Francis H. Case

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Francis Higbee Case (December 9, 1896 - June 23, 1962) was an American journalist and politician who served for 25 years as a member of the United States Congress from South Dakota. He was a Republican.

Case was born in Everly, Iowa. He moved with his parents to Sturgis, South Dakota at the age of 13. After graduating from the public schools he attended Dakota Wesleyan University and Northwestern University graduating in 1920. Meanwhile, during and shortly after World War I he served in the United States Marine Corps and United States Army.

Immediately after finishing college he began a 15-year career as a newspaper editor. Until 1922 he was the assistant editor of the Epworth Herald in Chicago. From 1922 to 1925 he was the telegraph writer and editorial writer for the Daily Journal in Rapid City, South Dakota. From 1925 to 1931 he was the editor and publisher of the Hot Springs Star in Hot Springs, South Dakota. Finally from 1931 until he entered congress he was the editor and publisher of the Custer Chronicle in Custer, South Dakota.

Case entered politics in 1934 when he ran for a seat in the United States House of Representatives but lost. In 1936, however, he was elected to the US House and served in it for seven terms. Before the United States entered World War II he was a moderate supporter of isolationism. Case left the House in 1951 when he became a senator.

Case decided to run for the Senate in the 1950 election, and defeated the incumbent John Chandler Gurney in the Republican primary. In the general election he easily defeated Democrat John A. Engel receiving 63% of the vote. In his first term in the Senate he served as chairman of the United States Senate Committee on the District of Columbia from 1953 to 1955, and was a supporter of greater self-rule in the district. In 1954 he served on a committee to investigate sensuring Senator Joseph McCarthy. Case was reelected to the Senate in 1956 in a very close race against Democrat Kenneth Holum receiving 50.8% of the vote.

Case served in the Senate from 1951 until his death. He died of an illness at the naval hospital in Bethesda, Maryland where many ailing politicians were treated. His death occurred several months before the expiration of his second term in the Senate.

Case was known as a moderate senator whose main goals were to expand America's road and waterway infrastructure, particularly in South Dakota. Lake Francis Case, along the Missouri River, is named after him.