Joseph Homan Manley

Joseph Homan Manley (1842-1905) was an American Republican Party official and close associate of Maine Republican politician and presidential candidate James G. Blaine.

Born in Bangor, Maine, Manley studied law in Boston and at Albany Law School in New York. In 1866 he was president of the Augusta, Maine City Council, where he first became associated with Blaine. Manley purchased a half-interest in the newspaper "The Maine Farmer", and made it into a major voice for Blaine-style Republicanism. Blaine subsequently secured Manley's appointment as Augusta's U.S. postmaster (an important federal post under the then-existing spoils system). The large Richardsonian Romanesque U.S. Post Office Building in Augusta is one of his legacies. Manley subsequently became Blaine's right-hand man on the Maine Republican State Committee, on which he served 1881-1900, and which he chaired for 15 of those years. ["New York Times", Feb. 8, 1905, p. 9 [http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9507E6D7163DE733A2575BC0A9649C946497D6CF Obituary] ; [http://history.rays-place.com/bios/maine/manley-jh.htm "Representative Men of Maine"] (Portland, 1893)]

Because Maine was an important and reliable Republican state, Manley also took a seat on the Executive Committee of the National Republican Party (1887-1890), eventually becoming its Chairman. In 1896 he personally managed the presidential candidacy of Thomas Brackett Reed, who unsuccessfully contested the Republican nomination with William McKinley. [Ibid]

Manley also held a variety of state offices, serving in the Maine House of Representatives (1899-1901, and as its Speaker in 1901), and the Maine State Senate (1903-04), but his power base was always the Republican Party itself. His wife was the daughter of a former Maine governor, and his son also became a Republican politico in New York City. [Ibid]

Manley's "New York Times" obituary describes him quite frankly as "a national politician who was identified with vast corporate interests". [Ibid]

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