Senator George William Norris

George William Norris served as a Senator from Nebraska in the United States Congress from 1903 to 1943. A member of the Independent Party, George William Norris contributed to the legislative process during 10 terms in office.

George William Norris’s service in Congress occurred during a significant period in American history. As a member of the Senate, George William Norris participated in the democratic process and represented the interests of constituents.

George William Norris (July 11, 1861 – September 2, 1944) was an American politician from Nebraska. He served five terms in the United States House of Representatives as a Republican, from 1903 to 1913, and five terms in the United States Senate, from 1913 to 1943. He served four Senate terms as a Republican and his final term as an Independent. Norris was defeated for re-election in 1942. George W. Norris was a leader of progressive and liberal causes in Congress. He is best known as the man behind the creation of the Tennessee Valley Authority in 1933. Still in operation today, the Tennessee Valley Authority brought electricity to poor rural areas and constructed dams for flood control in the American Southeast. Norris was also the father of Nebraska’s unicameral legislature—the only one-house legislature in the United States—and the author of the Twentieth Amendment. He was one of only six senators to vote against U.S. entry into World War I. Norris was known for his populist and pro-union ideology, his frequent defiance of the Republican Party, his non-interventionist foreign policy, and his intense crusades against what he characterized as “wrong and evil”. President Franklin D. Roosevelt called him “the very perfect, gentle knight of American progressive ideals”, and this has been the theme of all his biographers. He is one of eight senators profiled in President John F. Kennedy’s Profiles in Courage. A 1957 advisory panel of 160 scholars recommended Norris as the top choice for the five best senators in U.S. history.