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John Riley Tanner
Notuncurious/Working/tmp3
In office
January 11, 1897 – January 14, 1901
Lieutenant William A. Northcott
Preceded by John Peter Altgeld
Succeeded by Richard Yates
Born April 4, 1844
near Boonville, Indiana
Died May 23, 1901 (aged 57)
Springfield, Illinois
Political party Republican
Spouse Cora Edith English
Children none
Residence Clay County; Chicago; Springfield
Alma mater none
Occupation Politician
Profession Politician

John Riley Tanner (April 4, 1844 - May 23, 1901) was the governor of the U.S. state of Illinois from 1897 until 1901. He was one of the most remarkable governors of the late nineteenth century.

Tanner's administration was capable and efficient, placing the state on a sound financial footing and passing significant legislation. He was the first governor in the country to be openly neutral in labor disputes, gaining national notoriety for his actions in a series of coal mine disputes. He was a party to the infamous "Allen bill", which gave control of Chicago's intra-city transportation network to corrupt financier Charles Yerkes.

When the Spanish-American War was declared, Tanner quickly mobilized 10,000 troops, ready for muster into the U.S. military within 36 hours of President McKinley's call for volunteers, and he used his influence to ensure that African Americans would be represented in Illinois' contribution to the military during the conflict.

Tanner's political disputes within his own party would eventually cost him support, and he was not renominated for a second term. He died less than five months after leaving office.

Contents

[edit] Early life

John Riley Tanner was born on a farm near the town of Boonville in Warrick County, Indiana. His family moved to Illinois when he was a child, and he grew up on a farm near Carbondale. He enlisted in the 98th Illinois Infantry at the age of 19, during the Civil War, and saw service with Sherman's army. When the 98th Infantry was mustered out of service in June of 1865, Tanner was transferred to the 61st Illinois Infantry, and was mustered out of service later that year. He then returned to southern Illinois and settled in Clay County, where he farmed and entered into a partnership with his brother in a milling and lumber business.[1] He married, but was widowed.

[edit] Political rise

Tanner would rise through Republican party ranks to become the unrivaled boss of a powerful political machine. In 1870 he began his long and successful political career in the Illinois Republican party of that era, winning elections and garnering appointments to increasingly important positions. He was first elected to the office of sheriff of Clay County (1870-72), and afterwards became circuit court clerk for the county (1872-76). He was appointed master in chancery (ie, a senior officer of the court) of the circuit court (1877-80), and then served two terms in the Illinois State Senate (1880-1883). Tanner was appointed United States marshal of the Southern District of Illinois by Republican President Chester A. Arthur, but was soon removed by incoming Democratic President Grover Cleveland.

Now prominent in statewide Illinois politics, Tanner was elected State Treasurer in 1886, and in 1891 he was appointed to the State Railroad and Warehouse Commission. In 1892 he was made Assistant Treasurer of the United States Treasury at Chicago, and was elected chairman of the Illinois State Republican Central Committee in 1894, a committee on which he had previously served as a member (1874-84).[1]

As chairman, Tanner was at the head of his party in its heyday of state power and national influence, the boss of a well-oiled political machine that he had helped build. As such, he was instrumental in resuscitating the flagging political fortunes of U.S. Senator Shelby Moore Cullom within his own Republican party (Cullom's standing would recover and he went on to serve in the U.S. Senate until 1913).[2]

Tanner was a tireless worker and strong-willed party boss. Under his leadership during the 1896 political campaign, the Illinois Republican party elected their entire state ticket, secured majorities in both branches of the state legislature, and elected eighteen of twenty-two congressmen. Tanner himself was elected governor, defeating incumbent John Peter Altgeld by a wide margin.

[edit] Administration

John Tanner's administration was noteworthy in several respects. He placed the state on a sound financial footing, and significant legislation included the establishment of the State Board of Pardons, the State Board of Examiners of Architects, the offices of the State Food Commissioners and the State Commissioners of Game, and the Juvenile Court Act. Western Normal School was established at Macomb (originally a school for teachers, now Western Illinois University).

Tanner was nationally known as a strong supporter of workers rights, and made it clear that he would enforce Illinois laws against bringing gangs of mercenary gunmen into the state, a tactic that had been used by some coal mine owners. He refused to take sides in labor disputes, the first governor in the country to make such non-partisanship a state policy, and sent troops to troubled coal mining towns to keep order without taking sides in the disputes.

