On April 24, 1956, Alaskan voters approved both the new constitution and the Alaska-Tennessee Plan to elect two “senators” and one “representative” at the fall general election. The winners were William Egan, a Valdez businessman and early supporter of statehood legislation, and Ernest Gruening as “senators,” and Ralph J. Rivers, a Fairbanks attorney and former mayor, as “representative.” All three were Democrats. Bob Bartlett supported the plan and kept his official seat as Alaska’s territorial delegate, no doubt figuring that statehood was worth the risk of losing his job.
