History ETDs

Publication Date

5-11-1969

Abstract

Between 1930 and 1933 the Republican party in New Mexico was rapidly declining, while the Democrats were assuming leadership of the legislative and executive branches of government. During these years of transition the Democratic leader, Governor Arthur Seligman, and United States Senator Bronson Cutting, the most powerful Republican figure in the state, effected an alliance that allowed governmental power to be shared by the two major parties. In Seligman’s two campaigns for the governorship, he had the support of Senator Cutting’s Progressive Republican faction, although the Senator himself never personally endorsed Seligman’s Democratic ticket. During the tenth legislature of 1931, and the eleventh legislature in 1933, the progressive Republican legislators voted with those Democrats sympathetic to Seligman’s administration. Bronson Cutting’s motives for supporting the Democrat Seligman were political and ethnic. As leader of the Spanish-American people of New Mexico, Cutting was genuinely interested in promoting their welfare; the Republican party having failed to meet Cutting’s demands, he turned to the Democrats. Political considerations also figured in the Cutting-Seligman coalition. Senator Cutting never limited himself to one party; his own re-election to the Senate in 1934 might be as a Republican or a Democrat. The partnership with Governor Seligman enabled Cutting to be available as a candidate from either party.

Level of Degree

Masters

Degree Name

History

Department Name

History

First Committee Member (Chair)

Donald Colgett Cutter

Second Committee Member

Richard Nathaniel Ellis

Third Committee Member

Ferenc Morton Szasz

Language

English

Document Type

Thesis

Download

Included in

History Commons

Share

COinS