Dudley A. Guglielmo

Dudley Anthony Guglielmo, Sr. (April 21, 1909 – July 30, 2005), was the Louisiana insurance commissioner from 1964 to 1972. He served two terms until he was denied renomination in the 1971 Democratic primary by Sherman A. Bernard, a house mover from Westwego in Jefferson Parish. Bernard managed to win the position on the premise that Louisiana residents were paying too high in insurance premiums and that Guglielmo had presumably did little to stop the rate increases.

Guglielmo, who was of Italian ethnicity, went to work in 1930 for the administration of Governor Huey Pierce Long, Jr.. He held the position of administrator of personnel and finance until 1940, when Sam Houston Jones succeeded Earl Kemp Long as governor. Thereafter, he served in numerous state appointed posts.

Guglielmo succeeded Rufus D. Hayes as insurance commissioner in 1964. Hayes did not seek a second elected term in the position. Among the losing candidates were State Representative Jack M. Dyer of Baton Rouge and state senator Speedy O. Long of La Salle Parish, the choice of John McKeithen, the successful gubernatorial candidate that year. Speedy Long went on to serve in the United States House of Representatives. The Long-Guglielmo rivalry reflected the split in the Long ranks which had surfaced in the first primary held in December 1963. Guglielmo carried the backing of defeated gubernatorial candidates Shelby M. Jackson, Robert F. Kennon, Claude Kirkpatrick, and Gillis Long.

Gillis Long weakened his hold as congressman on Louisiana's 8th congressional district, since disbanded, by running for governor and lost his seat in 1964b to his distant cousin, Speedy O. Long, who had run unsuccessfully for insurance commissioner in 1963. Gillis Long appointed G. F. "Coach" Sweetman, who later worked for Guglielmo's company, to the United States Air Force Academy.

In 1967, Guglielmo defeated four opponents, John W. Davidson, Jack Simpson, a young insurance agent and a member of the Natchitoches Parish Police Jury; Raymond C. Wingate, and the conservative State Senator W. Spencer Myrick of Oak Grove in West Carroll Parish in northeastern Louisiana, to secure reelection as insurance commissioner. In Guglielmo's second term, several insurance companies failed to pay claims in a timely manner and forced the insured to accept lower amounts by with-holding payment until the insured was desperate. Guglielmo worked to require claims be paid more faithfully and also backed the claims of numerous insurance agents against a number of the companies. His failure to clarify and advertise these actions may have cost him a third term.

In 1971, Guglielmo faced the combined competition of once again John W. Davidson as well as Jerry Galliano and Sherman Bernard. Guglielmo was defeated in a runoff election by Bernard, who subsequently went to prison for extortion in connection with his insurance commissioner duties. Guglielmo subsequently ran an agency which serviced insurance companies. He hired Coach Sweetman as an investigator, who provided behind-the-scenes detailed records.

In 2004, Guglielmo was inducted into the Louisiana Political Museum and Hall of Fame in the Long's native Winnfield, the seat of Winn Parish. "I'm just very honored to even be here", said Guglielmo, a 42-year state employee. "I had no idea they had such a place. This goes back to Huey P. Long".

Guglielmo described Huey Long as "the best campaigner I ever saw. He would get out in those trucks with the horns and get his message to people. Today, politics has changed. They do it on TV".

Guglielmo lived in Baton Rouge. At the time of his death, he was a widower and was survived by two sons, including Dudley A. Guglielmo, Jr. (born 1943), and a daughter.