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Senate Years of Service: 1913-1921 Party: Democrat
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THOMAS, Charles Spalding, a Senator from Colorado; born in Darien, McIntosh County, Ga., December 6,
1849; attended private schools in Georgia and Connecticut; served briefly in the Confederate Army;
graduated from the law department of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor in 1871; admitted to
the bar in 1871; moved to Colorado and commenced practice in Denver, Colo.; Denver city attorney
in 1875 and 1876; member of the Democratic National Committee 1884-1896; unsuccessful
candidate for election to the United States House of Representatives in 1884, to the Senate in 1888
and 1895, and to the governorship in 1894; Governor of Colorado 1899-1901; elected as a
Democrat to the United States Senate in 1913 to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Charles J.
Hughes, Jr.; reelected in 1914, and served from January 15, 1913, to March 3, 1921; unsuccessful
candidate on the Nationalist ticket for reelection in 1920; chairman, Committee on Woman Suffrage
(Sixty-third and Sixty-fourth Congresses), Committee on Coast Defenses (Sixty-fifth Congress),
Committee on Pacific Railroads (Sixty-sixth Congress); resumed the practice of law; died in Denver,
Colo., June 24, 1934; the remains were cremated and the ashes interred in Fairmount Cemetery.
BibliographyDictionary of American Biography;
Leonard, Stephen J. Swimming Against the Current: A Biography of Charles S. Thomas, Senator and
Governor. Colorado Heritage (Autumn 1994): 29-34; Thomas, Sewell. Silhouettes of Charles S. Thomas, Colorado Governor and United States Senator.
Caldwell, ID: Caxton Printers, 1959.
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