Tanner was an active and unbiased patriot. When the Spanish-American War was declared, he was the first governor in the country to have the state militia (ie, the National Guard) ready to be called up into national service. Among Illinois' contributions were the 8th Illinois Volunteers, an all-black regiment with black officers and a black commander; and when the President tried to dissuade him from recruiting black soldiers, Tanner used his considerable influence to pressure the national government into calling up the regiment and sending them to Cuba, one of ten equipped Illinois regiments to be called up.[3]

from 1897 to 1898 ... Macoupin County (Virden): coal output dropped 39%; Christian County (Pana): coal output dropped 40%;[4]

Re Virden: began April 1, 1898; continued until November 15; signed agreement paid the commission-set wage, former workmen to be employed without discrimination, and the services of the superintendent, engineers, and mine managers who had taken an obnoxious part in the contest be dispensed with.[5]

Tanner was also known for his antagonistic relationship with Chicago, and was often at loggerheads with its political bosses, both Democratic and Republican. The mutual hostility came to be symbolized by the "Allen bill", a legislation signed by Tanner which gave control of Chicago's intra-city transportation system to corrupt financier Charles Yerkes. Faced with long-term constraints that would virtually cripple many efforts to develop the city, Chicago was galvanized into instituting internal reforms and ensuring the bill's repeal.

[edit] Legacy

Tanner's strong style had won him many enemies on both sides of the political aisle.

[edit] Quotes by and about Tanner

[edit]

Politics

"When it became known that a Republican legislature had been re-elected, opposition to Mr. Cullom developed within his own party. ... Mr. Cullom's campaign was managed by John R. Tanner, who was then chairman of the state central committee. Joseph Medill, of the Chicago Tribune, aspired to a seat in the Senate."
on Cullom's nomination and ultimate victory in the 1892 Senate race[6]
"A majority of the committee was friendly to Governor Tanner and desired to have the matter ignored in the platform. Judge Carter threatened to present a minority report and continue the fight on the floor of the convention. The question was referred to a sub-committee, which reported the following resolution: "The Republican party will uphold the interests of the people. To that end, if any legislative enactment is in any way injurious to any part of the people of Illinois and proves objectionable, a Republican legislature can be depended upon to correct the same, in the interests of the people." The resolution became a part of the platform. This action averted the embarrassment to which Governor Tanner would have been subjected had his championship of the act been openly condemned."
on Tanner's support of the "Allen bill"[7]
"Governor Tanner had announced that he would not be a candidate for re-election, but aspired to succeed Cullom in the senate. The principle of the popular election of senators was recognized to the extent that both Cullom and Tanner sought endorsement by the convention. In this rivalry Cullom was an easy winner."
p. 191 on Tanner's announcement and Cullom's renomination in 1900
"The result was the withdrawal of all other candidates from the race. Senator Cullom's name was the only one presented to the caucus, and he was re-elected."
p. 195 on Cullom outmaneuvering Tanner for the 1900 Senate nomination.
"I have always had the firm conviction that if he had remained loyal and had supported me for reelection in 1900, he would have been reelected Governor himself, and would have succeeded the late John M. Palmer as my colleague in the Senate."
Shelby Cullom's memoirs, 1911[8]
"The bitter personal attacks made on me by the Governor and his friends did not help him, but tended rather to help me."
Shelby Cullom's memoirs, 1911[9]
"It was in this last term that Governor Tanner of the State of Illinois and the Board of Trade came into conflict. The Governor had made a good deal of money on the Board of Trade through some of his brokers, which fact he did not deplore, but he did hold resentment against the Board of Trade for an attack made upon him in connection with standing in with the crooked element and vetoing certain legislation which the Board of Trade had championed for the purpose of purifying the trade of the evil things which beset it."
the son of William Taylor Baker, president of the Chicago Board of Trade, whose efforts to eliminate certain forms of corruption (such as "bucket shops") brought him into conflict with Tanner[10]

[edit]

