Ross Alexander Collins (April 25, 1880 – July 14, 1968) was a

U.S. Representative The United States House of Representatives is a chamber of the bicameral United States Congress; it is the lower house, with the U.S. Senate being the upper house. Together, the House and Senate have the authority under Article One of th ...

from

Mississippi Mississippi ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Alabama to the east, the Gulf of Mexico to the south, Louisiana to the s ...

. Born in

Collinsville, Mississippi Collinsville is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Lauderdale County, Mississippi, United States. The population was 1,984 at the 2020 census. Geography Collinsville is located in northwestern Lauderdale County at ...

, Collins attended the public schools of

Meridian, Mississippi Meridian is the List of municipalities in Mississippi, eighth most populous city in the U.S. state of Mississippi, with a population of 35,052 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is the county seat of Lauderdale County, Mississippi, ...

, and Mississippi Agricultural and Mechanical College. He graduated from the

University of Kentucky The University of Kentucky (UK, UKY, or U of K) is a Public University, public Land-grant University, land-grant research university in Lexington, Kentucky, United States. Founded in 1865 by John Bryan Bowman as the Agricultural and Mechanical ...

at Lexington in 1900 and from the law department of the

University of Mississippi The University of Mississippi (Epithet, byname Ole Miss) is a Public university, public research university in University, near Oxford, Mississippi, United States, with a University of Mississippi Medical Center, medical center in Jackson, Miss ...

at Oxford in 1901. He was admitted to the bar in 1901 and commenced practice in

. He served as Mississippi Attorney General from 1912 to 1920. He was an unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Mississippi in 1919. Collins was elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-seventh and to the six succeeding Congresses (March 4, 1921 – January 3, 1935). In 1929, Collins successfully proposed the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

's $1.5 million purchase of Otto Vollbehr's collection of

incunabula An incunable or incunabulum (: incunables or incunabula, respectively) is a book, pamphlet, or broadside (printing), broadside that was printed in the earliest stages of printing in Europe, up to the year 1500. The specific date is essentiall ...

, including one of four remaining perfect vellum copies of the

Gutenberg Bible The Gutenberg Bible, also known as the 42-line Bible, the Mazarin Bible or the B42, was the earliest major book printed in Europe using mass-produced metal movable type. It marked the start of the "Printing Revolution, Gutenberg Revolution" an ...

. He was not a candidate for renomination in 1934, but was an unsuccessful candidate for the Democratic nomination for

United States Senator The United States Senate consists of 100 members, two from each of the 50 U.S. state, states. This list includes all senators serving in the 119th United States Congress. Party affiliation Independent Senators Angus King of Maine and Berni ...

. He was awarded

American Library Association Honorary Membership Honorary Membership conferred by the American Library Association is the Association's highest award. "Honorary membership may be conferred on a living citizen of any country whose contribution to librarianship or a closely related field is so outs ...

in 1938. Collins was elected to the Seventy-fifth, Seventy-sixth, and Seventy-seventh Congresses (January 3, 1937 – January 3, 1943). In the late 1930s he was the chairman of the House Subcommittee on

District A district is a type of administrative division that in some countries is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or county, counties, several municipality, municip ...

Appropriations; during his time in office, he cut spending on local DC funds for welfare and education stating that "my constituents wouldn't stand for spending money on

nigger In the English language, ''nigger'' is a racial slur directed at black people. Starting in the 1990s, references to ''nigger'' have been increasingly replaced by the euphemistic contraction , notably in cases where ''nigger'' is Use–menti ...

s".
Home Rule or House Rule? Congress and the Erosion of Local Governance in the District of Columbia
' by Michael K. Fauntroy,

University Press of America University Press of America (''UPA'') is the former name of an American Academic publishing, academic publishing company based in Lanham, Maryland, which became the parent company of Rowman & Littlefield publishing house, then was later re-intr ...

, 2003 at

Google Books Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical charac ...

, page 94 He was an unsuccessful candidate for election to the

United States Senate The United States Senate is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and ...

in 1941. He was not a candidate for renomination in 1942, but was an unsuccessful candidate for the Democratic nomination for

. He resumed the practice of law. He died in

, July 14, 1968. He was interred in Magnolia Cemetery.

External links

Ross Alexander Collins Collection (MUM00082)
owned by the University of Mississippi.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Collins, Ross A 1880 births 1968 deaths Democratic Party members of the United States House of Representatives from Mississippi Politicians from Meridian, Mississippi Mississippi attorneys general People from Collinsville, Mississippi 20th-century members of the United States House of Representatives