Bert T. Combs
Bertram Thomas Combs (
August 13,
1911 –
December 4,
1991), born in
Manchester,
Clay County, Kentucky, was the
Democratic Governor of Kentucky from 1959 through 1963.
Combs attended the
University of Kentucky and graduated from the UK
Law School in 1937. Shortly thereafter, he was admitted to the bar and began his practice in Manchester, later moving to
Prestonsburg.
Combs began his political career with his election to the office of City Attorney in Prestonsburg in 1950, and later became
Commonwealth's Attorney. Less than two years later, he was elected to fill a vacancy on the
Kentucky Court of Appeals, where he served until 1955. That year, he resigned to run for Governor and was defeated by former Governor
A.B. "Happy" Chandler in the Democratic primary. Combs' candidacy and defeat were inextricably intertwined with factionalism in the Kentucky
Democratic Party, with Chandler heading one faction and Combs' ally
Earle C. Clements heading the other faction. Four years later, Combs was elected Governor. Combs defeated his Democratic primary opponent, the incumbent
Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky Harry Lee Waterfield who was an ally of Chandler, and then defeated
Republican nominee
John M. Robsion, Jr..
During his administration, Bert Combs created a
merit system for state government workers that is still in place today. He also formed the state's first Human Rights Commission and also ordered the
desegregation of all public accommodations in Kentucky. Combs improved Kentucky's education department and expanded the state's highway system. The
Bert T. Combs Mountain Parkway, which covers roughly eighty miles in Eastern Kentucky, was named in honor of the former governor.
Kentucky's Constitution then prohibited Combs from reelection, and in 1967 he appointed to the
United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit as a
Circuit Judge by
President Lyndon Johnson. Four years later, he resigned the judgeship to run for Governor again but was defeated in the Democratic primary by
Wendell H. Ford, who would later become Kentucky's long-serving member of the
United States Senate.
Combs eventually retired from public life but maintained an office in
Frankfort. Combs was later recruited by the Council for Better Education to serve as lead attorney in the lawsuit challenging the state's education funding system. The 1989 victory in the state supreme court led to the passage of the 1990 Kentucky Education Reform Act, which is widely viewed as a landmark progressive education bill in a historically conservative state with poor educational funding and outcomes. [From Charles J. Russo and Jane Clark Lindle, "On the cutting edge: Family Resource/Youth Service Centers in Kentucky, Politics of Education Association Yearbook, 1993, pp.178-187]
On the evening of
December 4,
1991, Combs was coming home from Frankfort when his car was swept from a roadway near Rosslyn, in
Powell County into the flooded
Red River. The 80-year-old former Governor drowned as a result. He was buried in Manchester.
*Powell, Robert. "Kentucky Governors" 1990.
