Edwin Edwards: Governor of Louisiana

by Leo Honeycutt

Overview

Edwin Edwards: The controversy and the facts
Profiled more times by 60 Minutes than any other governor in history, Edwin Edwards did not run from controversy, he embraced it. The quickest mind in politics, drafted once to run for president, elected governor four times, and friend of nearly every president since John Kennedy, as Louisiana’s fortunes dropped, however, so did those of the Cajun Prince. Author Leo Honeycutt has painstakingly recreated the Edwards years and especially his 2000 trial. Was Edwards guilty of corruption or merely arrogance? Honeycutt clears the air with facts, only to expose what really changed Louisiana and is changing America.

“Leo Honeycutt teaches us more about the most stunningly powerful Louisiana politician of our time. Engaging, well-written, captivating –you won’t put it down.”

—Dr. Wayne Parent, LSU Political Science

“We always knew Edwin would dance with the law but thought he’d outsmart them. Honeycutt tells us we were wrong, after intense research added to the words of an elegant white-haired prisoner.”

—Earl Casey, CNN Atlanta

Product Details

BN ID:	2940011817106
Publisher:	W2G Publishing
Publication date:	10/04/2010
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Sales rank:	713,792
File size:	705 KB

About the Author

My first impressions of Governor Edwin Edwards were contradictions. I didn’t like him but I loved being around him. He stood for so much of what I was against, arrogance, gambling, womanizing, shady dealing, an undercurrent of ruthlessness that seems to define politics at a high level. I know now that in a world of far more needs than solutions, short term politics is a thankless job with few winners. I had to look long term, however, to understand the riddle of Edwin Edwards, back across fifty some odd years of public service.

When former Louisiana Secretary of State, Insurance Commissioner and Senator Jim Brown called me in 2004 to suggest I consider writing Edwin Edwards’ biography, I scoffed, “I really don’t care to.” Then it hit me that I, too, was arrogant and remembered that Governor Edwards usually treated me kindly from the day I met him in 1973. A freshman at Northeast Louisiana University (now University of Louisiana at Monroe), I was assigned to photograph the new governor and his wife, First Lady Elaine Edwards, at the dedication of the Anna Gray Noe Alumni Center. I was astounded how much taller I was than he, yet when he walked into a room, there was no doubt who was in charge. He was funny, too, peeling off jokes one after another. Chief photographer Billy Heckford and I had so much fun we shadowed the couple through that night’s football game, shooting hundreds of photos we would never use.

As a 1970s cub reporter for KNOE Television in Monroe, I usually interviewed the Governor on the run with a CP-16 film camera on my right shoulder and a microphone in my left hand. He answered questions I didn’t ask while I fumbled with framing and audio levels. Then he would turn to aides and associates and say, “This is what we need to do in state government. Leo is the most efficient reporter I know.” The love fest didn’t last long. I personally liked Governor Dave Treen, methodical and lethargic as he was, and I defended his honor when Edwards wisecracked, “Dave Treen is so slow it takes him an hour-and-a-half to watch 60 Minutes.” Treen was a “good man.” He was, however, an overly cautious administrator trampled beneath the sheer volume of state business. Edwin Edwards flew at high speeds above the minutiae, deftly delegating to qualified staffers while maintaining mental control.

But if he was so smart, so br