University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill William Cato Cramer Sr. (August 4, 1922 – October 18, 2003), was an American attorney and politician, elected in 1954 as a member of the United States House of Representatives from St. Petersburg, Florida.
In Congress, Cramer became a ranking member of the Roads subcommittee of the Committee on Public Works, and influenced national highway policy at a time of major expansion, ensuring that Interstates were kept toll-free.
[7] The migration of such business executives and senior citizens began to change the partisan profile of the Pinellas County area, and other popular destinations, such as Miami on the Atlantic coast.
Having spent $25,000 in a handshaking tour of Pinellas, Hillsborough, Pasco, and Hernando counties, Cramer benefited from the national Eisenhower-Nixon ticket but lost by 0.7 percent.
[10] Cramer found that the $40,000 he spent in 1954 was insufficient for advertising in the still new medium of television, but the state party had contributed several thousand dollars to his campaign.
[11] U.S. Representative Robert L. F. Sikes of Crestview depicted his fellow Democrat Courtney Campbell as "hard-working, dedicated, and capable" but ineffective in public speaking.
In 1957, Cramer joined four other southern Republican House colleagues, including Bruce Alger of Texas and Joel T. Broyhill of Virginia, in seeking a conference with President Eisenhower to discuss the Little Rock Integration Crisis.
Using his influence on a federal project in the state, Cramer secured funding for the additional mileage to provide a link between Tampa Bay and Miami via Interstate 75.
Trying to build up recognition and support, Kirk appealed to Cramer to address meetings held during the delegate and national committeeman races, and thus became acquainted with Republican party activists.
"[28] In April 1970 the Senate rejected Judge G. Harrold Carswell of Tallahassee as Nixon's second consecutive conservative nominee to the United States Supreme Court.
[34] Carswell secured endorsements from nationally known actors John Wayne and Gene Autry, and retained Richard Viguerie, the direct mail specialist from Falls Church, Virginia, to raise funds.
His former district assistant Charles William "Bill" Young of St. Petersburg, then the Florida Senate minority leader, ran to succeed Cramer and won.
In the primary campaign, Cramer stressed his amendment to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to prohibit forced busing to achieve racial balance in public schools.
"[38] A reporter from the Miami Herald compared Carswell's speeches to "legal opinions" aimed more at Senators Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts and Birch Bayh of Indiana, who had worked against his confirmation, than to Florida Republican primary voters.
[39] At a time of cultural change and social unrest, Cramer went beyond the busing issue in his speeches to attack "cop killers, bombers, burners, and racial revolutionaries who would destroy America.
A Pennsylvania native and businessman, Eckerd had relocated to Florida after World War II where he operated and expanded a large chain of drugstores.
Unlike the Republicans, Democratic State Senators Lawton Chiles of Lakeland and Reubin Askew of Pensacola, had healed philosophical division within their own ranks.
Kirk ridiculed his opponent Askew as "a momma's boy who wouldn't have the courage to stand up under the fire of the legislators" and a "nice sweet-looking fellow chosen by liberals ... to front for them.
[55] The Tallahassee Democrat forecast correctly that Chiles's "weary feet and comfortable hiking boots" would carry the 40-year-old "slow-country country lawyer" with "back-country common sense and methodical urbane political savvy" to victory over his opponent Bill Cramer.
But the press was enamored with the walk ... Every time he was asked a question about where he stood, he would quote somebody that he met on the campaign trail to state what he was to do when he got to the Senate consistent with what that constituent had said.
Cramer received little credit from environmentalists, although he had drafted the Water Pollution Control Act of 1956 and had sponsored legislation to protect alligators, stop beach erosion, dredge harbors, and remove oil spills.
[63] The New York Times observed that Chiles and Askew "convey amiable good ol' boy qualities with moderate-to-liberal aspirations that do not strike fear into the hearts of conservatives.
"[66] During the late 1960s, a period of protests against the Vietnam War and other social unrest, Cramer had introduced an anti-riot measure as an addition to the Civil Rights Act of 1968.
[69] Nixon claimed that more Republicans were needed in Congress to bring an "honorable end" to the Vietnam War, to maintain America's international presence, and to halt "permissiveness, pornography, and busing."
"[71] Making the first presidential appearance in Tallahassee since William McKinley, Nixon plugged "neighborhood schools" and renounced busing for the "sole purpose of achieving racial balance" as contrary to law and "quality education.
[73] The GOP was weakened when partisans of former governor George C. Wallace of Alabama, the 1968 American Independent Party nominee, endorsed Askew and Chiles.
Representatives Albert W. Watson, a Strom Thurmond ally seeking the governorship of South Carolina; and George Herbert Walker Bush, running a second time from Texas for the U.S. Senate but losing to Lloyd M. Bentsen.
They gained extensive support from working-class whites, blacks (who were voting in higher numbers), Jews (including retirees from the North), Cuban Americans, urban residents, and rural voters.
L. E. "Tommy" Thomas, an automobile dealer from Panama City who was supported by Cramer, gained the Florida state Republican chairmanship, defeating the Gurney-endorsed Duke Crittenden of Orlando.
In 1973, he and Matthews served as unpaid advisers to House Republican Leader Gerald R. Ford, Jr. of Michigan for confirmation as vice president following the resignation of Spiro T. Agnew from the Nixon administration.