No one was more instrumental in promoting state birds than Katherine B. Tippets. In 1932, she suggested the ruby-crowned kinglet as a good candidate for Connecticut. But the Audubon Society backed the grosbeak and song sparrow.
In 1933, a Miss Nichols of Fairfield had a bill introduced to name the rose-breasted grosbeak the official bird. But the bill didn’t pass. In 1935, Miss Nichols tried her luck with the song sparrow. It, too, failed.
In 1940, Life magazine printed paintings of all the state birds by famous ornithologist and artist Roger Tory Peterson. Connecticut and neighboring Massachusetts were the only states not represented. (Alaska and Hawaii were not states yet.)
The next bird to take a shot at political office was the robin. It was championed by Dr. William L. Higgins of South Coventry. Higgins said,
“I feel that a state bird should have three attributes-he should be frequently seen, he should have a beautiful plumage, he should have a sweet song. There is no bird that has all these fully, but in my opinion the robin has. It is seen in parks, on your lawns and is a bird children see frequently and appreciate. The American Robin is seen frequently and he is here in these parts of the state all the year around. In winter he stays in under brush. In my town I can find a robin anytime. As far as plumage he has a color his own and he sings frequently morning and evening.”
It appears that Higgins may have submitted a bill to adopt the robin in 1941. He was certainly campaigning for it in 1943. The May-June 1943 issue of Bird-Lore carried the following letter in support of the robin:
“Prized for its fine and varied songs, its friendliness toward man, its value as an insect destroyer, it is well-known to a host of people who never recognize a grosbeak or kinglet. When the first settlers reached the rugged shores of Connecticut and Massachusetts the found the robin a friendly bird and one they quickly compared to the English robin redbreast. Hence they found themselves less lonely in a strange new world many days’ sail from home. Ever since then it has been safe to say that no where in all America is the robin more of a favorite bird than in New England.”
The robin was finally adopted on October 1, 1943.
The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism - 
