Earle Clements

Earle Chester Clements
United States Senate Majority Whip
In office January 3, 1955 – January 3, 1957
Leader	Lyndon B. Johnson
Preceded by	Leverett Saltonstall (Massachusetts)
Succeeded by	Mike Mansfield (Montana)
U.S. Senator for Kentucky
In office November 27, 1950 – January 3, 1957
Preceded by	Garrett Lee Withers
Succeeded by	Thruston Ballard Morton, Sr.
47th Governor of Kentucky
In office December 9, 1947 – November 27, 1950
Preceded by	Simeon Willis
Succeeded by	Lawrence Wetherby
U.S. Representative for Kentucky's 2nd congressional district
In office January 3, 1945 – December 1947
Preceded by	Beverly M. Vincent
Succeeded by	John A. Whitaker
Kentucky State Senator for Henderson, Union, and Webster counties
In office 1941–1944
Born	October 22, 1896 Morganfield, Union County Kentucky
Died	March 12, 1985 (aged 88) Morganfield, Kentucky
Resting place	Odd Fellows Cemetery No. 37 in Morganfield
Political party	Democrat
Spouse(s)	Sara Blue Clements (married 1927-1976, her death) Daughter: Elizabeth "Bess" Hughes Clements Abell (Social secretary to Lady Bird Johnson and Walter Mondale)
Alma mater	University of Kentucky (Bachelor of Science)
Military Service
Service/branch	United States Army
Years of service	1917–1919
Rank	Captain
Battles/wars	World War I

Earle Chester Clements (October 22, 1896 – March 12, 1985) was a Kentucky farmer and politician who served in the middle 20th century in both houses of the United States Congress. He was also the 47th Governor of his state from 1947 to 1950. For three decades, he led a faction of his state's Democratic Party that stood in opposition to his boyhood friend, A. B. "Happy" Chandler, a two-time governor, U.S. Senator, and baseball commissioner.

Background

Clements was born in the small town of Morganfield in Union County in southwestern Kentucky. He was the youngest of two sons and four daughters born to Aaron Waller Clements (1853-1925) and the former Sallie Ann Tuley (1860-1934). After he graduated from Morganfield High School in 1915,he enrolled in the College of Agriculture at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, at which he played football in 1915 and 1916 for the popular Kentucky Wildcats.

Clements' studies were interrupted by the outbreak of World War I. In 1917, he enlisted as a private in Company M of the Kentucky National Guard. The soldiers in his company were dispatched to Camp Taylor near Louisville where he was mustered into the infantry of the United States Army. Clements then entered the office training school at Fort Benjamin Harrison near Indianapolis, Indiana, from which he graduated with the rank of first lieutenant. He remained within the country as a professor of military science. He reached the rank of Captain prior to his discharge from the Army in 1919.

After the war, Clements worked for two years in the burgeoning petroleum fields of East Texas. His father was a county judge and sheriff in Union County. When the senior Clements' health began to fail, Clements returned to Kentucky to help with the farm and served as his deputy sheriff. On January 18, 1927, Clements married the former Sara M. Blue (1894-1976). Their only child, Elizabeth "Bess" Hughes Clements Abel (1933-2020), became the social secretary to First Lady Lady Bird Johnson and later U.S. Senator Walter Mondale, who lost the 1984 presidential election to Ronald Reagan.

Political career

Clements began his political career in Union County in southwestern Kentucky. In 1935, he served as the chairman of the gubernatorial campaign of Thomas Stockdale Rhea, Sr. (1871-1946), of Logan County. In taking this role, Clements turned down an offer from Happy Chandler to chair Chandler's own 1935 campaign for governor. As a result, a rift developed between Clements and Chandler. Clements served in the Kentucky State Senate from 1941 to 1944, by which time he had been selected as Democratic floor leader of the body. He campaigned for a larger budget than that proposed by Republican Governor Simeon Willis. This stand against Willis increased Clements' popularity within the Democratic Party. He went on to serve two terms in the United States House of Representatives from 1945 to 1947.

Clements was elected to the Kentucky Senate in 1941 for Henderson, Webster, and Union counties. By 1944, he had risen to the post of majority leader of the state Senate and played a central role in writing the state budget that year. He then began the first of his two terms as a U.S. Representative.

In December 1947, Clements left Congress to succeed Governor Willis. In the Democratic primary, he defeated Chandler's preferred candidate, Harry Lee Waterfield (1911-1988). In the campaign, Waterfield proposed a tax on parimutuel betting which Clements at the time opposed. Waterfield also favored the development of electric power generation through public utilities. Clements, however, supported private development.

In the 1947 general election, Clements faced Republican state Attorney General Eldon Steven Dummit (1896-1973). While Clements managed to keep the Democrats united following the primary, Dummit had fractured the minority Republicans by attacking the administration of sitting Republican Governor Simeon Willis. Clements defeated Dummit by 100,000 votes, 387,795 to 287,756. He resigned his seat in the U.S. House to become governor.

Governor Clements raised taxes to fund the state park system and construct and maintain roads. He also achieved advancements in education. In 1950, Clements was elected to the United States Senate and therefore resigned the governorship to make the move back to Washington, D.C. He was elected by his colleagues as the Democratic Whip from 1955 to 1957, with service under Majority Leader and later U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson. He was also the executive director of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee from 1957 to 1959. In 1956, Clements was unseated after one term by the Moderate Republican Thruston B. Morton of Louisville. Chandler, then in his second nonconsecutive term as governor, offered no support to Clements' in his re-election bid, but Lyndon Johnson insisted that he resume the chairmanship of the reelection committee for the first two years that he was out of office.

In 1955, Clements supported Bertram Thomas "Bert" Combs (1911-1991) for governor against Chandler and did so again in 1959 against Harry Lee Waterfield. Combs defeated Waterfield. In 1961, Clements and Combs split over the state's leasing of a fleet of dump trucks from a Louisville dealership. When Combs canceled the deal, Clements resigned to work on the 1960 presidential campaign of his friend, Lyndon Johnson, who wound up with the vice presidency under John F. Kennedy. Following his split with Combs, Clements allied himself with the Chandler faction and opposed Combs' lieutenant governor, Wilson Watkins Wyatt (1905-1996), in his unsuccessful 1962 bid to unseat Senator Thruston Morton, who had coincidentally defeated Clements for his Senate seat in 1956. After the dispute with Combs, Clements' influence within the party declined. In the 1963 gubernatorial campaign, Clements could not even deliver his own county for Chandler, who unsuccessfully challenged his fellow Democrat, Edward Thompson "Ned" Breathitt (1924-2003), who went on to defeat narrowly his eventual successor as governor, Republican Louie B. Nunn.

When Alben Barkley resigned his Senate seat to assume the office of vice president in January 1949, Clements appointed Garrett Lee Withers (1884-1953) to fill the vacancy. Barkley's term was to expire in January 1951, and near the end of the term, Withers resigned to allow Clements to run at the same time in a special election to finish Withers' term and a full six-year term as well. Clements won the 1950 Senate election over Republican Charles I. Dawson (1881-1969), 300,276 to 256,876 votes.

Legacy

Clements died at his home in Morganfield at the age of eighty-eight. He and Mrs. Clements are interred at Odd Fellows Cemetery. He once said that he "never ran for anything with the idea that it was a steppingstone to a higher job. I always got accused of that, but those folks were wrong. You run for office because you want to represent all your people. And when you get that office, you devote all your time to it." Republican former Governor Louie Nunn said on Clements' passing: "He was a bare-knuckle politician. ... He and I were political adversaries and warm friends.