{{Short description|American politician (1872–1944)}} {{Other people|Thomas Hardwick}} {{more citations needed|date=March 2013}} {{Use American English|date=November 2025}} {{Use mdy dates|date=August 2021}} {{Infobox officeholder | name = Thomas W. Hardwick | image = Senator Thomas Hardwick.jpg | caption = Hardwick, {{circa}} 1912 | order1 = 63rd | title1 = [[Governor of Georgia]] | term_start1 = June 25, 1921 | term_end1 = June 30, 1923 | predecessor1 = [[Hugh Dorsey]] | successor1 = [[Clifford Walker]] | jr/sr2 = United States Senator | state2 = [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]] | term2 = November 4, 1914 – March 3, 1919 | preceded2 = [[William Stanley West]] | succeeded2 = [[William J. Harris]] | state3 = [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]] | district3 = {{ushr|GA|10|r}} | term_start3 = March 4, 1903 | term_end3 = November 2, 1914 | predecessor3 = [[Emory Speer]] | successor3 = [[Carl Vinson]] | office4 = Member of the [[Georgia House of Representatives]] | term_start4 = January 19, 1898 | term_end4 = February 9, 1902 | birth_name = Thomas William Hardwick | birth_date = {{birth date|1872|12|9|mf=y}} | birth_place = [[Thomasville, Georgia]], U.S. | death_date = {{death date and age|1944|1|31|1872|12|9|mf=y}} | death_place = [[Sandersville, Georgia]], U.S. | party = [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic]] | resting_place = [[City Cemetery (Sandersville, Georgia)|Old City Cemetery]]<br>Sandersville, Georgia, U.S. | alma_mater = [[Mercer University]] (B.A.)<br>[[University of Georgia School of Law]] (J.D.) | occupation = | spouse = {{plainlist| * {{marriage|Maude Elizabeth Perkins|1894}} * {{marriage|Sallie Warren West|1938}} }} }}
'''Thomas William Hardwick''' (December 9, 1872 – January 31, 1944) was an American [[politician]] from the U.S. state of [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]] who served as [[governor of Georgia]], a [[United States Senator]] from Georgia, a member of the [[United States House of Representatives]] from Georgia, and a member of the [[Georgia House of Representatives]].
==Early life== Hardwick was born on December 9, 1872, in [[Thomasville, Georgia]].<ref name="rites">{{Cite news |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/83409328/hardwick-rites-set-for-today-2-feb-1944/ |title=Hardwick Rites Set for Today |date=1944-02-02 |page=9 |newspaper=[[The Atlanta Journal-Constitution|The Atlanta Constitution]] |via=[[Newspapers.com]] |access-date=2021-08-14}} {{Open access}}</ref> He graduated from [[Mercer University]] with a [[Bachelor of Arts]] degree in 1892 and received a [[Juris Doctor]] degree from the [[University of Georgia School of Law]] in 1893. He was an active member of [[Phi Delta Theta]] at Mercer, and while at UGA, he was a member of the [[Phi Kappa Literary Society]].
==Personal life== Hardwick married Maude Elizabeth Perkins in 1894.<ref name="bday">{{Cite news |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/83424046/this-is-my-43rd-birthday-12-dec-1915-l/ |title=This is My 43rd Birthday |page=10 |newspaper=Laredo Weekly Times |location=Laredo, TX |date=1915-12-12 |access-date=2021-08-14 |via=[[Newspapers.com]]}} {{Open access}}</ref> He married Sallie Warren West in 1938 after Maude's death in 1937.<ref name="rites"/> He had one daughter and two stepdaughters.<ref name="rites"/>
==Career== ===Law career=== Hardwick practiced law in [[Savannah, Georgia|Savannah]]<ref name="rites"/> and then entered politics with the support of [[Thomas E. Watson]].<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Smith|first1=Zachary|title=Tom Watson and Resistance to Federal War Policies in Georgia during World War I|journal=Journal of Southern History|date=2012|volume=78|issue=2|pages=293–326|url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=khh&AN=75191954&site=eds-live&scope=site|access-date=1 November 2016}}</ref> Hardwick was the prosecutor of [[Washington County, Georgia]], from 1895 to 1897.
