Robert Archer Cooper
Template:Short description Script error: No such module "infobox".Script error: No such module "Check for unknown parameters".Script error: No such module "Check for conflicting parameters". Script error: No such module "Unsubst". Robert Archer Cooper (June 12, 1874Template:Spaced ndashAugust 7, 1953) was the 93rd Governor of South Carolina from January 21, 1919 to May 20, 1922.[1]
Biography
Born in Waterloo Township, Laurens County, Cooper graduated with a law degree from Polytechnic Institute in San Germán, Puerto Rico. He was admitted to the bar in 1898 and practiced law in Laurens. In 1900, Cooper was elected to the South Carolina House of Representatives until 1904, when he was elected the solicitor of the Eighth Judicial Circuit of South Carolina.
Cooper entered the gubernatorial election of 1918 and won the general election without opposition to become the 93rd governor of South Carolina. He continued the progressive policies of his predecessor, Richard Irvine Manning III, by presiding over new labor laws,[2][3][4] establishing a seven-month school term, mandating compulsory school attendance, expanding health care, and improving the state roadways. These initiatives were paid for by stricter enforcement of existing tax laws and re-evaluating state property. Cooper was elected to a second term in 1920.
He resigned from the governorship in 1922 to accept an appointment to the Federal Farm Loan Board that lasted five years. After this, Cooper returned to the practice of law but was called by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to serve as the General Counsel of the Commodity Credit Corporation. Roosevelt later appointed him in 1934 as Judge of the District Court for Puerto Rico, during which he presided over the trial and retrial for sedition of Pedro Albizu Campos and eight other members of Albizu's Puerto Rican nationalist group Cadets of the Republic. The day after Judge Cooper sentenced the defendants to the U.S. Penitentiary in Atlanta, an unsuccessful assassination attempt was made against him.[5][6] Cooper held the Puerto Rican position until 1947. Cooper died on August 7, 1953, and was buried at the Laurens City Cemetery in Laurens.
Legacy
His house at Laurens is included in the South Harper Historic District and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986.[7]
References
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- ↑ United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico-Robert Archer Cooper (1874-1953)
- ↑ Title: Labor Legislation of 1919 : Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 277, P.295-296
- ↑ Title: Labor Legislation of 1921 : Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 308, P.235
- ↑ Title: Labor Legislation of 1922 : Bulletin of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics, No. 330, P.35-37
- ↑ "Bullets Miss U. S. Judge in San Juan— Attempt Made on Life of Robert A. Cooper Who Sentenced Campos", The Plain Dealer (Cleveland), June 9, 1937, p.1
- ↑ "FBI Files"; "Puerto Rico Nationalist Party"; SJ 100-3; Vol. 23; pages 104-134. Template:Webarchive
- ↑ Template:NRISref
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- Guillermo A. Baralt, History of the Federal Court in Puerto Rico: 1899-1999 (2004) (also published in Spanish as Historia del Tribunal Federal de Puerto Rico)
External links
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- Pages with script errors
- 1874 births
- 1953 deaths
- 19th-century American lawyers
- People from Laurens County, South Carolina
- Interamerican University of Puerto Rico alumni
- South Carolina lawyers
- Democratic Party members of the South Carolina House of Representatives
- Democratic Party governors of South Carolina
- University of South Carolina trustees
- Judges of the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico
- United States Article I federal judges appointed by Franklin D. Roosevelt
- South Carolina state solicitors
- People from Laurens, South Carolina
- American expatriate judges
- Expatriates in the Spanish Empire
- 20th-century members of the South Carolina General Assembly