Thomas E. Watson

: "For the U.S. Marine Corps general, see Thomas E. Watson (USMC) (1892-1966)."Infobox Senator
name=Thomas Edward Watson
nationality=American


jr/sr=United States Senator
state=Georgia
party=Democrat, Populist
term=March 4, 1921 – September 26, 1922
preceded=M. Hoke Smith
succeeded=Rebecca L. Felton
party_election2 = Populist Party
candidate2= Vice President of the United States
term_start2= November 3, 1896
runningmate2= William Jennings Bryan
opponent2= Garret Hobart (R)
Arthur Sewall (D)
incumbent2= Adlai E. Stevenson I (D)
party_election3 = Populist Party
candidate3= President of the United States
term_start3= November 8, 1904
runningmate3= Thomas Tibbles
opponent3= Theodore Roosevelt (R)
Alton B. Parker (D)
Eugene Debs (Socialist)
Silas C. Swallow (Prohibition)
incumbent3= Theodore Roosevelt (R)
party_election4 = Populist Party
candidate4= President of the United States
term_start4= November 3, 1908
runningmate4= Samuel Williams
opponent4= William Howard Taft (R)
William Jennings Bryan (D)
Eugene Debs (Socialist)
Eugene W. Chafin (Prohibition)
Thomas Louis Hisgen (Independence)
incumbent4= Theodore Roosevelt (R)
date of birth=birth date|1856|9|5|mf=y
place of birth=Thomson, Georgia, U.S.
dead=dead
date of death=death date and age|1922|9|26|1856|9|5|mf=y
place of death=Washington, D.C., U.S.
spouse=Georgia Durham Watson
profession=Politician, Lawyer, Editor, Publisher, Teacher

Thomas Edward Watson (September 5, 1856 – September 26, 1922), generally known as Tom Watson, was a United States politician from Georgia. In early years, Watson championed poor farmers and the working class; later he became a controversial publisher and Populist politician. Two years before his death, he was elected to the United States Senate. His virulent attacks on the Roman Catholic Church, blacks, Jews, the League of Nations, President Woodrow Wilson and the war effort in World War I diminished his political influence.

Early career

Watson was born in Thomson, the county seat of McDuffie County, Georgia. After attending Mercer University (he did not graduate; family finances forced withdrawal after two years), he became a school teacher. Watson later studied law and was admitted to the Georgia bar in 1875. He joined the Democratic Party and in 1882 was elected to the Georgia Legislature.

As a state legislator, Watson struggled unsuccessfully to curb the abuses of the powerful railroad corporations. A bill subjecting railroads to county property taxes was voted down after U.S. Senator Joseph E. Brown offered to provide the legislators with round-trip train fares to the Louisville Exposition of 1883. In disgust, Watson resigned his seat and returned to the practice of law before his term expired. He was a presidential elector for the Democratic ticket of Grover Cleveland and Allen G. Thurman. in the 1888 election.

Congressman

Watson began to support the Farmers' Alliance platform, and was elected to the United States House of Representatives as an Alliance Democrat in 1890. In Congress, he was the only Southern Alliance Democrat to abandon the Democratic caucus, instead attending the first Populist Party congressional caucus. At that meeting, he was nominated for Speaker of the House by the eight Western Populist Congressmen. Watson was instrumental in the founding of the Georgia Populist Party in early 1892. The Populist Party advocated the public ownership of the railroads, steamship lines and telephone and telegraph systems. It also supported the free and unlimited coinage of silver, the abolition of national banks, a system of graduated income tax and the direct election of United States Senators. As a Populist, Watson tried to unite the agrarians across class lines, overcoming racial divides. He also supported the right of African American men to vote. Unfortunately, the failures of the Populist party's attempt to make political progress through fusion tickets with the Democrats in 1896 and 1898 deeply affected Watson. He became a virulent racist and anti-Semite, blaming the minorities in the South for Populism's failures.

Watson served in the House of Representatives from 1891 until March 1893. After being defeated he returned to work as a lawyer in Thomson, Georgia. He also served as editor of the "People's Party Paper".

Vice Presidential candidacy

In the 1896 presidential election the leaders of the Populist Party entered into talks with William Jennings Bryan, the proposed Democratic Party candidate. They were led to believe that Watson would become Bryan's running mate. After giving their support to Bryan, the latter announced that Arthur Sewall, a conservative politician with a record of hostility towards trade unions, would be his vice presidential choice.

This created a split in the Populist Party; some refused to support Bryan whereas others, such as Mary Lease, reluctantly campaigned for him. Watson's name remained on the ballot as the vice presidential nominee of only the Populist Party while Sewall was listed as that of the Democratic Party; both parties listed Bryan as their presidential nominee. Watson won 217,000 votes for Vice President, less than a quarter of the number of votes received by the 1892 Populist ticket but by far the most ever received by a Populist candidate at the national level after that.

The defeat of Bryan severely damaged the Populist Party. While Populists continued to hold power for several years in a few Western states, the party ceased to be a factor in national politics.

Presidential candidacies

As his own personal wealth grew, Watson denounced socialism, which had drawn many converts from the ashes of Populism. He became a vigorous anti-Semite and anti-Catholic crusader who called for the reorganization of the Ku Klux Klan. [Comer Vann Woodward. "Tom Watson: Agrarian Rebel." Oxford University Press, 1963.]

He was the Populist Party's presidential candidate in 1904 and won 117,183 votes, a doubling of the Populist showing in 1900, but less than one-eighth of the party's support from just 12 years earlier.