Workers' rights

"This is the first time in the history of the State or of the nation that the military power of the law, during an industrial contest, has been exercised in defense of the rights of American labor."
on Tanner's use of the state militia at Virden [11]
"Again, those who attempted to take the place of the locked-out miners did not move of their own volition, but came as an army, some of them in cattle cars, and all under the protection of Winchesters in the possession of men disqualified to perform police duty under the laws of this State."
on Tanner's use of the state militia at Virden [12]
"Personally, I believe that employes and laboring men have the same natural and legal right to form combinations for the purpose of maintaining a living wage that employers have to combine in order to keep up the price of their manufactured products and to keep down the price of labor."
from a speech by Tanner at Trenton, Illinois on November 7, 1898 [13]
"It appears to me that of all obligations that can be formed, none is so justifiable, or expedient, or sacred, as an agreement in which the employers of labor and their employes unite upon equal terms and have a common interest. That was precisely the character of the agreement reached at Springfield, to which the Virden and Pana mine owners were parties."
from a speech by Tanner at Trenton, Illinois on November 7, 1898 [14]
"I am the only Governor in the United States who sent to the field, in response to the call of the President for volunteers, a negro regiment, officered by negroes, with a negro colonel at its head."
from a speech by Tanner at Trenton, Illinois on November 7, 1898 [15]
"Who hired these assassins? What right had they to hire them? They were not even citizens of this State, but armed invaders of its soil—fifty or sixty of them them, armed with repeating Winchester rifles loaded with powder and ball, invading our State for the purpose of shooting—and they did shoot down—our citizens."
from a speech by Tanner at Trenton, Illinois on November 7, 1898 [16]
"The laboring man's only property is the right to labor, which is as dear to him as the capitalist's millions, and he has the same right to carry arms in defense of his property as the capitalist has to protect his millions."
attributed to an interview by Tanner with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, October 10, 1898 (REFERENCE)
"The A. F. of L. expresses its heartfelt thanks to John R. Tanner, governor of Illinois, for the noble stand taken and the precedent established by him for the cause of organized labor."
American Federation of Labor, 1919[17]

[edit]

Racial attitudes

"To His Excellency, John R. Tanner, the able and fearless executive of the great State of Illinois, who believes and who has the courage of his convictions, that it is the heart, the brain, the soul, not the skin, that go to determine manhood; who, acting on this belief and the fundamental principle of this government that 'taxation without representation is tyranny,' had the manhood to appoint colored officers to command a Colored Regiment, this book is affectionately dedicated"
History of the Eighth Illinois United States Volunteers, 1899[18]
"Even from the very doors of the White House have I received letters asking and advising me not to officer this regiment with colored men, but I promised to do so, and I have done it. I shall never rest until I see this regiment—my regiment—on the soil of Cuba, battling for the right, and for its kinsmen."
from a speech by Tanner to members of the 8th Illinois, after an all-white regiment had been activated for service in the Spanish-American War, 1899[19] [20]

[edit]

Medicine

"The Osteopathy Bill passed by the Illinois legislature, the object of which was to legalize this peculiar form of irregular practice, has been vetoed by Governor Tanner of that State."
?? AMA ??, 1897[21]
"From the homeopathic view point, Gov. John R. Tanner of Illinois is eminently a fair-minded man. He has placed the homeopathic profession of this State under lasting obligations for the degree of recognition he has thus far given us in his medical appointments."
Journal of Homeopathic Medicine and Surgery, 1897[22]
"Gov. John R. Tanner has chosen Dr. W. E. Taylor, of Monmouth, as the successor to Dr. Vincent, whom Gov. Altgeld appointed at the eleventh hour to the superintendency of the Western Insane Hospital, now building at Rock Island. This is in every essential particular an excellent appointment."
Journal of Homeopathic Medicine and Surgery, 1897[23]

[edit] RR and Warehouse Commission

The Railroad and Warehouse Commission was created in 1871 to supervise the railroad and warehouse business in Illinois (L. 1871, p. 618). The Governor appointed three commissioners to initiate proceedings against railroad and warehouse companies that violated the law, to hear and decide applications for the cancellation of warehouse licenses, to study the annual reports of railroads, and to report annually to the Governor on the commission's activities and on the operations of railroads and warehouses in the state. The commission also was empowered to examine any accounts or other records relating to the management of railroads and warehouses, to establish rules and regulations for the inspection of grain, to fix rates for grain inspection, and to direct the activities of the Chief Inspector of Grain. In 1873 an appeals committee was appointed by the commission to handle complaints on grain inspection and in 1907 the commission was empowered to issue warehouse licenses (L. 1873, p. 141; L. 1907, p. 491).

