Louisiana’s economy began to diversify significantly in the late 1800s with the emergence of a large timber industry, which continued as a major part of the state’s economy into the 21st century. Extensive lumbering attracted large corporations to Louisiana for three decades following 1890, and the discovery of oil and gas reserves helped to increase industrial development. The conservative political leadership of the state refused to tax the extractive industries heavily, however, and the controversy that ensued helped propel the rise of the left-wing demagogue Huey Long, who was elected governor and then senator beginning in the late 1920s. Through a ruthless political machine that he tightly controlled, Long dominated virtually every public decision made at the state level until his assassination in 1935.

With the support of the rural areas and the emerging working class, Long’s administration raised welfare benefits and educational services and built many new bridges, roads, and hospitals. Long’s political allies and his brother, Earl K. Long (elected governor in 1948 and 1956), perpetuated his liberal spending policies, and his legacy of public benefits financed by increased taxation has continued to some extent to the present day.

During and after World War II, Louisiana experienced significant new economic development, which was heavily concentrated in the petrochemical industry and increasingly concerned with offshore oil and natural gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. The growth of the petrochemical industry raised the overall prosperity of the state after 1940 and contributed heavily to a significant increase in personal income among state residents. In the 1930s and ’40s, African Americans in Louisiana, led by a well-educated middle-class group of New Orleaners, began to challenge the entrenched system of segregation, mainly by arguing against discrimination in the courts. Black Louisianans rose up against segregation more forcefully in the 1960s as part of the nationwide civil rights movement.

(Read Charles Blow’s Britannica essay on Louisiana & the Juneteenth holiday.)

Louisiana’s politics, although more open since the 1960s, have hardly lost their colourful, controversial character. The Republican Party has become more competitive in state politics, as evidenced by the election of Republican governors and members of Congress and the state legislature. One Republican, David Duke—an avowed white supremacist and former head of the KKK—was elected to a term (1989–93) in the Louisiana House of Representatives and has run for other state and federal offices. Edwin W. Edwards, a flamboyant Democrat who was elected governor four times between 1972 and 1992, enacted liberal policies but was often accused of public corruption; although acquitted of charges in the 1980s, he was convicted in 2000 of racketeering, fraud, and extortion.

Since the 1970s Louisiana’s economy has often sputtered, a reflection of its overdependence on the oil industry, which has tended to tie the state to boom-and-bust cycles. The state also failed to diversify into other industrial activities as fast as some other Southern states, and its service sector has lacked the dynamism of various neighbouring states on the Gulf Coast. The damage and devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005 severely affected the state’s economy and infrastructure—notably in southern Louisiana—although oil and gas extraction did rebound relatively quickly. After the disaster, the state began to rebuild and repair the affected areas with support from the federal government and a plethora of local and national organizations. Louisiana also introduced incentives to revitalize tourism, notably in the New Orleans area.

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In April 2010 calamity again befell the state when a deepwater oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, about 50 miles (80 km) southeast of the Louisiana coast, exploded, burned, and then collapsed, creating a rapidly spreading oil spill. The spill encroached upon the shores of Louisiana and other Gulf states and put into jeopardy wildlife and the region’s large fishing industry.