Attorney General of Ohio
What was the position of John W. Bricker from 1923 to 1927?
John W . Bricker John William Bricker ( September 6 , 1893March 22 , 1986 ) was an American politician and attorney who served as a United States Senator and the 54th Governor of Ohio . He was also the Republican nominee for Vice President in 1944 . Born in Madison County , Ohio , Bricker attended Ohio State University and began a legal practice in Columbus , Ohio . He also served in the United States Army during World War I . He held various public offices between 1920 and 1937 , including the position of Ohio Attorney General . Bricker served three terms as Governor of Ohio from 1939 to 1945 . Bricker was an unsuccessful candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 1944 . He was Thomas E . Deweys running mate on the Republican ticket in the 1944 election , campaigning against the New Deal and President Franklin D . Roosevelts judicial nominees . The Republican ticket was defeated by the Democratic ticket of Roosevelt and Harry S . Truman . Bricker won election to the Senate in 1946 . He introduced the Bricker Amendment , which would have limited the presidents power to make treaties . Though the Bricker Amendment received support from some members of both parties , it was not passed by Congress . Bricker won re-election in 1952 but was narrowly defeated by Stephen M . Young in 1958 . After leaving office , Bricker resumed the practice of law and died in 1986 . Early life and education . Bricker was born on a farm near Mount Sterling in Madison County in south central Ohio . He was the son of Laura ( née King ) and Lemuel Spencer Bricker . He attended Ohio State University at Columbus , where he divided his time between the debating team , the varsity baseball team , and the Delta Chi Fraternity . After graduating with a Bachelor of Arts from Ohio State in 1916 and from its law school in 1920 , he was admitted to the bar in 1917 and began his legal practice in Columbus in 1920 . Public service . During World War I , Bricker served as first lieutenant and chaplain in the United States Army in 1917 and 1918 . He was subsequently the solicitor for Grandview Heights , Ohio , from 1920 to 1928 , assistant Attorney General of Ohio from 1923 to 1927 , a member of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio from 1929 to 1932 , and Attorney General of Ohio from 1933 to 1937 . He was elected governor for three two-year terms , serving from 1939 to 1945 , having each time won with a greater margin of victory . Bricker espoused a stance against centralized government , preferring to increase involvement in state and local governments , and made this known in his inaugural address as Governor : Bricker was the 1944 Republican nominee for vice president , having run with presidential nominee Thomas E . Dewey , the governor of New York who was nine years Brickers junior . The Republicans lost handily to the Democratic ticket of Franklin D . Roosevelt and Harry S . Truman . In that campaign , Bricker proved to be a tireless campaigner . He visited thirty-one states and made 173 speeches , including 28 over a six-day period . His final remarks came on radio on election eve from the governors office in Columbus , when he declared : Not only has the New Deal depleted our resources , recklessly spent our money , but it has undermined the very spiritual foundations of our government . Though most of his campaigning was in New England , the Midwest , and the West , Bricker even visited the then-historically and -heavily Democratic state of Texas , where in Dallas , he called Franklin Roosevelt a front for the Hillman-Browder Communist Party , referring to the respective leaders of the Congress of Industrial Organizations and the Communist Party of the United States of America . In 1946 , Bricker was elected to the United States Senate . He was re-elected in 1952 , serving from January 3 , 1947 , to January 3 , 1959 . Governor Dewey was the Republican presidential nominee again in 1948 , but Senator Bricker was not his running mate . Dewey chose instead Governor Earl Warren of California in the hope that the 1948 ticket would carry California , which the Dewey-Bricker ticket had failed to do . The Dewey-Warren ticket also lost California , and the absence of Bricker on the second ticket may have been a factor in Deweys failure to win Brickers home state of Ohio again . Bricker had campaigned with Warren in 1944 in Sacramento , where Bricker attacked the politics of war-time rationing ; then in San Francisco Bricker charged that Roosevelt had packed the U.S . judiciary with liberal jurists hostile to the Constitution . However , even if Dewey had carried both California and Ohio in 1948 , the two large states would have been insufficient to elect him President in that second campaign . Brickers Senate service is best remembered for his attempts to amend the United States Constitution to limit the Presidents treaty-making powers ( the Bricker Amendment ) . He was the chairman of the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce during the 83rd Congress . On July 12 , 1947 , a former Capitol police officer , William Louis Kaiser , fired shots at Senator Bricker as he boarded the underground trolley from the Senate office building to the Capitol . The two shots , fired as close range , narrowly missed their target . Kaiser stated he was trying to refresh Brickers memory . Kaiser had served on the police force as a protege of Brickers predecessor in the Senate and had complained of losing substantial money on Columbus real estate . Bricker voted in favor of the Civil Rights Act of 1957 . In 1958 , Stephen M . Young ran for the Senate against the incumbent Bricker . Bricker seemed invincible , but Young capitalized on widespread public opposition to the proposed right to work amendment to Ohios constitution , which Bricker had endorsed . Few thought that Young , 70 at the time , could win ; even members of his own party had doubts , particularly Ohios other senator , Democrat Frank J . Lausche . In an upset amid a national Democratic trend , Young defeated Bricker by 52 to 48 percent . Bricker then retired from public life . Professional life and death . In 1945 , Bricker founded the Columbus law firm now known as Bricker & Eckler . The firm now has additional offices in Cleveland , Cincinnati , Dayton , Marietta , and Barnesville . It is now one of the ten largest firms in the state of Ohio . He was married to the former Harriet Day . After leaving the Senate , John Bricker resumed the practice of law . He died in Columbus on March 22 , 1986 at the age of 92 and is interred at Green Lawn Cemetery . Miscellaneous . - Bricker Hall on the Ohio State University campus is named for him . The building currently serves as the home of many of the university administrative units , including the Office of the Board of Trustees and President Dr . Michael V . Drake . Bricker was a member of the OSU Board of Trustees from 1948 to 1969 . - The Bricker Building at the Ohio Expo Center ( site of the annual Ohio State Fair and many other events ) is named for him . - The John W . Bricker Federal Building in downtown Columbus is named for him . - In Philip K . Dicks 1962 novel The Man in the High Castle , set in an alternate timeline , Bricker succeeded John Nance Garner as the 33rd President of the United States in 1940 . External links . - Former Capitol Policeman Shoots at Senator - Ghosts of DC blog - John Bricker Oral History finding aid , Dwight D . Eisenhower Presidential Library - Grave