Howell Heflin (19 June 1921-29 March 2005) was a Democratic US Senator from Alabama from 3 January 1979 to 3 January 1997, succeeding John Sparkman and preceding Jeff Sessions. Heflin was a conservative Southern Democrat who opposed abortion rights, gun control, gay rights, and free trade, but he did not share many of his fellow Southern Democrats' racial views, as he was a strong supporter of affirmative action and of initiatives to remove the legacy of racism and slavery from the American South. He was the last Alabama Democrat to serve in the US Senate until Doug Jones in 2018.
Biography[]
Howell Thomas Heflin was born in Poulan, Georgia on 19 June 1921, and he was raised in Leighton, Alabama. He was a nephew of the white supremacist US Senator James Thomas Heflin and the great-nephew of US House of Representatives member Robert Stell Heflin. Heflin served in the US Marine Corps during World War II, fighting on Bougainville and Guam. He went on to become a law professor for nearly two decades, and he served as Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court from 1971 to 1977 and in the US Senate from 1979 to 1997. He was a conservative Southern Democrat who opposed abortion rights and gun control, and he also supported public school prayer, supported the Gulf War, and opposed LGBT anti-discrimination laws, cuts in defense spending, and the Family and Medical Leave Act. On economic issues, he was affiliated with his party's populist wing, voting against NAFTA, GATT, and Tort reform, while he strongly supported affirmative action laws. In 1993, he gave a memorable speech before the Senate supporting the African-American Senator for Illinois Carol Moseley Braun's successful effort to deny renewal of a Confederate flag design patent for the United Daughters of the Confederacy, speaking of his pride and love for his Confederate ancestors (including his grandfather, a general), his respect for the UDC, and his conflict with breaking with them over the issue, before arguing that the nation faced a daily struggle with the scars of racism, and declared his support for anti-racist initiatives. He retired in 1997, the last Democratic Senator from Alabama until Doug Jones in 2018, and he died at his longtime home in Tuscumbia in 2005.