“_And this was all the harvest that I reap’d--I came like water and
like wind I go._”
----THE RUBÁIYÁT
A few hours after Huey Long had breathed his last, Dr. Weiss was buried
with requiem services at St. Joseph’s Church, where he and Yvonne had
gone to Mass only three days before. John M. Parker and J. Y. Sanders,
Sr., two former governors prominent among leaders of the political and
personal opposition to the Kingfish regime, attended the funeral, and
were bitterly assailed by Long partisans for doing so. Dr. McKeown, the
anesthetist during the emergency operation performed by Dr. Vidrine, was
one of the pallbearers.
Yvonne’s uncle, Dr. Pavy, a member of the House of Representatives, had
been delegated by the Weiss family to act as their spokesman in meeting
with reporters who had swarmed into Baton Rouge from near and far. It
should be noted that at this time no one had as yet voiced the slightest
doubt about Dr. Weiss having fired the shot that ended Long’s reign.
Only the question of motive was the subject for argument and dispute.
“There was absolutely nothing premeditated about what Carl did,” Dr.
Pavy told newsmen gathered at the little cottage he shared with Judge
Philip Gilbert when in Baton Rouge. “On Sunday, while his parents sat on
the beach of their camp with their baby grandchild, Carl and Yvonne
sported about the water. When he returned home, he bade his wife an
affectionate good-by, as he left about 7 P.M. for a professional call.
He even phoned the Lady of the Lake Sanitarium to make an appointment
for an operation Monday morning.
“He was an earnest lad, and lived for humanity, but he was sorely
distressed about the suppressive form of government he felt existed in
Louisiana. He never talked much about it, and he certainly never
confided to his family or anyone else any plan to kill Long. Our only
explanation for his action is that this suppressive type of rule preyed
on his mind until it unhinged, and he suddenly felt himself a martyr,
giving his life to the people of Louisiana. He must have felt that way,
else how could he have left the wife and baby that he loved above
everything?”
To a question as to whether the gerrymander that would oust his wife’s
father from the honorable office he had held for so many years could
have prompted the decision to shoot Long, Dr. Pavy replied:
“In the first place, none of us would kill anyone over such a matter as
the loss of a public office. It is my understanding that while the bill
aimed at my brother’s judgeship was discussed at the Weiss’s dinner
table Sunday, it was treated lightly rather than otherwise.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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