===Political career=== Hardwick served as a member of the [[Georgia House of Representatives]] from 1898 to 1902; and a member of the [[United States House of Representatives]] representing Georgia's 10th district from 1903 to 1914.<ref name="cd">{{cite web |title=S. Doc. 58-1 - Fifty-eighth Congress. (Extraordinary session -- beginning November 9, 1903.) Official Congressional Directory for the use of the United States Congress. Compiled under the direction of the Joint Committee on Printing by A.J. Halford. Special edition. Corrections made to November 5, 1903 |url=https://www.govinfo.gov/app/details/SERIALSET-04562_00_00-001-0001-0000 |website=GovInfo.gov |publisher=U.S. Government Printing Office |access-date=2 July 2023 |page=18 |date=9 November 1903}}</ref> He introduced resolutions for the repeal of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Gidlow |first=Liette |date=2018 |title=The Sequel: The Fifteenth Amendment, the Nineteenth Amendment, and Southern Black Women's Struggle to Vote |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26854870 |journal=The Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era |volume=17 |issue=3 |pages=433–449 |issn=1537-7814}}</ref>
In 1914 he ran for a seat in the [[United States Senate]] in a [[1914 United States Senate elections|special election]] for the unexpired term of [[Augustus O. Bacon]] who had died in office. Hardwick won, and served in the Senate from 1915 to 1919. Senator Hardwick was defeated in the Democratic primary for [[1918 United States Senate election in Georgia|reelection]] in 1918 by [[William J. Harris]].
====Anarchist bombings==== As a senator, Hardwick co-sponsored the [[Immigration Act of 1918]], which was enacted in October of that year. Aimed at radical anarchists who had immigrated to the U.S., the new law enabled deportation of any non-citizen who belonged to an anarchist organization or who was found in possession of anarchist literature for the purpose of propaganda.
On [[1919 United States anarchist bombings|April 29, 1919]], as a direct result of his sponsorship of the Immigration Act, Senator Hardwick was targeted for assassination by adherents of the radical anarchist [[Luigi Galleani]], who mailed a booby trap bomb to his residence in Georgia. The bomb exploded when Ethel Williams, a house servant of the Hardwicks, attempted to open the package, blowing off her hands and severely injuring Hardwick's wife, Maude.<ref>Avrich, Paul, ''Sacco and Vanzetti: The Anarchist Background'', Princeton University Press (1991), {{ISBN|0-691-02604-1}}, {{ISBN|978-0-691-02604-6}}, p. 141</ref><ref name="packages">{{Cite news |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/83425175/ |title=Packages Mailed From Same Place to Mayor Hanson and to Hardwick |page=1 |newspaper=[[The Atlanta Journal-Constitution|The Atlanta Constitution]] |via=[[Newspapers.com]] |access-date=2021-08-14}} {{Open access}}</ref>
===Governor (1921–1923)=== Hardwick then served as [[Governor]] of Georgia from 1921 to 1923, and due to his opposition to the [[Ku Klux Klan]], lost to [[Clifford Walker]] in the [[1922 Georgia gubernatorial election|subsequent election]].<ref>Abad, Jay-Raymond N., "The Evolution of a Society and Fraternity: The Response of Phis regarding Equality" http://thephideltlegacy.com/articles/equality/equality.html</ref><ref>Lucket, Robert E. "Thomas Hardwick (1872–1944)" http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/government-politics/thomas-hardwick-1872-1944</ref> While standing unsuccessfully for re-nomination in 1922, Hardwick described his rival [[Clifford Walker]] as the Ku Klux Klan’s candidate and being supported by the “radical union labor element.”<ref>[https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=PdhPAAAAIBAJ&pg=PA1&dq=The+Evening+Independent+13+Sep+1922+hardwick&article_id=2113,2267512&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjBk_D3-7WQAxX_QEEAHfSRPXgQ6AF6BAgJEAM#v=onepage&q=The%20Evening%20Independent%2013%20Sep%201922%20hardwick&f=false The Evening Independent 13 Sep 1922]</ref>
He ran unsuccessfully for election to the Senate in [[1922 United States Senate elections|1922]] and [[1924 United States Senate elections|1924]], and then retired from politics. He spent the rest of his life practicing law, with offices in [[Washington, D.C.]], [[Atlanta, Georgia]], and [[Sandersville, Georgia]].
One of Hardwick's most notable actions as governor of Georgia was his appointment of [[Rebecca Latimer Felton]] to the United States Senate as a temporary replacement for Tom Watson, who had died. Though Felton only served for one day, she was the first woman to serve in the Senate.
