James C. Jones

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James C. Jones

James Chamberlain Jones (born April 20, 1809 in Davidson County , Tennessee , † October 29, 1859 in Memphis , Tennessee) was an American politician and the twelfth governor of Tennessee.

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Jones studied law in his teens but worked as a farmer in Wilson County . In 1836 he made his first political appearance when he campaigned, albeit in vain, for Hugh Lawson White as a presidential candidate. In 1839 he was elected to the Tennessee House of Representatives as a Whig Party member. When the gubernatorial elections were up in 1841, he ran against the incumbent and later US President James Polk . Although he was not very familiar with election campaigns and the political scene, he managed to beat Polk. He benefited from a temporary crisis in the Democratic Party, which had lost the presidential election to the Whigs the previous year. His first term as governor was politically very difficult because the Whigs had a majority in the State House of Representatives while the Democrats outnumbered the Senate. Both houses blocked each other and Tennessee's domestic politics stagnated. There was also a general economic crisis. In 1843 Jones ran again successfully against Polk. In his second term, Nashville was officially declared the capital, even though the city had held this role for several years. Jones sponsored schools for the blind and deaf-mute. In 1845 he did not seek a third term and resigned from office. Instead, he became president of the Memphis and Charleston Railroad Railroad Company. From 1851 to 1857 he was a US Senator in Washington. He supported the presidential campaigns of Wigh candidates Zachary Taylor and Winfield Scott . After the dissolution of the Whigs, he supported the Democrat James Buchanan in 1856 . Jones died on October 29, 1859.

He was married to Sara Watson Munford. The couple had ten children.

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personal data
SURNAME Jones, James C.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Jones, James Chamberlain
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American politician
DATE OF BIRTH April 20, 1809
PLACE OF BIRTH Davidson County (Tennessee) , Tennessee
DATE OF DEATH October 29, 1859
Place of death Memphis , Tennessee