Representative Maston Emmett O’Neal

Maston Emmett O’Neal Jr. (July 19, 1907 – January 9, 1990) was a Democratic U.S. Representative from Georgia who served in the United States Congress from 1965 to 1971. Born in Bainbridge, Decatur County, Georgia, he spent his early years in that community and attended the local public schools. He went on to pursue preparatory training at Marion Military Institute in Marion, Alabama, laying the foundation for his later academic and professional pursuits.

O’Neal continued his education at Davidson College in Davidson, North Carolina, from which he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in 1927. Immediately after college, he entered the field of education, serving as principal of Shellman High School in Shellman, Georgia, from 1927 to 1928. He then turned to the study of law, attending the Lamar School of Law at Emory University in Atlanta. After completing his legal studies, he was admitted to the bar of the Albany Judicial Circuit on January 16, 1930, and began the practice of law in southwest Georgia.

O’Neal’s legal career advanced steadily over the following decade, culminating in his election as solicitor general of the Albany Judicial Circuit. He assumed that office on January 1, 1941, and served continuously until May 1, 1964. During this period he was reelected five times to four-year terms without opposition, a record that included one term won and held in absentia while he was away on active military duty. As solicitor general, he became a prominent figure in Georgia’s prosecutorial community, and he was chosen as the first president of the Solicitors General Association of Georgia. He also served as a director of the National Association of County and Prosecuting Attorneys, extending his influence and professional leadership to the national level.

During World War II, O’Neal took leave from his civilian responsibilities to serve in the United States Naval Reserve. From 1944 to 1946 he was on active duty as a lieutenant in the amphibious forces in the Pacific Theater. His wartime service coincided with some of the most intense operations in the Pacific, and he returned to Georgia after the war to resume his duties as solicitor general, continuing in that role for nearly two more decades.

O’Neal entered national politics in the mid-1960s. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives as a Democrat from Georgia to the Eighty-ninth, Ninetieth, and Ninety-first Congresses, serving from January 3, 1965, to January 3, 1971. His three terms in office coincided with a significant period in American history marked by the civil rights movement, the Great Society legislative agenda, and the Vietnam War. As a member of the House of Representatives, Maston Emmett O’Neal participated in the democratic process, contributed to the legislative work of Congress, and represented the interests of his Georgia constituents during these turbulent years. He chose not to be a candidate for reelection in 1970 to the Ninety-second Congress, thereby concluding his congressional service at the end of his third term.

After leaving Congress, O’Neal returned to private life in his hometown of Bainbridge. He remained a resident there for the rest of his life, maintaining his longstanding ties to the community where he had been born and first educated. Maston Emmett O’Neal Jr. died in Bainbridge, Georgia, on January 9, 1990, closing a career that spanned education, law, military service, state-level prosecution, and three terms in the United States House of Representatives.