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"The Senate and the galleries have just witnessed a demonstration. Egotism, arrogance and ignorance are seldom displayed in the Senate of the United States. They require a measure of talent possessed only by the Senator from Louisiana. . . . Mr. President, it ill becomes a Member of this body to attempt to bulldoze his fellow Senators. . . . "I am perfectly content that General Johnson and the Senator from Louisiana may have their fight out in any form they choose. I think it would be rather in good taste ... if they should use the good old- fashioned way of settling personal controversies, rather than bringing them into the Senate. ... It is regrettable that this should be the forum for the display of such disposition as the Senator from Louisiana has exemplified in this body today. I do not know what his end will be. ... Has he no power to look into the future, except with the hope of rousing hatred, animosity and wants that he knows cannot be supplied? "Month after month the Senator from Louisiana has disgusted this body with repeated attacks upon men who are superior to him . . . now it is about time that the manhood in the Senate should assert itself. ... I have spoken earnestly, and I realize that there are those who are listening to me who will say, 'Why pay attention to the ravings of one who anywhere else than in the Senate would be called a madman?' "
When he had finished his address, Senator Robinson's fellow-members went climbing over their desks to pump his hand in congratulation for a deed many of them had long lacked the nerve to do. But the price to be paid for trading parliamentary mud with the "Kingfish" was soon exacted. Returning to the fray, the button-nosed Louisianian accused Senator Robinson of double-crossing him on patronage, asserted that President Roosevelt had told him [Long] to keep Senator Robinson "in trouble," revealed that Senator Robinson had made his brother-in-law Federal Rice Administrator in Louisiana. "Threatening to campaign against Senator Robinson's re-election in 1936, Huey Long declared: "I am going to Arkansas next year and I am going to ask for some of that pie." The "Kingfish" also raked from the past an incident which the Senator from Arkansas would much rather have forgotten: his assault on a golfer at the Chevy Chase (Md.) Club in 1924. "The Senator suggested that General Johnson and I have a fist fight," drawled the "Kingfish." "That is bad advice from the Senator."
Still a glutton for parliamentary punishment, Senator Robinson told the Senate next afternoon: "I do not know whether my colleagues care whether I come back or not. But I am prepared to say now that if I have to continue to look at the Senator from Louisiana every day, if I have to hear him speak three or four times a day ... I think it would be a Godsend to me if in some way I got out of the Senate!"
"I did not know whether I would run for governor of Louisiana or whether I would run for the Senate." grinned the "Kingfish." "But I now announce that I will run for re-election to the Senate."
"God save the Senate!" cried Senator Robinson.