Hill McAlister
Harry Hill McAlister ( born July 15, 1875 in Nashville, Tennessee, † October 30, 1959 ) was an American politician and the 41th Governor of the State of Tennessee.
Early years and political rise
The young McAlister came from a family of politicians, who had previously produced the Governors William Blount, Willie Blount and Aaron V. Brown. He graduated from Vanderbilt University in 1897, where he studied law and settled in Nashville as a lawyer down. Since 1901 he worked for the local prosecutor's office. Until 1904 he was deputy prosecutor and 1904-1910 he was himself chief prosecutor of the city. It was followed a few years in the Senate of Tennessee. In 1916 he was a member of the Electoral College, the Woodrow Wilson chose for the second time as U.S. president. At the same time, he held several leading positions in the Democratic Party. Between 1919 and 1927, and in 1931 and 1933 he was Minister of Finance of Tennessee ( State Treasurer ). Both in 1926 and 1928 failed his attempts to win his party's nomination for the gubernatorial elections.
Governor of Tennessee
In 1932 he achieved this goal, and was elected the 41st Governor of Tennessee. However, the political and economic conditions were very bad. Politically, Tennessee just had a financial scandal behind him, in the also the former Governor Henry Hollis Horton was involved and through which the country lost millions of dollars. Added to this was the general economic depression due to the global economic crisis. The national debt had risen to $ 6,000,000. The governor took office about the same time as President Franklin D. Roosevelt. He had great hopes on the policy of the New Deal. Above all, the Tennessee Valley Authority should benefit the state. Indeed at the time done more to overcome the crisis at the federal level than in Tennessee itself
Hill McAlister was the beginning of his term closely associated with Edward Crump, the former mayor of Memphis, who exercised great political influence both in Tennessee as well as at the federal level. Last but not least Crump he owed his 1932 election. That made him also dependent on this and its desires. Nevertheless McAlister did everything to ablate the national debt. In March 1933, the banks were also in Tennessee, as in some other states, closed for six days. With this and with the help of federal policy confidence in the banks should be restored. Actually succeeded to the governor by radical savings and with help from Washington, until 1934 to balance the budget again. In that year he was elected for a second term. In his second tenure, he fell out with his patron Crump. McAlister wanted the Prohibition Act in Tennessee maintained even though it had been painted in 1933 by the 21st Amendment again from the Constitution. This and the introduction of VAT angry Crump, who saw his economic interests at risk in Tennessee. Crump pulled out all the stops to harm McAlister. He then described his former allies as incapable of governing. For McAlister this meant the end of his career as governor. He knew he had no chance in 1936 to run successfully against the powerful influence of Crump. For this reason, he did not stand for re-election.
End of life and death
After the end of his term he returned to Nashville. In 1940 he got a job with the federal government to mediate in cases of insolvency ( Federal Referee for Bankruptcy Cases). This office he retained until his death in 1959. He was married to Louise Jackson, with whom he had two children.