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109 [i] (2015)

handle is hein.ssl/sstn0271 and id is 1 raw text is: 









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                          HOUSE   JOINT  RESOLUTION NO. 2

                               By Representative Halford

       A RESOLUTION to   honor the legacy of the late Senator Mildred Jolly Lashlee, the first
female to win regular election to the Tennessee State Senate.

       WHEREAS,   this General Assembly wishes to honor the enduring legacy of one of this
state's finest public servants, the late Senator Mildred Louella Jolly Lashlee of Carroll County;
and

       WHEREAS,   a member  of a distinguished political family with deep roots, Mildred Jolly
Lashlee became  the first woman elected in a regular general election to the Tennessee Senate
in November 1944; and

       WHEREAS,   she  had been  representing the 26th Senate District since July of 1944,
when  she was appointed to fill the remainder of her late husband's first term in the Senate,
Senator John Wyly Lashlee having passed away on July 9, 1944; and

       WHEREAS, she then qualified   for the seat without opposition in place of her late
husband  and was  elected to the 74th General Assembly to ably represent the citizens of
Benton, Decatur, Hardeman, Hardin, and McNairy counties, which comprised the 26th Senate
District; and

       WHEREAS,   Mildred Jolly Lashlee's husband was a first cousin of the late Governor
Frank Clement; and  his father, O.P. Lashlee; grandfather; great-great-uncle; and numerous
other ancestors served in elected county and state offices; and

       WHEREAS, Mrs. Lashlee also gave birth to another generation of   Lashlee  public
servants; her elder son, John W. Lashlee II, served as a Metro Nashville Councilman and
Davidson County Criminal Court Clerk, and her younger son, Frank Priestley Lashlee, served
eighteen years combined  in the Senate and  House  of Representatives of the Tennessee
General Assembly; and

       WHEREAS,   serving in the Senate from 1945 to 1947, Senator Mildred Jolly Lashlee
helped lead Tennessee from war  back to peace, and she was the first woman in the state's
history to serve on the Senate Finance Committee; and

       WHEREAS,   born on April 24, 1906, in Carroll County, Tennessee, Senator Mildred Jolly
Lashlee was the daughter of Sheriff John Frank Jolly and Lydia Warbritton Jolly; after attending
Columbia College of Dramatic Arts and the Chicago Conservatory of Music, she taught music
and dramatic arts at the high school level in Bruceton and Camden; and

       WHEREAS,   after marrying John Wyly Lashlee on December 28, 1925, she helped her
husband with the family's livestock and farming operations and ferry service on the Tennessee
River; and

      WHEREAS, active   in her community, Senator Lashlee served as Chair of the American
Cancer Society county fundraising organization and was a faithful member of the Methodist
Church; and

       WHEREAS,   Senator Mildred Jolly Lashlee served as Governor Frank Clement's oratory
and grammar  coach  for his address to the 1956 Democratic National Convention; she was
active in politics, in addition to her legislative service, and was a delegate to the Democratic
National Convention in 1960; and

       WHEREAS,   after she completed her tenure in the Tennessee Senate, she served as
Chief Personnel Interviewer for the Tennessee Department of Employment Security until her
passing in 1966; and

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