From the collection of the Old State House Museum |
Born in Fort Worth, Texas, September 5, 1908, Cherry grew up in Oklahoma. In 1932 he made his way to Fayetteville, Arkansas to attend law school. There he fell in love with the prettiest girl on campus: Margaret Frierson, who was voted campus queen in 1933. In 1937 the two married. The marriage produced three children.
Cherry entered law practice in Jonesboro. During the New Deal he was appointed U.S. Commissioner for the Jonesboro Division U.S. Eastern District and Gov. Carl Bailey made him a referee for the Workmen's Compensation Commission. Cherry was elected chancellor and probate judge, but resigned to enter the Navy in 1942. Cherry was reelected to the position following the war.
In 1952 Cherry entered a crowded field to oppose Sid McMath's bid for a third term as governor. While it was generally acknowledged that McMath was vulnerable, Cherry was virtually unknown. He brought in an outside advertising firm to help devise a strategy that would help him both to raise money and to distinguish him from others challenging McMath. The solution was series of special radio "talkathons." The first lasted for twenty-four hours. Nineteen more followed, each at least three hours long. It was the most novel use of the medium of radio ever seen in an Arkansas election. Cherry finished second behind McMath in the primary and garnered the endorsement of virtually every other candidate. He annihilated McMath in the runoff by a margin of over 100,000 votes.
Cherry entered office with a three-pronged political agenda. The first was the creation of a department of finance and administration to keep the various state agencies within budget. The second was to reform the highway commission to eliminate some of the problems which had plagued McMath. The third, which proved to be Cherry's undoing, was to reform the property tax system.
Cherry's lack of experience proved a problem in his dealings with the legislature. While the General Assembly passed the highway department reforms Cherry requested, it was not content to stop there. Many called for a special session to reorganize the department. Cherry, who simply was not prepared to deal with the nightmare of political horse-trading which would ensue at such a gathering, vetoed the notion.
Even more controversial was Cherry's property tax plan. He wished to value all property the same, eliminating a bewildering array of special exemptions. While Cherry's proposed constitutional amendment actually would have lowered the taxes of most Arkansans, it was easy for opponents to portray it as a tax-raising scheme. It took an enormous investment of time and energy to persuade the legislature to present the measure to the people for a vote. In order to prevent a filibuster he was forced to acquiesce to a number of special interest measures, undercutting his claim to the reformist high ground.
At one point Cherry had declared: "I would rather see this tax provision go through than to be governor of Arkansas." As the measure was about to be submitted to the people, Cherry realized that he had likely written his own political epitaph. By 1954 Cherry was declining to campaign for the measure, but it was too late to attempt to distance himself from the unpopular proposal. Though it was almost unprecedented for an incumbent governor not to be returned for a second term, Cherry's controversial property tax plan, coupled with his failure to build a political organization, lack of political skill, controversial agency appointments, and formation of an anti-Cherry coalition, led to his defeat in 1954.
Next: Orval Eugene Faubus
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