Percival W. Clement

Percival Wood Clement (* July 7, 1846 in Rutland, Rutland County, Vermont; † January 9, 1927 ) was an American politician and 1919-1921 Governor of the State of Vermont.

Early years

Percival Clement graduated from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut and worked in the company Clement & Sons Marble, which belonged to his family. There he was in 1871 one of the partners. In 1876 he sold his share of the Rutland Marble Company. Then Clement has been doing business in various other fields. He was involved in the Rutland State Trust Company, the Clement National Bank, the Rutland Railroad Company and the newspaper " Rutland Herald ".

Political rise

Clement was a member of the Republican Party. Between 1892 and 1893 he was a delegate in the House of Representatives from Vermont. From 1897 to 1898 he was mayor of Rutland City, which he had co-founded by this district was excluded from Rutland Town. In the years 1900 and 1901 he was a member of the State Senate. Both in 1902 and 1908, he competed unsuccessfully for the governorship of his state. From 1911 to 1912 he was once mayor of Rutland. 1912 Clement was chairman of a conference of railway committees of the New England states. A year later he became a member of the Education Commission of Vermont and later he was in the security committee of his state. In 1918, he was still elected governor.

Governor of Vermont

Percival Clement took up his new post on January 9, 1919. He was an opponent of women's suffrage and Prohibition, but could not prevent its introduction at the federal level and the ratification in Vermont. Clement also pardoned his predecessor Horace F. Graham, who had been sentenced as head of the Court of Vermont for embezzlement of funds in his earlier work. While Clements term conscripts of the First World War were compensated with a total of $ 1 million.

Further CV

After the expiration of his term on January 6, 1921, Clement again devoted his business interests. Politically, he moved over to the Democratic Party. He died in January 1927. Together with his wife Maria H. Goodwin he had nine children.