Happy Chandler

First term as Governor

When Beckham chose not to run for governor, the group opposed to Laffoon threw its support behind Chandler instead of Rhea. In the primary, Chandler hammered the unpopular sales tax, dubbing Rhea "Sales Tax Tom" and urging voters to save the state from "Ruby, Rhea, and Ruin." The first round gave Rhea 203,010 votes to Chandler's 189,575, with Frederick A. Wallis taking 38,410 and Elam Huddleston 15,501. Since no one had a majority, a runoff followed.

Wallis and Huddleston both endorsed Chandler, who beat Rhea by 26,449 votes for the nomination. Chandler vowed to kill the sales tax, cut the gasoline tax, block any property tax hike, and stop the practice of taking a cut of state employees' pay for campaigns. Furious at the loss, Laffoon and his allies backed Republican King Swope. The race turned on personal attacks and the records of Presidents Hoover and Roosevelt.

Chandler beat Swope by 95,158 votes, the biggest margin ever in a Kentucky governor's race, and at 37 became the youngest governor of any U.S. state.

United States Senator

Both Robert Bingham and Percy Haly died in 1937. With J. C. W. Beckham aging, Chandler moved to fill the leadership void in the faction and came to believe he was destined to become president. The retirement of Justice George Sutherland in January 1938 gave President Franklin Roosevelt an opportunity, but Roosevelt preferred younger justices and Kentucky's senior senator, Alben Barkley, recommended Solicitor General Stanley Forman Reed for the appointment.

Roosevelt heeded Barkley's advice. Angered by this, Chandler did not attend a dinner in Barkley's honor on January 22, 1938, instead holding his own event and alluding to challenging Barkley in the Democratic primary. Barkley announced his re-election bid the next day. After a January 31 meeting with Roosevelt, Chandler was encouraged by his political mentor Harry F. Byrd to challenge Barkley, and he officially announced his candidacy on February 23, 1938, in Newport, Kentucky.

Commissioner of baseball

After the death of baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis in November 1944, John O. Gottlieb suggested Chandler as a successor. Baseball owners, who had feared their players would be made eligible for the draft during the war, wanted a commissioner with skills to represent baseball's interests in Washington, D.C. Chandler had advocated for baseball as a senator, which endeared him to owners, and the $50,000 annual salary—about five times that of a U.S. senator—was a significant enticement.

Other candidates included National League President Ford Frick, Democratic National Committee Chairman Robert E. Hannegan, former Postmaster General James Farley, Senator John W. Bricker, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, former federal Judge Fred M. Vinson, Ohio Governor Frank Lausche, and Undersecretary of War Robert P. Patterson. After opposition to Frick from Warren Giles and Philip K. Wrigley, Larry MacPhail began advocating for Chandler. When owners met in Cleveland on April 24, 1945, Chandler's name was not on the shortlist.

None of the shortlisted candidates received the required two-thirds majority. After lobbying by MacPhail and Horace Stoneham, an informal vote showed Chandler in the top three on each of sixteen ballots. A formal vote followed; after two ballots Chandler received the necessary majority, and a third vote made the choice unanimous.

Second term as Governor

Chandler remained involved in politics during his tenure as baseball commissioner. In 1948, he was the de facto leader of the Dixiecrat movement in Kentucky, hosting presidential candidate Strom Thurmond at his home; his wife Mildred signed the petition to get Thurmond on the state's ballot, and his newspaper editor Orval Baylor was co-chair of the States Rights Democratic Party in Kentucky. Chandler did not officially endorse Thurmond because of his baseball role.

When he permanently returned to Kentucky in mid-1951, it was too late to play a major role in the gubernatorial contest, and he endorsed Governor Lawrence Wetherby. He spent the next four years rebuilding his political base. Twenty years after his first governorship, Chandler entered the 1955 race using the slogan 'Be like your Pappy and vote for Happy. Lieutenant Governor Emerson 'Doc' Beauchamp was handicapped by connections to political bosses.

Clements handpicked Judge Bert T. Combs, whom Chandler nicknamed 'The Little Judge. Chandler portrayed Combs as a pawn of Clements and Wetherby, whom he derisively called 'Clementine' and 'Wetherbine. Combs's first campaign speech, read verbatim from notes, included an admission that a sales tax might be needed to balance the budget. Chandler charged that Combs would raise taxes while promising to lower them as he had in his first term.

Did You Know?

• Chandler's mother abandoned the family when he was young; he later found her living in Jacksonville, Florida, where she had remarried and he had three half-siblings.
• His full brother Robert Chandler died at age 13 after falling from a cherry tree.
• Chandler was a vestryman at St. John's Church in Versailles and received the Bishop's Medal of the Episcopal Church in 1959.