John Ellis Martineau
| John Ellis Martineau | |
|---|---|
 |
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| 28th Governor of Arkansas | |
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In office January 11, 1927 – March 4, 1928 |
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| Lieutenant | Harvey Parnell |
| Preceded by | Tom Jefferson Terral |
| Succeeded by | Harvey Parnell |
| Judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas | |
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In office 1928–1937 |
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| Nominated by | Calvin Coolidge |
| Preceded by | Jacob Trieber |
| Succeeded by | Thomas Clark Trimble III |
| Member of the Arkansas House of Representatives | |
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In office 1902-1905 |
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| Personal details | |
| Born |
December 2, 1873 Clay County, Missouri, USA |
| Died | March 6, 1937 (aged 63) Little Rock, Pulaski County Arkansas, USA |
| Resting place | Roselawn Memorial Park in Little Rock, Arkansas |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Alma mater | University of Arkansas School of Law |
| Profession | Attorney |
John Ellis Martineau (December 2, 1873 – March 6, 1937) was the 28th Governor of Arkansas, having served for less than one term from 1927 to 1928. His term was marked by the Great Mississippi Flood, when he was named president of the Tri-State Flood Commission.
John Ellis Martineau was born in Clay County in western Missouri and graduated from the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville in 1896 and obtained his law degree from the University of Arkansas School of Law in 1899. After graduation, he served as a school administrator.
From 1902 to 1905, he was a member of the Arkansas House of Representatives. He was appointed chancellor of the First Chancery Court in 1907 and served in that capacity until 1927.
While serving in that court he issued a writ of habeas corpus for defendants in the criminal prosecutions arising out of the Elaine Race Riot in Phillips County in eastern Arkansas. Although the Arkansas Supreme Court later vacated that order, it allowed the defendants enough time to avoid execution and to seek habeas corpus relief in federal court. Their guilty verdicts were eventually reversed by the United States Supreme Court in its groundbreaking decision in Moore v. Dempsey.
Martineau ran unsuccessfully for governor in the 1924 Democratic primary. In 1926, he unseated in the primary the one-term incumbent Tom Jefferson Terral and then defeated in the general election the Republican attorney Drew Bowers, originally from Pocahontas in Randolph County, in northeastern Arkansas. Martineau received 76.5 percent of the vote to Bowers's 23.6 percent. Bowers was an assistant U.S. attorney for the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas in both the Coolidge and Eisenhower administrations.
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