Robert Emmet Quinn (2 April 1894-19 May 1975) was the Democratic Governor of Rhode Island from 5 January 1937 to 3 January 1939, succeeding Theodore F. Green and preceding William Henry Vanderbilt III.
Biography[]
Robert Emmet Quinn was born in Phenix, Rhode Island in 1894, and he served in the Foreign Service during World War I before serving in the State Senate from 1923 to 1925 and from 1929 to 1933, as Lieutenant Governor from 1933 to 1937, and as Governor from 1937 to 1939. As Lieutenant Governor, he prevented two fraudulently-elected Republicans from being seated in the State Senate and participated in the elimination of Republican corruption in the state, ushering in a long period of Democratic rule. He served as Governor from 1937 to 1939, and he implemented a meritocracy, a personal income tax, and exemption for the poor from real estate taxes. He went on to serve as a captain in the US Navy during World War II and as Chief Justice of the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces from 1951 to 1971, and he died in 1975.