Henry Horner
28thGovernor of Illinois
In office January 9, 1933 – October 6, 1940
Lieutenant	Thomas Donovan John Stelle
Preceded by	Louis Emmerson
Succeeded by	John Stelle
Personal details
Born	Henry Levy (1878-11-30)November 30, 1878 Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Died	October 6, 1940(1940-10-06) (aged 61) Winnetka, Illinois, U.S.
Political party	Democratic
Education	University of Chicago Illinois Institute of Technology (LLB)

Henry Horner (November 30, 1878 – October 6, 1940^[1]) was an American politician. Horner served as the28th Governor of Illinois, serving from January 1933 until his death in October 1940. Horner was noted as the first Jewish governor ofIllinois.

Horner was born Henry Levy to Solomon Abraham Levy and Dilah Horner inChicago. He assumed the Horner surname after his parents divorced in 1883. He attended theUniversity of Chicago. Horner attendedIIT Chicago-Kent College of Law and received his LLB in 1898.^[2] Horner was a lawyer and served as a probate judge from 1915 to 1931.

First elected governor in1932, Horner served during the difficult years of theGreat Depression. Because of a fiscal crisis in Illinois during his first term in office, he was forced to ask the General Assembly for newtax revenue.^{[citation needed]} In 1933, he signed Illinois's first permanentsales tax law into effect with an inaugural rate of 2.0%. Horner also signed a bill in 1935 increasing the Illinois sales tax rate to 3.0%.

Horner's administration was marked by integrity and a strong commitment to both conservative fiscal management and the needs of the indigent and those in state institutions.^{[citation needed]} His insistence on stopping graft and keeping state payrolls free of non-working patronage appointees put him at odds with the Democratic political organization of Chicago run by Patrick Nash and MayorEdward Joseph Kelly.^{[citation needed]} They backed a rival candidate in the1936 primary,Herman Bundesen, the President of the Chicago Board of Public Health and a well-known physician,^[3] who carried Cook County, but whom Horner defeated with the help of a large downstate vote.

Horner went on to win re-election in November 1936 and was now determined to defeat the Kelly-Nash machine. He supported the election ofScott W. Lucas to the Senate in 1938 to succeed retiring incumbentWilliam H. Dieterich, who had proven to be anti-Semitic and somewhat pro-German.^{[citation needed]}

Horner suffered a stroke four days before the November election and spent five months recovering in Florida before returning to Illinois, too late to mount the campaign he had wanted to lead against the re-election of Mayor Kelly. Horner's health wavered over the next year until a collapse in the summer of 1940. He convalesced in Winnetka andHighland Park, Illinois from June 1940 until his death, in early October. Horner was succeeded by his fellow Democrat, Lt. GovernorJohn H. Stelle. Horner was a member of Temple B'rith Sholom inSpringfield, Illinois.^[4]

Horner is interred atZion Gardens Cemetery in the Mt. Mayriv section, aJewish cemetery in theDunningneighborhood of Chicago. AJewish summer camp inIngleside, a suburb of Chicago, is named Camp Henry Horner after him. Horner, a lifelong bachelor, collected memorabilia related toAbraham Lincoln and bequeathed it to the people of Illinois. The Horner Collection is now stored and partly displayed in theAbraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield, Illinois. Horner Park, located in Chicago, is a 55-acre (220,000 m²) facility bordered by Montrose Avenue to the north,Irving Park Road to the south, California Avenue to the west, and the north branch of theChicago River to the east. TheGovernor Horner State Memorial is located in Horner Park. TheChicago Housing Authority built theHenry Horner Homes, a public housing project on Chicago's near–west side; named in honor of Governor Horner in 1957.

• (1969) Thomas B. Littlewood,Horner of Illinois. Northwestern University Press.
• (2007) Charles J. Masters,Governor Henry Horner, Chicago Politics, And The Great Depression. Southern Illinois University Press.ISBN 0-8093-2739-2.

• Henry Horner atFind a Grave
• Henry Horner Collection at the Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum

• 1878 births
• 1940 deaths
• Chicago-Kent College of Law alumni
• Democratic Party governors of Illinois
• Illinois state court judges
• Jewish American state governors of the United States
• Politicians from Chicago
• University of Chicago alumni

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