The Election of Byron Looper and Tommy Burks essays

The Election of Byron Looper and Tommy Burks essays In 1998, an election for state Senate ended up being the worst election that Tennessee had ever witnessed. Throughout the years, this election is the one that everyone will remember for a long time. Going through an election can be very stressful and hard, but nothing could give someone a reason to murder another person, to win an election. In 1998, there were many candidates running for election in October. One of the most popular elections that were going on at this time was the state senate. Two men by the names of Tommy Burks and Byron Looper were both in the race. Byron Looper was forty-seven years old with a wife and two kids. This was the first election he had ever run for, dealing with the state senate. At the age of fifty-eight, Tommy Burks served four terms in the state House of Representatives before being elected to the Senate in 1978 (Thompson 2). He was running for re-election to the Senate in the 1998 election. Senator Burks was respected for his honesty and hard wor k, both in his farming operation and his work in the state legislature. He was a 1963 graduate of Tennessee Technological University and had been honored by the University with awards. Tommy Burks also served as a director of the TTU Agriculture Foundation (Thompson 2). On October 19, 1998 State Senator Tommy Burks was murdered on a road on his farm just east of Monterey, TN., preparing to take a local school children on a field trip to his pumpkin patch (Fleming 1). Thus showing Tennessee how he cared about kids in the community and his love for his occupation. Tommy Burks, a longtime state legislator, was a farmer and was on his way to his barn, traveling along a road near the section of the large farm Where his daughter, Kim Blaylock, lives when he was shot to death. Senator Tommy Burks was found sitting in his Pickup truck on the road to the barn (Fleming 1). News agencies were reporting that Burks was shot twice, one in the chest, the other, i...