Ed Ware

Edwin Oswald "Ed" Ware, III (September 10, 1927 – July 10, 2016) was an American lawyer from Alexandria, Louisiana. From 1967 to 1984, he was the district attorney of the 9th Judicial District Court for his native Rapides Parish in Central Louisiana. He is best remembered for his trademark suspenders and his unsuccessful efforts to block under state law the sale of pornography.^[1]

Background

Ware's grandfather, Edwin O. Ware, Sr., a clergyman originally from Kentucky, was a founder and first president of the Southern Baptist-affiliated Louisiana College in Pineville, Louisiana,^[2] from which Ware obtained his undergraduate degree in 1948. Ware, however, was a Presbyterian^[3] Sunday school teacher.^[1] Ware's father, Edwin, Jr., was born in Alexandria in 1897; his mother, the former Mary Louella Pierce (1902-1992), was from Calcasieu Parish. The couple married in 1922 and lived in Alexandria.^[4]

Ware was the third of five children. His only brother, William Eaton "Bill" Ware (1930-2013) of Haughton in Bossier Parish in northwestern Louisiana, served in the United States Air Force and was stationed in the Pacific Proving Grounds during the nuclear testing on Bikini Island. He later worked for General Motors in Shreveport.^[5] Ware's three sisters, all deceased, were Dorothy Ruth Brown (1924-1966), who died at the age of forty-two in Fort Worth, Texas;^[6] Jewel Ware Dean (1925-2011), an English teacher in Livingston Parish near Baton Rouge,^[7] and Mary Louella Ware Dvorak (1933-2009) of Blanchard in McClain County, Oklahoma.^[8]

After Ware graduated from Bolton High School in Alexandria, he served stateside as an enlisted man from 1945 to 1946 in the United States Navy. He was thereafter a lieutenant commander in the Navy Reserve.^[3]

From 1953 until his death in Rapides General Hospital in Alexandria,^[1] Ware was married the former Barbara Fritchie (born November 1929).^[3] The couple lived in the Alexandria Garden District.

Legal and political life

Ware obtained his legal credentials in 1951 from the Louisiana State University Law Center in Baton Rouge, where he was affiliated with Lambda Chi Alpha.^[3] His law school classmates included other later Alexandria political figures U.S. Representative Gillis William Long of Louisiana's 8th congressional district, since disbanded; 9th Judicial District Judge Guy Humphries, State Representative Lloyd George Teekell,^[9] and Ware's law partner and assistant DA, Gus Voltz, Jr. (c. 1922-2008).^[10] Also in the class were later state Representatives George B. Holstead of Ruston and Risley C. Triche of Napoleonville in Assumption Parish.^[9]

Ware and Voltz established their long-term practice, Voltz and Ware, in downtown Alexandria.^[11] From 1955 to 1957, he was an assistant district attorney for Rapides Parish. He was elected three times as DA in 1966, 1972, and 1978.^[3] Voltz was his first assistant DA during all of those years. In his capacity as DA, Ware was frequently involved in high-profile legal cases. In 1969, he was the defendant in Snyder v. Ware, et al., in which later Alexandria Mayor John K. Snyder sued regarding a criminal defamation charged brought against him.^[12] In the spring of 1977, Ware felt compelled to deny a charge by Mayor Snyder, who was then seeking reelection in his failed campaign against Carroll E. Lanier, that Ware was for all practical purposes "running" the city police department and undercutting the mayor's position.^[13][1]

In 1970, Ware as DA defended the Rapides Parish School Board from a challenge that public schools were still largely segregated despite federal court orders. The suit noted that half of the schools in Wards 1 and 8 were still predominantly African-American. The plaintiffs sought a greater degree of racial integration than then required by federal courts.^[14] The suit continued to be litigated after Ware left the DA's office. In 2006, Judge Dee D. Drell of the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana declared Rapides schools racially unitary and closed the long-term litigation.^[15]

In the early 1970s, during a showing of the film, The Last Picture Show, Ware and his wife, Barbara, walked out of the theater during a nude bathing scene. The DA received many telephone calls and letters from people offended by the film. The theater sued successfully to return the film to the screen. Ware also tried unsuccessfully to stop sexually-explicit magazines, including Playboy, from being sold in Rapides Parish. Ware never wavered in the positions he took. In a 2001 interview, he said, "I think our failure [to stop pornography] is reflected in the life-style of the country today. Community standards have changed since then and none of them for the better."^[1]

In his 1978 race, Ware defeated a challenge waged by his fellow Democrat, Arnold Jack Rosenthal, a lawyer-businessman who was the last-serving of the finance and utilities commissioners for the City of Alexandria and a persistent critic of Mayor Snyder.^[16] Ware did not seek a fourth term in 1984 but returned full-time to Voltz and Ware.

Ware was president of the Louisiana District Attorney's Association from 1974-1975. From 1975 to 1983, he was a board member of the National District Attorneys Association. He also served as chairman of the Louisiana District Attorney's Retirement Board. Ware was a member from 1964 to 1968 of the Rapides Parish Democratic Executive Committee and from 1968 to 1980 of the Louisiana State Democratic Central Committee.^[3] Ware is a former member of the Louisiana Board of Ethics, which acts as the Supervisory Committee for Campaign Finance Disclosure.^[17]

Active in civic affairs too, Ware in 1955 was named the "Outstanding State Vice-President" by the Junior Chamber International. In 1976, the DA was named "Outstanding Lawman" by the Alexandria Exchange Club. In 1979, he received a "Distinguished Service Award" from the National District Attorney's Association. He is a member of the Louisiana Bar Association, the American Legion, and Kiwanis International.^[3]

Ware is interred at Alexandria Memorial Gardens.^[1]

References