Hardwick was associated with progressivism earlier in his political career,<ref>[https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Myth_and_Southern_History_The_New_South/q-Tdit9xouUC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=After+1900+the+southern+progressive+movement+reveals+itself&pg=PA67&printsec=frontcover Myth and Southern History: The New South, Editors: Nicholas Cords and Patrick Gerster, 1989, P.67]</ref><ref>[https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=NHRFAAAAIBAJ&pg=PA6&dq=Trenton+True+American+hardwick+governor+wilson&article_id=4053,5145318&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiY4o_OwMqRAxU05QIHHcwKAY4Q6AF6BAgIEAM#v=onepage&q=Trenton%20True%20American%20hardwick%20governor%20wilson&f=false Trenton True American 3 Feb 1912]</ref> but by the time he served as governor of Georgia he had moved towards conservatism; denouncing what he regarded as paternalism and proclaiming his belief that “God helps those who help themselves.”<ref>[https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Short_time_Rural_Credits/0DAwAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=hardwick+God+helps+those+who+help+themselves&pg=RA1-PA2&printsec=frontcover Hearings Before the Joint Congressional Committee on Short-time Rural Credits, Sixty-seventh Congress, Second Session. Testimony Taken at Atlanta, Ga. January 26 and 27, 1922 By United States, Congress, Joint Committee on Short-Time Rural Credits, 1922, P.2]</ref> After his death, one journal said of Hardwick that he was “essentially a conservative, distrustful of reformers, and extremely jealous of states rights.”<ref>[https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Families_of_Southeastern_Georgia/SWRMkeyyIMwC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=hardwick+essentially+a+conservative,+distrustful+of+reformers,+and+extremely+jealous+of+states+rights&pg=PA272&printsec=frontcover Families of Southeastern Georgia By Jack N. Averitt, 2009, P.272]</ref>
==Death== Hardwick died of a heart attack on January 31, 1944, in Sandersville.<ref name="rites"/> Hardwick was interred in [[City Cemetery (Sandersville, Georgia)|Old City Cemetery]] in Sandersville.<ref name="cemetery">{{Cite web |url=https://www.sandersvillega.org/cemetery-history.cfm |title=Old City Cemetery History |website=sandersvillega.org |access-date=2021-08-14}}</ref>
==See also== * [[1919 United States anarchist bombings]]
==Notes== {{Reflist}}
==References== {{commons category|Thomas W. Hardwick}} {{CongBio|H000193}}
{{S-start}} {{s-ppo}} {{s-bef|before=[[Augustus Octavius Bacon]]}} {{s-ttl|title=[[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic]] nominee for [[United States Senator|U.S. Senator]] from [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]<br />([[Classes of United States senators|Class 2]])|years=[[1914 United States Senate special election in Georgia|1914]]}} {{s-aft|after=[[William J. Harris]]}} {{s-bef|before=[[Hugh Dorsey]]}} {{s-ttl|title=[[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic]] nominee for [[List of Governors of Georgia|Governor of Georgia]]|years=1920}} {{s-aft|after=[[Clifford Walker]]}} {{S-par|us-hs}} {{US House succession box |state = Georgia |district = 10 |before= [[William H. Fleming]] |after= [[Carl Vinson]] |years=March 4, 1903 – November 2, 1914 }} {{S-par|us-sen}} {{Succession box |before=[[William S. West]] |title=[[List of United States senators from Georgia|U.S. Senator (Class 2) from Georgia]] |years=November 4, 1914{{spaced ndash}}March 3, 1919 |after=[[William J. Harris]] }} {{S-off}} {{Succession box |before=[[Hugh Dorsey]] |title=[[List of governors of Georgia|Governor of Georgia]] |years=1921–1923 |after=[[Clifford Walker]] }} {{S-end}}
{{USSenGA}} {{Governors of Georgia}} {{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hardwick, Thomas W.}} [[Category:1872 births]] [[Category:1944 deaths]] [[Category:People from Thomasville, Georgia]] [[Category:Mercer University alumni]] [[Category:University of Georgia School of Law alumni]] [[Category:Democratic Party governors of Georgia (U.S. state)]] [[Category:Democratic Party members of the Georgia House of Representatives]] [[Category:Democratic Party United States senators from Georgia (U.S. state)]] [[Category:Democratic Party United States representatives from Georgia (U.S. state)]] [[Category:Georgia (U.S. state) lawyers]] [[Category:Phi Delta Theta members]] [[Category:20th-century United States senators]] [[Category:20th-century United States representatives]] [[Category:19th-century members of the Georgia General Assembly]] [[Category:20th-century members of the Georgia General Assembly]]