A man named Sam

Sam Rayburn, the 43rd Speaker of the United States House of Representatives

This is a story about a man named Sam.

He was known for his integrity. Early in his career, a wealthy businessman delivered a beautiful horse to his farm seeking favor. No one was looking, and no one would have ever known had he kept it. He sent the horse back. He was a man who could not be bought.

Later in his life, a very large group of his colleagues, made up of both Democrats and Republicans threw money in a hat to buy the man many called “Mr. Sam” a new Cadillac. They were concerned that he didn’t have a car of his own in Washington, DC. He didn’t accept it. Firstly, he wasn’t a taker, and secondly, his integrity wouldn’t allow him to accept a gift that made him appear beholden or kept.

We know Sam wasn’t a saint because he was a politician from Texas. He was a congressman first elected in 1912. His national service began the year that Titanic sank. He was a member for the congressional investigations. The world was moving inexorably towards catastrophe — a global industrialized war, which would be called the Great War — finishing off the frivolous excess of the Edwardian age and killing 40 million people, among them close to 117,000 Americans.

He died with his boots on. He was still serving in 1961, the year that Alan Shepard became the first American to take the first steps toward the moon.

He was a consequential man.

He was a builder and a dreamer.

America celebrated its 150th birthday in 1926. One hundred years had past since John Adams and Thomas Jefferson died within hours of one another on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of independence.

He wanted to connect the country. In 1926, he led the effort to link the country with paved roads. He was the congressman responsible for the construction of Route 66. Every year of his career was “infrastructure year.” Nearly 40 years later, he would call for the “Frost Belt and the Sun Belt to be connected.” He helped make that happen with a Republican president who shared his vision. Together, they created the Interstate Highway System. It was among the most transformational pieces of legislation in American history. It was called the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956.

Sam had a mentor named “Cactus Jack” and a protégé named Lyndon. He had a friend named Harry from whom he kept a secret.

Harry was a regular in the invitation-only poker game Sam held in his Speaker of the House’s private office. Everyone wanted an invitation to the “Board of Education” meeting. It was the place to be. Being invited meant that you were “in the room where it happens.” It was the place in which deals were done over bourbon and cards. It was the literal back room, and it was a good thing.

Harry showed up for the card game on April 12, 1945, and received an urgent phone call. He returned immediately to the White House, and was met there by First Lady of the United States Eleanor Roosevelt. Mrs. Roosevelt stunned the World War I combat veteran and former US Senator, who had been Vice President for just 83 days. She said, “Harry, the president is dead.”

Harry Truman asked if there was anything he could do for her. She was steady. She answered, “No, Mr. President, is there anything that I can do for you?” Truman described the moment by saying, “I felt like the moon, the stars, and all of the planets had fallen on me.”

Hitler would be dead within weeks, and the war in Europe was nearly finished. Senator Truman had become nationally famous as chairman of the Truman Committee, which rooted out waste and profiteering in the war time economy. He had commanded men in combat, and was incensed by the rampant corruption of the First World War. He vowed that it would not happen on his watch.

He learned about his friend Sam’s secret after he was fully briefed on the “Manhattan Project.” It was the most closely held secret of the war.

President Roosevelt had a willing accomplice in the fight to deceive the American people and Congress about the secret weapon that would end World War II, and begin the age of mankind’s ability to choose Armageddon. President Roosevelt knew Sam Rayburn could be trusted with life and death matters and the nation’s greatest secrets. The Speaker did not disappoint. He found the money. He concealed it — even from his closest friends.

He was both a pragmatist and an idealist. He rejected the Southern Manifesto, which attacked the Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. the Board of Education of Topeka (KS) decision. He advanced civil rights legislation alongside his protégé Lyndon Johnson, whom he helped become Majority Leader of the United States Senate.

The year was 1957, and they went to work. This is a snapshot of what they built — so many landmark bills — alongside a Republican president named Dwight Eisenhower from Abilene, Kansas:

• National Interstate and Defense Highways Act

• National Aeronautics and Space Act that established NASA

• Federal Aviation Act of 1958 that created the FAA

• National Defense Education Act

• Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960

Sam Rayburn’s record of legislative achievements also included passage of the Lend Lease Act and the Marshall Plan. He was singularly responsible for making sure that the America First caucus of fascist appeasers, isolationists and naifs didn’t end the draft in 1940, which would have been catastrophic for the US military on the edge of combat against the gravest threat ever faced by free people.

The man they called “Mr. Sam” was the longest-serving Speaker of the United States House of Representatives in American history. He was a giant and the offices he occupied and served in as Speaker of the House from have become desecrated by the presence of the lowest, tiniest, vainest and dishonest of men. Here is what the Speaker in Name Only (SINO) did when he saw his new name plate affixed to the door of his office:

Photo credit: AP

What a disgrace. The Speaker of the House is an honored title in America. It is a constitutional office created directly by the US Constitution. The Speaker of the House is second in line to the presidency.

The office of Sam Rayburn should be liberated from its desecration. The chance will come soon enough. The hour to begin preparing for the moment has arrived. The dignity of a man named Sam’s office will be restored the instant the name plate is changed. Honor will be restored to the speakership by a man named Hakeem. It’s time to get busy.

In the meantime, the tiniest Speaker In Name Only that the United States of America has ever endured can get busy with his legislative dream list, which apparently is confined to Hunter Biden’s laptop and woke indoctrination. Has anyone seen a Speaker of the House? It has become the invisible office.