Edwin Morrow
| Edwin Porch Morrow | |
 | |
| In office December 9, 1919 – December 11, 1923 | |
| President | William Howard Taft |
|---|---|
| Preceded by | James D. Black |
| Succeeded by | William J. Fields |
United States District Attorney
for the Eastern District of Kentucky | |
| In office 1910–1913 | |
| Born | November 28, 1877 Somerset, Pulaski County, Kentucky |
| Died | June 15, 1935 (aged 57) Frankfort, Kentucky |
| Resting place | Frankfort Cemetery |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse(s) | Katherine Hale Waddle Morrow (married 1903-1935, his death) |
| Children | Edwina Morrow (1904-1998) Charles R. Morrow |
| Alma mater | Cumberland College (Williamsburg, Kentucky) University of Cincinnati Law School |
| Occupation | Attorney |
Military Service
| |
| Service/branch | United States Army |
| Years of service | 1898-1899 |
| Rank | Second lieutenant |
| Unit | 4th Kentucky Infantry Regiment |
| Battles/wars | Spanish–American War (non-combat) |
Edwin Porch Morrow (November 28, 1877 – June 15, 1935) was the 40th Governor of his native Kentucky, with service for a single term from 1919 to 1923. He was the second of only five Republicans of the 20th century to fill the governorship. He supported civil rights in a still segregationist state.
Background
Of Scottish descent, Morrow was born in Somerset in Pulaski County in south Kentucky to Thomas Zanzinger Morrow (1836-1913) and the former Virginia Catherine Bradley (1844-1900). His family was among the founders of the Kentucky GOP. His father was the unsuccessful Republican gubernatorial nominee in 1883, and his maternal uncle, William O'Connell Bradley (1847-1914), was elected governor in 1895, the first Kentucky Republican to have filled the office.[1][2]
Political career
After non-combat service in the Spanish–American War, Morrow in 1902 graduated from the University of Cincinnati Law School in Cincinnati, Ohio, and opened his practice in Lexington, Kentucky. Early in his career, he gained the acquittal of an African-American accused of murder based on perjured testimony and a false confession. In 1910, U.S. President William Howard Taft appointed Morrow as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky. He ran unsuccessfully for the United States Senate in 1912. His service as U.S. Attorney ended in 1913, when the Democrat Woodrow Wilson replaced him. In 1915, Morrow ran for governor against his friend, Democrat Augustus Owsley Stanley, I (1867-1958), who prevailed by less than five hundred votes in the tightest gubernatorial race in Kentucky history.[3]
Morrow ran for governor again in 1919 and handily defeated his Democrat opponent, James Dixon Black (1849-1938), who had ascended to the governorship earlier that year when Stanley resigned upon his election to the United States Senate. Urging voters to "Right the Wrong of 1915," Morrow supported women's suffrage and the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.[3]
With a friendly legislature in 1920, much of Morrow's agenda was accomplished, including an anti-lynching law and a restructuring of state government. Morrow prevented the lynching of a black prisoner in 1920, and he removed local officials who failed to end mob violence. By 1922, Democrats regained control of the legislature, and Morrow was unable to continue with his goals. After he left the governorship, he returned to Somerset and served on the United States Railroad Labor Board and the Railway Mediation Board, but he never again held an elected office.[3]
He died of a heart attack at the age of fifty-seven in the capital city of Frankfort. Mrs. Morrow died twenty-two years later in Washington, D.C., at the home of daughter Edwina. The couple is interred at Frankfort Cemetery.
