Joseph T. O'Neal

Infobox Person
name = Joseph Thomas O'Neal, Jr


image_size =
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residence =
birth_date = August 13 1881
birth_place = Louisville, Kentucky USA
death_date = September 4 1944
death_place = Louisville, Kentucky USA
occupation = Attorney
death_cause =
title = Mayor of Louisville
term = June 1927 to December 1927
predecessor = Arthur A. Will
successor = William B. Harrison
party = Democratic Party

Joseph Thomas O'Neal, Jr was interim Mayor of Louisville, Kentucky from June to December 1927. His father was a respected Louisville lawyer who ran for mayor in 1905, losing in a rampantly fraudulent election to Paul C. Barth. The younger O'Neal graduated from Louisville Male High School, Centre College and then the University of Louisville School of Law in 1903, and practiced law in his father's firm.

In 1925, the Democrat candidate for mayor was William T. Baker. Republican Party boss Chesley Searcy discovered in October that Baker had been a member of the Ku Klux Klan as recently as April 1925. After the "Louisville Herald-Post" broke the story, O'Neal was appointed the emergency replacement for Baker a week before the election. O'Neal lost narrowly to Republican Arthur A. Will.

Democrats alleged voting fraud had occurred in the election, and in June 1927 the Kentucky Court of Appeals overturned the election. Governor William Fields appointed O'Neal to serve the remainder of the term until a November 7 special election. O'Neal ran in that election against Republican William B. Harrison and lost by a narrow margin. He served briefly as a judge on the Court of Appeals following his term as Mayor.

O'Neal died in 1944 and was buried in Cave Hill Cemetery.

ee also

*Emmet O'Neal - Brother

References

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