Governor
On April 30, 1807, he defeated the incumbent Governor Morgan Lewis – Tompkins received 35,074 votes, Lewis 30,989 – and remained in office as Governor of New York until 1817. He was reelected in 1810, defeating Jonas Platt – Tompkins 43,094 votes, Jonas Platt 36,484. In 1813 he defeated Stephen Van Rensselaer – Tompkins 43,324 votes, Van Rensselaer 39,718 – and in 1816, he beat Rufus King – Tompkins 45,412 votes, King 38,647. He declined an appointment as United States Secretary of State by President James Madison.
During the War of 1812, Tompkins proved to be one of the most effective war governors. He played an important role in reorganizing the state militia and promoted the formation of a standing state military force based on select conscription.
In 1815 Tompkins established a settlement along the eastern shore of Staten Island that came to be called Tompkinsville. He built a dock along the waterfront in the neighborhood in 1817 and began offering daily steam ferry service between Staten Island and Manhattan.
Read more about this topic: Daniel D. Tompkins
Famous quotes containing the word governor:
“Three years ago, also, when the Sims tragedy was acted, I said to myself, There is such an officer, if not such a man, as the Governor of Massachusetts,—what has he been about the last fortnight? Has he had as much as he could do to keep on the fence during this moral earthquake?... He could at least have resigned himself into fame.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“President Lowell of Harvard appealed to students ‘to prepare themselves for such services as the Governor may call upon them to render.’ Dean Greenough organized an ‘emergency committee,’ and Coach Fisher was reported by the press as having declared, ‘To hell with football if men are needed.’”
—For the State of Massachusetts, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“Ah, Governor [Murphy, of New Jersey], don’t try to deceive me as to the sentiment of the dear people. I have been hearing from the West and the East, and the South seems to be the only section which approves of me at all, and that comes from merely a generous impulse, for even that section would deny me its votes.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)