The owner of a successful insurance agency in Lewiston, Longley got his first opportunity in statewide politics when then-Governor Kenneth M. Curtis asked him to lead a state government commission called The Maine Management and Cost Survey Commission, which was intended to make government more efficient, and cut costs.

[1] His work at the commission gave him a prominent statewide profile, something he decided to try to turn into an electoral mandate when Governor Curtis retired in 1974.

Longley had been a lifelong Democrat, but due to earning a maverick reputation acting in a non-partisan role on the cost-cutting commission and because he inadvertently missed the filing deadline for party candidates in the 1974 Maine gubernatorial election, he ran as an independent.

[1] Some Maine observers believed he knew he would be unable to beat both former Edmund Muskie adviser George J. Mitchell and state Senator Joseph E. Brennan in a Democratic primary, causing him not to file with the party.

During his term as governor, Longley opposed legal efforts by the Penobscot and Passamaquoddy tribes to seek recovery of land.