Raymond E. Baldwin

Raymond E. Baldwin
Associate Justice of the Connecticut Supreme Court of Errors
In office
1949–1959
United States Senator
from Connecticut
In office
December 27, 1946 – December 16, 1949
Preceded byThomas C. Hart
Succeeded byWilliam Benton
72nd & 74th Governor of Connecticut
In office
January 6, 1943 – December 27, 1946
LieutenantWilliam L. Hadden
Wilbert Snow
Preceded byRobert A. Hurley
Succeeded byWilbert Snow
In office
January 4, 1939 – January 8, 1941
LieutenantJames L. McConaughy
Preceded byWilbur Lucius Cross
Succeeded byRobert A. Hurley
Majority Leader of the Connecticut House of Representatives
In office
1933
Member of the Connecticut House of Representatives
In office
1931-1933
Personal details
Born
Raymond Earl Baldwin

(1893-08-31)August 31, 1893
Rye, New York, U.S.
DiedOctober 4, 1986(1986-10-04) (aged 93)
Fairfield, Connecticut, U.S.
Political partyRepublican
Spouse
Edith Lindholm
(m. 1922; died 1970)
Children3
EducationWesleyan University
Yale Law School (LL.B.)
Professionlawyer, politician, judge
Military service
Branch/service United States Navy
Years of service1918–1919
Rank Lieutenant (junior grade)
Battles/warsWorld War I

Raymond Earl Baldwin (August 31, 1893 – October 4, 1986) was an American politician who served as a United States senator from Connecticut and also as the 72nd and 74th Governor of Connecticut. A conservative Republican, he was elected governor of Connecticut in 1938 during a Republican landslide promising a balanced budget, government aid to private business, and lower taxes. He sharply cut the state budget, producing a million dollars surplus. He was defeated for reelection in 1940, but was elected governor again in 1942 and 1944. He supervised a complex system of civil defense and statewide services on the homefront during the war. He planned an elaborate program to deal with the postwar reconversion of Connecticut's many warplane and munitions plants. He was elected to the Senate in the Republican landslide of 1946. As a spokesman for the small businesses of America, he compiled a conservative record in favor of less regulation, except for more regulation of labor unions through the Taft–Hartley Act. As chairman of a subcommittee of the Armed Services committee, Baldwin engaged in a long-running dispute with Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy. McCarthy alleged that Baldwin was whitewashing an episode in which Army prosecutors in 1944 gained the death penalty for German soldiers accused of massacring Americans at the Malmedy Massacre. Exhausted by the highly publicized controversy, Baldwin resigned from the Senate in December 1949 to become a state judge.[1]

  1. ^ Eleonora W. Schoenebaum, ed. Political Profiles: The Truman Years (1978) pp 18-19