tenn. in 1811, the son of David Houston, a farmer, and his wife, Hannah Pugh Reagan. Houston's father's family was one of many which left Ireland in the eighteenth-century migration, his paternal grandparents having come to North Carolina about 1750 from County Tyrone. His mother was of Welsh ancestry. In 1821 David and Hannah Houston moved to Lauderdale County, Ala.
Education
He read law and was admitted to the bar in 1831.
Career
Admission to the bar led him directly into a political career, for he was quickly recognized as one of the most effective stump speakers in the state. In 1832 he represented his county in the state legislature and he held the office of district solicitor repeatedly during the next ten years. Elected to Congress, he took his seat in 1841, and, save for the years 1849-51, served there until the secession of Alabama. Houston was opposed to secession, and during the ten years preceding the Civil War worked without ceasing to prevent the destruction of the Union.
In 1850 he was the Unionist candidate for Congress, on a platform denying the constitutional right of secession, and was elected. He supported Douglas in 1860 and served as a member of the Committee of Thirty-three. When Alabama seceded, however, he bowed to the will of his state and surrendered his seat in Congress. He was the author of the statement which the Alabama delegation presented to the speaker of the House at the time of its withdrawal from membership in that body. Although he refused to serve in the Confederate army, he also refused to take the oath of allegiance to the government of the United States. This independence did not alienate the people of Alabama from him, for in 1865 he was elected to represent the state in the United States Senate, though he was not permitted to take his seat.
In 1874 Houston became governor of Alabama, the first Democrat to be chosen for that office after the Civil War. The state was bankrupt and the people were burdened with debt and discouraged. With shrewd business sense and untiring energy the Governor set to work to bring order out of chaos. He adopted a rigid program of retrenchment and reform. Offices were abolished, state employees were discharged, and salaries and appropriations for state departments were drastically reduced. It was the Governor who recommended the establishment of a state debt commission and became the most influential member of that commission after it was organized.
In 1878 he resigned his executive position to take the seat in the United States Senate to which he had been elected by the state legislature. He died in office one year later.
Achievements
Connections
Houston was married in 1835 to Mary Beatty and in 1861 to Ellen Irvine. He was the father of ten children.