Richard Manning Jefferies

Richard Manning Jefferies (born February 27, 1889 in Cherokee County , South Carolina , † April 20, 1964 in Charleston , South Carolina) was an American politician and Governor of South Carolina from 1942 to 1943.

Early years and political advancement

Richard Jefferies attended the University of South Carolina until 1910 . He then studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1912. Among other things, he earned the money for his studies as a teacher. In the following years he worked as a lawyer and newspaper publisher. After holding a few offices in the local Democratic party administration in the 1910s, he was a probate judge in Colleton County from 1913 to 1927 . He served in the South Carolina Senate from 1926 to 1958.

Governor of south carolina

Richard Jefferies became governor of South Carolina by chance. In the November 1938 election, Burnett Rhett Maybank had been elected governor for four years. His term of office was originally supposed to end in January 1943. In November 1941, Maybank resigned to serve as a U.S. Senator in Washington, DC , and was succeeded by Lieutenant Governor Joseph Emile Harley . But he was seriously ill and died at the end of February 1942. According to the constitution, the President of the Senate now had to take over the office of governor and that was Richard Jefferies at that time. This made him the third governor in a single legislature. He had less than a year until the end of that term. These months were marked by the war effort. The war also came twice to the vicinity of South Carolina at short notice when German submarines tried to mine the port of Charleston.

Another résumé

After the end of his short term in office, he returned to the Senate of his country, where he remained until 1958. In 1956 and 1960 he was head of the National Committee of the Democratic Party. In addition, from 1944 until his death, he was head of the South Carolina Public Service Authority, a company that was established in the 1930s for the water and electricity supply of the country, comparable to the Tennessee Valley Authority in Tennessee . Richard Jefferies was married to Annie Keith Savage.

literature

• Robert Sobel, John Raimo (Eds.): Biographical Directory of the Governors of the United States, 1789–1978. Volume 4. Meckler Books, Westport, CT, 1978. 4 volumes.

Web links

• Richard Manning Jeffries in the National Governors Association (English)
• Richard Manning Jeffries in the South Carolina Information Highway database