Bob Livingston

Robert Linlithgow Livingston Jr. (born April 30, 1943) is an American lobbyist and politician who served as a U.S. Representative from Louisiana from 1977 to 1999. A Republican, he was chosen as Newt Gingrich's successor as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, a position he declined following revelations of an extramarital affair. He served as a U.S. Representative from Louisiana from 1977 to 1999 and as the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee from 1995 to 1999. During his final years in Congress, Livingston was a strong supporter of Bill Clinton's impeachment. He is currently a Washington, D.C.-based lobbyist. Livingston's memoir, ''The Windmill Chaser: Triumphs and Less in American Politics'', was published in September 2018.

Family

Livingston was born in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He is a descendant of the Livingston family of New York, whose members include Philip, a signer of the United States Declaration of Independence; Chancellor Robert R. Livingston, a co-author of the Declaration and author of the Louisiana Purchase; his younger brother, Edward, Aide de Camp and later Secretary of State to President Andrew Jackson, and who had earlier in his career held the same Congressional seat (La-1) as Bob Livingston. Livingston is a direct descendant of Henry Livingston, who was probably the (then anonymous) author of the poem, ''The Night Before Christmas'',and French Admiral François Joseph Paul de Grasse, who together with General George Washington cornered and defeated British General Cornwallis in the Siege of Yorktown, Virginia, thereby concluding the American Revolutionary War. De Grasse's daughter, Sylvie, married Henry Walter Livingston, ancestors of the Congressman.

Livingston was married in 1965 to the former Bonnie Robichaux (also born 1943), a native of Raceland in Lafourche Parish. Bonnie's grandfather, Alcide Robichaux, served in the Louisiana State Senate, and her uncle, Philip Robichaux, was Lafourche Parish coroner for decades. Livingston's father, a Roman Catholic, and his mother, an Episcopalian, were divorced when Livingston and his sister were quite young. Raised first as Roman Catholic and later as an Episcopalian, he returned to his wife's religion, Roman Catholicism, in later years. The Livingstons have three biological sons, Robert, Richard and David, and an adopted daughter, SuShan a/k/a Susie. They have nine (9) grandchildren. In July 2006, their son Richard died after being electrocuted by a live wire while trimming a tree damaged by Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.

Early career

As an undergraduate at Tulane University,
he was a member of Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity. Graduating from Tulane University Law School in 1968, Livingston joined the law practice of David C. Treen, who would become Louisiana's first Republican congressman and governor since Reconstruction. Treen had been an active Republican in the days when the party barely existed in Louisiana, and this connection allowed Livingston to make valuable contacts in GOP circles. He was a delegate to all Republican conventions between 1976 and 2000. Between 1970 and 1976, Livingston worked for U.S. Attorney for the Louisiana's Eastern District Gerald J. Gallinghouse, Orleans Parish

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