Thomas R. Marshall

Biography

Thomas Riley Marshall was born in North Manchester, Indiana, in 1854, the son of a country doctor, and grew up in Illinois, Kansas, Missouri and Indiana. He graduated from Wabash College in 1873, read law in Columbia City and was admitted to the bar in 1875. For three decades he practised law in Columbia City, built a reputation as a courtroom speaker and campaigned across the state for Democratic candidates.

In 1908 he narrowly won the Indiana governorship. As governor from 1909 to 1913 he backed child labour, anti-corruption and workplace-safety laws, opposed the state's sterilisation law and commuted death sentences. His attempt to replace the state constitution without a convention was blocked by the Indiana Supreme Court.

Chosen as Woodrow Wilson's running mate in 1912, he served two full terms as vice president from 1913 to 1921. Presiding over the Senate, he oversaw the 1917 adoption of the first rule allowing debate to be closed by a two-thirds vote, and during the First World War he toured the country selling Liberty Bonds. He chaired cabinet meetings while Wilson was in Europe, but after Wilson's severe stroke in October 1919 he refused to assume presidential powers without a formal declaration of the president's inability.

After leaving office he practised law in Indianapolis, served briefly on federal commissions and wrote a humorous memoir. He died in Washington, D.C., in June 1925. He is remembered for his wit, above all the remark that what the country needed was a really good five-cent cigar.