John M. Vorys Explained

John M. Vorys
State1:Ohio
District1:12th
Term Start1:January 3, 1939
Term End1:January 3, 1959
Preceded1:Arthur P. Lamneck
Succeeded1:Samuel L. Devine
Office2:Member of the Ohio Senate
Term2:1925–1926
Office3:Member of the Ohio House of Representatives
Term3:1923–1924
Birth Name:John Martin Vorys
Birth Date:16 June 1896
Birth Place:Lancaster, Ohio
Death Place:Columbus, Ohio
Restingplace:Green Lawn Cemetery, Columbus, Ohio
Party:Republican
Alma Mater:Moritz College of Law
Yale University

John Martin Vorys (June 16, 1896 – August 25, 1968) was a U.S. Representative from Ohio.

Early life

Born in Lancaster, Ohio, Vorys attended the public schools in Lancaster and Columbus, Ohio. During the First World War served overseas as a pilot in the famous "Yale Unit" of the United States Naval Air Service, retiring to inactive service in 1919 with rank of lieutenant. He graduated from Yale University in 1918, where he was a member of Skull and Bones,[1] [2] and from Ohio State University Law School at Columbus in 1923. He was a teacher in the College of Yale, Changsha, China, in 1919 and 1920. He served as assistant secretary, American delegation, Conference on Limitation of Armaments, Washington, D.C., in 1921 and 1922. He was admitted to the bar in 1923 and commenced practice in Columbus, Ohio, at the firm founded by his grandfather, Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease.[3]

Political career

He served as member of the Ohio House of Representatives in 1923 and 1924, and in the Ohio Senate in 1925 and 1926. He served as director of aeronautics of Ohio in 1929 and 1930.

Vorys was elected as a Republican to the Seventy-sixth and to the nine succeeding Congresses (January 3, 1939 – January 3, 1959). He did not seek reelection in 1958. Vorys voted in favor of the Civil Rights Act of 1957.[4]

A confidential 1943 analysis of the House Foreign Affairs Committee by Isaiah Berlin for the British Foreign Office described Vorys as[5]

In 1947–8, he served on the Herter Committee.[6]

Vorys served as delegate to the United Nations General Assembly in 1951, and as Regent of the Smithsonian Institution 1949–1959, before resuming the practice of law.

He died in Columbus, Ohio, August 25, 1968, and was interred in Green Lawn Cemetery.[7]

Buchenwald Concentration Camp

On April 11, 1945, US forces liberated the Buchenwald Concentration Camp which was established in 1937 and caused the death of a least 56,545 people. General Eisenhower left rotting corpses unburied so a visiting group of US legislators could truly understand the horror of the atrocities. This group was visiting Buchenwald to inspect the camp and learn firsthand about the enormity of the Nazi Final Solution and treatment of other prisoners.

The legislators who visited included Alben W. Barkley, Ed Izac, John M. Vorys, Dewey Short, C. Wayland Brooks, and Kenneth S. Wherry along with General Omar N. Bradley and journalists Joseph Pulitzer, Norman Chandler, William I. Nichols and Julius Ochs Adler.[8] [9]

References

Retrieved on 2009-02-22

Notes and References

  1. Memorabilia Yalensia . The Yale Literary Magazine . 1917 . 82 . 8 . 291.
  2. Book: . Isaacson. Walter. Thomas. Evan. Walter Isaacson. Evan Thomas . 1997 . Simon and Schuster . 690.
  3. http://www.vssp.com/about-history.html Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease firm history
  4. Web site: HR 6127. CIVIL RIGHTS ACT OF 1957.. GovTrack.us.
  5. American Profiles on Capitol Hill: A Confidential Study for the British Foreign Office in 1943 . https://web.archive.org/web/20131021185357/http://berlin.wolf.ox.ac.uk/published_works/singles/bib139a/bib139a.pdf . 2013-10-21 . Hachey, Thomas E. . Wisconsin Magazine of History . Winter 1973–1974 . 57 . 2 . 141–153 . 4634869.
  6. Web site: Final Report on Foreign Aid of the House Select Committee on Foreign Aid. Marshall Foundation. May 1, 1948. May 30, 2020.
  7. Jeffery C. Livingston, Swallowed by Globalism: John M. Vorys and American Foreign Policy (University Press of America, 2001)
  8. Web site: American Congressmen and reporters visit Buchenwald, April 24, 1945. www.scrapbookpages.com. 2019-09-13. 2020-11-18. https://web.archive.org/web/20201118003856/http://www.scrapbookpages.com/buchenwald/Liberation5.html. dead.
  9. Web site: American congressmen view the open ovens in the Buchenwald crematorium. - Collections Search - United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. collections.ushmm.org. 2019-09-13.