| In 1920 Morganfield farmer Earle Chester Clements reluctantly began a remarkable political career in the Union County sheriff's office. He developed a reputation as an extraordinarily able administrator and political organizer who worked quietly, modestly, and efficiently. Influenced heavily in his youth by Jeffersonian, Jacksonian and Wilsonian ideas, he became an arch-New Deal disciple and an advocate of "modern progressivism." He was associated with the Lafoon-Rhea-Donaldson faction of the state party, and by 1933 was a power-broker, serving on the influential State Central Executive Committee. But, for twenty years he largely preoccupied himself in the arena of county government and politics.;In 1940 Clements won election to the state senate where initially his views were unpopular with the Democratic majority leadership. However, after Republican Simeon Willis' 1943 gubernatorial victory, Clements became the senate majority leader, and quickly dominated that body. Against Willis' objections, he largely wrote the 1944 budget statute and he protected the 1936 Government Reorganization Act from Republican encroachment. Later, during 1945-1947, he strengthened ties with the New Deal-Fair Deal national leadership. He also diligently achieved unity within the highly factionalized Kentucky Democratic party.;Becoming governor in 1947, he initiated a liberal-progressive "foundation legislation" program to modernize the state's government and economy. He quietly ended the threatened disaccreditation of the state's public colleges, began the desegregation of Kentucky's higher education institutions, and won voter approval for two constitutional amendments. Included in his successful legislative package were: a massive rural roads, tourism and state parks program; an Agricultural and Industrial Development Board and a topographic mapping project; a new insurance code; a Legislative Research Council; an improved child labor code, plus liberalized unionization and workmens' compensation legislation; and a state Buildings and Property Commission. However, his attempts at merit and pension system reform were unsuccessful.;In 1935, through an historical accident, he and Albert B. Chandler broke politically. Under the Chandler administration there emerged a faction loyal to the governor and a more liberal-progressive wing increasingly dominated by Clements and Alben Barkley. But, personalities generally prevailed over issues. |
