Ellison DuRant Smith (August 1, 1864 – November 17, 1944) was an American cotton planter, lobbyist, and Democratic Party politician who represented South Carolina in the United States Senate from 1909 until 1944.
Smith was widely known for his virulently racist and segregationist views, his advocacy of white supremacy, and his support for the Southern cotton industry, earning him the nickname “Cotton Ed”.
Early life
Smith was born near Lynchburg, South Carolina, the youngest child of William Hankin Smith and Mary Isabella Smith (née McLeod), at his ancestral home, Tanglewood Plantation (formerly Smith's Grove). Throughout his life, he would reside in Tanglewood. and graduated from Wofford College in 1889.
Smith served in the South Carolina House of Representatives from 1896 to 1900. He was unsuccessful in his bid to become a member of the U.S. House of Representatives in 1900. In 1901, Smith helped organize the Farmer's Protective Association Smith received the nickname "Cotton Ed" after he declared: "Cotton is king and white is supreme."
Election to the U.S. Senate
Smith was elected to the United States Senate in 1908. He was re-elected five times, although from 1920 until 1944, he had four close elections, with three of them leading to run-off elections because he failed to capture a majority. Smith never won more than 61 percent in Democratic Party primaries during that time. During his time in Congress, he had a goal to “keep the Negroes down and the price of cotton up.” He also developed a reputation for having a violent temper while speaking in Congress and would at times stand on his feet and try to get the floor speaker's attention by repeatedly hacking his armchair with a penknife whenever the speaker angered him. Smith was not fond of his fellow Senators and liked to describe the Senate Chamber as "the Cave of the Winds." During this time Smith's policies were "a curious mixture of conservatism and liberalism". He was a loyal supporter of President Woodrow Wilson and his New Freedom agenda especially regarding agriculture supporting the Smith–Lever Act of 1914, Smith–Hughes Act, the Warehouse Act of 1916, Federal Farm Loan Act, and Federal Aid Road Act of 1916. He also supported the Clayton Act, the Federal Trade Commission, the Underwood tariff, and the Adamson Act. He opposed the Keating–Owen Act which prohibited child labor.
Smith, reflecting the xenophobic views of constituents, sponsored numerous bills restricting immigration culminating in the Immigration Act of 1917 that passed over President Wilson's veto.
During the First World War he supported most of the war time actions of President Wilson but prevented attempts by the President to impose price controls on cotton. After the war he supported the League of Nations and the Treaty of Versailles.
In the 1930s, Smith became Chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry and would imperiously summon the fellow Senators on the committee by saying