Lindy Boggs - Definition and Overview

Corinne Claiborne Boggs

Corinne Claiborne "Lindy" Boggs (born Corinee Morrison Claiborne in 1916) is a United States political figure, a member of the United States House of Representatives. She was the wife of House Majority Leader T. Hale Boggs Sr. (whose seat she originally won in a special election after his death), in addition to being the mother of Cokie Roberts (a television news commentator) and Thomas H. "Tommy" Boggs Jr. (a prominent lobbyist).

Corinne Boggs was born in Brunswick Plantation, Louisiana. She attended college at Tulane University in New Orleans.

She first took office after the presumed death of her husband from a plane crash. The first bill that the House passed in 1973, House Resolution 1, officially recognized Hale Boggs' death, opening the door for a special election, which she won, running as a Democrat. She was reelected to the next eight Congresses, retiring in 1991 after 18 years of service in the House.

In 1997, President Bill Clinton appointed her official U.S. ambassador to the Vatican, a position she held until 2001.

Further reading

• Boggs, Lindy, with Katherine Hatch. Washington Through a Purple Veil: Memoirs of a Southern Woman. New York: Harcourt Brace and Co., 1994
• Ferrell, Thomas H., and Judith Haydel. “Hale and Lindy Boggs: Louisiana’s National Democrats.” Louisiana History 35 (Fall 1994): 389-402.

External links

• Biographical Dictionary of the U.S. Congress entry (http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=B000592)