reference here

[edit] 1900 Republican convention

1900 Republican convention - Governor Tanner had announced that he would not be a candidate for re-election, but aspired to succeed Cullom in the senate. The principle of the popular election of senators was recognized to the extent that both Cullom and Tanner sought endorsement by the convention. In this rivalry Cullom was an easy winner. Senator Cullom had obtained a sufficient number of written pledges from members of the legislature to secure his election. This fact, however, was not known to Congressmen Hitt, Cannon and Prince, all of whom were candidates. The most aggressive aspirant was former Governor Tanner. Senator Cullom, in his recent book, charges that Tanner attempted to undo him by means of a secret ballot in the caucus. This alleged plan was a failure. Hitt and Cannon would not unite on Tanner against Cullom. The result was the withdrawal of all other candidates from the race. Senator Cullom's name was the only one presented to the caucus, and he was re-elected. Cullom ventures the opinion that if Tanner had remained loyal to him he would have been renominated governor.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b "Tanner, John R.". Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois. (1905). Ed. Newton Bateman. Chicago: Munsell Publishing Company. p. 518. 
  2. ^ insert ref for resuscitation Cullom's career.
  3. ^ Sobel, Robert, ed. (1978), Biographical Directory of the Governors of the United States, 1789–1978, vol. 1, Westport: Meckler Books  - quoted in Illinois Governor John Riley Tanner by the National Governors Association
  4. ^ Ross 1899:178
  5. ^ Ross 1899:16
  6. ^ Church 1912:177
  7. ^ Church 1912:187-88
  8. ^ Cullom 1911:437
  9. ^ Cullom 1911:447
  10. ^ Baker, Charles H. (1908), Life and Character of William Taylor Baker, New York: Premier Press, pp. 145, <http://books.google.com> 
  11. ^ Ross 1899:6
  12. ^ Ross 1899:7
  13. ^ Ross 1899:8
  14. ^ Ross 1899:8
  15. ^ Ross 1899:9
  16. ^ Ross 1899:10
  17. ^ "Tanner, John". American Federation of Labor: History, Encyclopedia, Reference Book. (1919). p. 369. 
  18. ^ McCard 1899:frontispiece
  19. ^ McCard 1899:85
  20. ^ Jamieson 1919:90–91
  21. ^ "ARTICLE NAME HERE". Medical Record: A Weekly Journal of Medicine and Surgery (January 2, 1897–June 26, 1897) 51. (1897). Ed. George F. Shrady. Boston: William Wood and Company. p. 884. 
  22. ^ Fisher 1897:149
  23. ^ Fisher 1897:149

[edit] Bibliography and References

Article Bibliography

Biographical Data

  • "Tanner, John Riley". The Encyclopedia Americana. (1920). New York: Encyclopedia Americana Corporation. p. 945. 
    TANNER, John Riley, American soldier and statesman: b. Warwick Count , Ind., 4 April 1844: P Springfield, IN, u Kay 1901. He enlisted in the 98th Illinois volunteers in 1863, and was with Sherman's army during its active campaign in Georgia, Tennessee and Alabama. Returning to Illinois after the war, he engaged in fanning and selling fruit trees, entered politics in 1870, as Republican candidate for sheriff, was elected, and held thereafter the offices of circuit clerk 1872-76, State senator 1880-83, United States marshal 1883-85, State treasurer 1886-88, assistant United States treasurer, Chicago, 1892-93 governor of Illinois 1897-1900. He was the recognized leader of the Republican party in Illinois, was the first in Illinois to speak openly for a single gold standard, declaring himself thereon early in 1895, and as governor his administration was able, efficient and economical. Immediately after the blowing up of the Maine in Havana Harbor, he secured the passage of resolutions in the legislature, tendering to the national government the material and moral support of Illinois in the event of war with Spain, and within 36 hours after the call for troops he had mobilized 10,000 men at Springfield, thus procuring for Illinois the honor of having the first regiment ready for muster into the national service. His vigorous stand against the importation of contract labor under arms at the time of the Virden riots brought about a storm of protests that his acts were without precedent and unconstitutional. These were met with the answer that he would make precedents and construe the Constitution and the law for the welfare of the State.
  • "Tanner, John Riley". Appletons' Annual Cyclopædia and Register of Important Events of the Year 1901. (1902). New York: D. Appleton and Company. p. 470. 
  • "Tanner, John Riley". The Cyclopedic Review of Current History II. (1902). Boston: Current History Company. p. 324. 
  • (external; mod to proper citation) NIU web page on Cora Tanner "Cora English Tanner ... John R. Tanner, governor 1897-1901 ... Cora English Tanner, who was 20 years younger than her husband, married John Tanner in an extravagant ceremony days before his inauguration. She had a quick tongue and was a social reformer. ... Socialite Cora English Tanner stands out. She lived during the Gay Nineties, and lived up to that period's reputation. But though the wife of Gov. John Tanner was an elegant hostess, she also was an outspoken reformer, writing a series of protest letters to newspapers in the deep South to chastise them for failing to condemn lynch mobs. She accompanied her husband on tours of Illinois prisons and was critical of the conditions she observed. Three decades later, incoming Gov. Henry Horner, a bachelor, chose to escort Cora Tanner to his inaugural ball in 1933."

[edit] Notes to me

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Preceded by
John Peter Altgeld		 Governor of Illinois
1897–1901		 Succeeded by
Richard Yates