Benjamin Pavy

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Benjamin Henry Pavy (October 16, 1874 -- April 1943) was a district judge in St. Landry and Evangeline parishes who was gerrymandered out of office through the intervention of his arch political rival, the powerful Huey Pierce Long, Jr. Moreover. Pavy's son-in-law, Dr. Carl Austin Weiss, was the alleged assassin of Long though the family has long disputed that assertion.

Pavy (pronounced PAH VEE) was born in Coulee Croche in St. Landry Parish to Alfred Henry Pavy (died 1908) and the former Laperle Guidry. He was educated in the schools of Opelousas, the seat of St. Landry Parish. He had a brother, Felix Octave Pavy, Sr. (died 1962), an Opelousas physician who was also a member of the St. Landry Parish Police Jury (county commission in most states) and the Louisiana House of Representatives. On November 4, 1896, Pavy wed the former Ida Veazie (died 1941) of Opelousas. Their children included three sons, Alfred Veazie Pavy and the twins Albert L. Pavy and Alfred Dudley Pavy, and four daughters, Louise Yvonne Pavy Weiss Bourgeois (1907-1963), Marie Pavy, Evelyn Pavy, and Ida (pronounced E DA) Catherine Pavy Boudreaux (born 1922).

Pavy was employed at the age of seventeen in the parish clerk of court's office. He worked there again when his father was elected as the St. Landry clerk of court. He began his law practice in Opelousas in 1901, after reading law in the office of his future father-in-law, Edward P. Veazie (died 1916). Pavy was elected as as Democrat to the Sixteenth District judgeship in 1910 -- at the time there were no Republicans competitive in Louisiana -- and served until he was redistricted out of office.

Long repeated an old story that Edward Veazie had a black mistress and allegedly warned Pavy that if Pavy continued to oppose him, he would announce that Pavy's family was tainted with "coffee blood." Long also moved to have Pavy's daughter Marie dismissed from a teaching job. Marie lived for more than a year with her widowed sister Yvonne Weiss before a change in school administration permitted her to return to her teaching duties. Finally, Long succeeded in gerrymandering Pavy from the judgeship. Dr. Weiss, then 28, went to Long's office, allegedly to confront the former governor and U.S. senator regarding reports that Long was saying that Yvonne Weiss was the daughter of a black man. In the historic confrontation, Dr. Weiss and Long were both shot; Weiss was killed instantly by Long's bodyguards. Long died thereafter of internal injuries sustained in the shooting. Questions still abound about the tragic consequences that shook both the Long and Pavy families to their sinews. Judge Pavy was so shaken by the turn of events that his doctor ordered him not to attend his son-in-law's funeral.

Both Judge Pavy and Mrs. Pavy died of cancer. Ida Boudreaux recalls that her father had paid the last bill for her college tuition just days before his death. The Pavys are buried in the St. Landry Catholic Church Cemetery in Opelousas.