Robert L. Williams
|Robert Lee Williams|
|3rd Governor of Oklahoma|
January 11, 1915 – January 13, 1919
|Lieutenant||Martin E. Trapp|
|Preceded by||
Robert L. Williams
|Robert Lee Williams|
|3rd Governor of Oklahoma|
January 11, 1915 – January 13, 1919
|Lieutenant||Martin E. Trapp|
|Preceded by||Lee Cruce|
|Succeeded by||James Robertson|
|1st Chief Justice of Oklahoma|
December 20, 1868|
April 10, 1948
Robert Lee Williams (December 20, 1868 – April 10, 1948) was an American lawyer, judge, and the third governor of Oklahoma. Williams played a role in the drafting of the Oklahoma Constitution and served as the first Oklahoma Supreme Court chief justice. He also served the United States federal government as a district and circuit judge.
As governor, Williams oversaw the state's response to the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling against Jim Crow laws and its involvement in World War I. He instituted the Oklahoma State Board of Affairs, which provided central purchasing services to state agencies. Due to his direct administrative role and concentration of power, Williams counteracted the loss of executive power under Governor Lee Cruce. He was succeeded by James B. A. Robertson.
Williams died in 1948 in Durant, Oklahoma, where he is buried.
- Early life 1
- Statehood convention delegate 2
- Oklahoma Supreme Court chief justice 3
- Governor of Oklahoma 4
- Service in federal courts 5
- Death 6
- State of the State Speeches 7
- References 8
Williams was born on December 20, 1868, near Brundidge, Alabama. Williams earned a number of degrees, one included a study of Methodist doctrines, entitling him to become a certified minister. Earning a Doctor of Laws degree, Williams passed the Alabama bar exam in 1891 at the age of 23 and began his practice in Troy, Alabama.
At the age of 25, Williams, in 1893, moved to the Cherokee Outlet in Indian Territory following its opening where he briefly practiced law in Orlando. After briefly moving back to Alabama, Williams returned to Indian Territory in 1897 and settled in Durant. He became increasingly involved in local politics and a driving force behind the Democratic Party in modern day eastern Oklahoma in his role as the national committeeman from Indian Territory.
Statehood convention delegate
Selected to represent Durant and the surrounding area at the Oklahoma Constitutional Convention, Williams traveled to Guthrie where he would meet two men that would have profound effects on both his and Oklahoma’s future: Charles N. Haskell and William H. Murray. Through their labors, Oklahoma’s Constitution was established and Oklahoma became a state on November 16, 1907. On that same day, Charles Haskell was inaugurated as the first governor of Oklahoma.
Oklahoma Supreme Court chief justice
Through his friendship with Haskell and his own skill as an attorney, Williams was appointed by Haskell to the Oklahoma Supreme Court. Once on the Court, Williams was selected to serve as the Court’s first Chief Justice. He was reappointed that post again in 1908 and would serve in that office until 1914, the only position he would hold on Oklahoma’s highest court.
In 1914, before the end of Oklahoma’s second governor’s term, Governor Lee Cruce, Williams resigned from his position as Chief Justice in order to place his name in the Democratic primaries for Governor of Oklahoma. His fame as Chief Justice easily won him the Democratic nomination. Despite being a Democrat, Wil