The party's fortunes continued to decline and in the 1908 presidential campaign Watson attracted only 29,100 votes. Though he never received more than 1% of the vote on a national level, Watson had respectable showings in selected Western and Southern states. In both campaigns his home state of Georgia was where much of his support was concentrated, first capturing 18% and later 12% of the vote there.

ubsequent influence

Through his publications "Watson's Magazine" and "The Jeffersonian", Watson continued to have great influence on public opinion, especially in his native Georgia.

In 1913 he played a prominent role in inflaming public opinion in the case of Leo Frank, a Jewish American factory manager who was accused of the murder of Mary Phagan, a 13 year-old factory worker. Watson and the Southern press sensationalized the case, directing racist and anti-Semitic comments against Frank while making wild, unsubstantiated charges. [Crowe, Charles. "Tom Watson, Populists, and Blacks Reconsidered," Journal of Negro History, April 1970.] Frank was convicted and sentenced to death by hanging.

On June 20, 1915, departing Governor of Georgia John M. Slaton commuted the sentence of Frank to life in prison. The decision followed a lengthy appeals process. Some viewed the action as a conflict of interest, as Slaton was a law partner of Frank's lead defense counsel, a fact which Watson made sure to emphasize. [Dinnerstein, Leonard. "Leo Frank Case." Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1987: 123-34. [http://books.google.com/books?id=3vnRrYTnCFkC&pg=PA124&lpg=PA124&dq=Governor+Slaton+law+partner+Frank+%22conflict+of+interest%22&source=web&ots=Ki-dP2rnC2&sig=Rjkhx0QzmwR-t5IG_X2VwJ2RFC8&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=7&ct=result#PPA124,M1 Accessed via Google Book Search] , August 12, 2008.] He railed against the decision and called for Georgians to take justice into their own hands. On August 17, 1915, Frank was dragged from his prison cell by a group of men and lynched.

enator

Watson rejoined the Democratic Party and in 1920 was elected to the U.S. Senate. However, he died in 1922 of a cerebral hemorrhage at age 66. This triggered a historic event when Rebecca L. Felton was appointed to replace him, making her the first female Senator.

Watson is honored with a twelve foot high bronze statue on the lawn of the Georgia State Capitol in Atlanta over the legend "A champion of right who never faltered in the cause." [Jonathan Turley "Atlanta Journal-Constitution" 2000Aug13 ]

Notes

Books by Watson

* "The Story of France" (1899),
* "Napoleon: A Sketch of His Life, Character, Struggles, and Achievements" (1902)
* "The Life and Times of Thomas Jefferson" (1903).

Further reading

*"Tom Watson: Agrarian Rebel", by C. Vann Woodward
* "The Life of Thomas E. Watson", by William W. Brewton

External links

* [http://www.lib.unc.edu/mss/inv/w/Watson,Thomas_E.html/ Inventory of the Thomas E. Watson Papers, 1863-1996] in the Southern Historical Collection at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
* [http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=7827002 Tom Watson] at Find A Grave
* [http://projects.vassar.edu/1896/watson.html Tom Watson Biography at Vassar]
* [http://www.watson-brown.org/heritage/tw_bio.html Tom Watson Biography at Watson-Brown Foundation]
* [http://www.wvu.edu/~lawfac/jelkins/lp-2001/watson.html Tom Watson Biography at Strangers To Us All]
* [http://www.augustachronicle.com/history/watson.html Fiery Politician Alienated Many, By Ben Palmer]
* [http://www.philsp.com/homeville/FMI/d1447.htm#A71931 A selection of some of his editorials and writings]
* [http://www.philsp.com/homeville/FMI/t1386.htm#BOT Selections from "Watsons Jeffersonian Magazine"]
* [http://www.philsp.com/homeville/FMI/t1387.htm#TOP More selections from "Watsons Jeffersonian Magazine"]
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=-wjrKs0ZxHQC "Political and Economic Handbook"] By Thomas Edward Watson (1916)
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ajYPAAAAYAAJ "Socialists and Socialism"] By Thomas Edward Watson (1910)
* [http://www.archive.org/details/lifetimesofandre00wats "The Life and Times of Andrew Jackson"] By Thomas E. Watson (1912)
* [http://www.archive.org/details/watsonjefferson00thomrich "The Life and Times of Thomas Jefferson"] By Thomas E. Watson
*"The Story of France" By Thomas E. Watson [http://www.archive.org/details/storyoffrancefro01watsiala Vol. I] [http://www.archive.org/details/storyoffrancefro02watsiala Vol. II] (1899)
*cite book
title=Napoleon
author=Thomas Edward Watson
year=1902
publisher=The Macmillan co.
isbn=
url=http://books.google.com/books?id=NAjb_NH62_YC&pg=PA1&dq=inauthor:Thomas+inauthor:Watson&as_brr=1#PPP15,M1
*cite book
title=The Roman Catholic Hierarchy
author=Thomas Edward Watson
year=1915
publisher=Jeffersonian Pub. Co.
isbn=
url=http://books.google.com/books?id=XCkwGkMTeDwC&pg=PA7&dq=inauthor:Thomas+inauthor:Watson&as_brr=1#PPA3,M1
*cite book
title=Bethany
author=Thomas Edward Watson
year=1904
publisher=D. Appleton
isbn=
url=http://books.google.com/books?id=2QUeAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA3&dq=inauthor:Thomas+inauthor:Watson&as_brr=1#PPP9,M1
*cite book
title=Contested Election Case of Thomas E. Watson Vs. J.C.C. Black
author=United States Congress. House
year=1896
publisher=Govt. Prtg. Off.
isbn=
url=http://books.google.com/books?id=uJYRAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA278&dq=inauthor:Thomas+inauthor:Watson&as_brr=1#PPA1,M1