Gov. Albert H. Roberts 35th Governor of Tennessee - 1919-2921

Roberts's support for suffrage is the part of his term the state remembers, but he also governed through a tax revolt. His plan to lower property taxes through standardized assessments went wrong when owners of intangible property failed to report their holdings. The state fell back on land, and farm tax rates rose about 260 percent in a single year. He also used state troops against labor. Roberts alienated both wings of his party, and Republican Alf Taylor defeated him in 1920, the year Tennessee's vote helped make the amendment law.

What the plaque says

Gov. Albert H. Roberts 35th Governor of Tennessee - 1919-2921 Albert H. Roberts lived on this site from 1910 to 1920. This building, previously located on Main Street, was his law office. During Governor Roberts' administration, the General Assembly cast the decisive vote that made the women's suffrage amendment part of the United States Constitution. The Nineteenth Amendment passed the Tennessee General Assembly by one vote with Roberts' support. Governor Roberts died on June 25, 1946, and is buried in Good Hope Cemetery.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Standing Stone State Park — 7.9 mi
  A New Deal park on Mill Creek named for a vanished stone that Native peoples revered and railroad builders blasted, with a lake, 1930s cabins and a marbles championship.
• Cordell Hull Birthplace and Museum State Park — 15 mi
  A replica of the log cabin where the secretary of state and Nobel laureate was born in 1871, with a museum of his belongings, in Pickett County's hills.
• Cummins Falls State Park — 16 mi
  A 75-foot waterfall and swimming hole on the Blackburn Fork, saved from a housing development in 2011 and opened as Tennessee's 54th state park.
• Muddy Pond Mennonite Community — 17 mi
  A Mennonite farming community in Overton County near Monterey, known for sorghum syrup pressed and boiled each fall and for the farm stores along its roads.

More markers nearby

• Livingston Academy — steps away
• Birthplace of Lester Raymond Flatt — 0.3 mi
• Alpine School — 5.6 mi
• Albert Houston Roberts — 5.8 mi