Courtesy of the Arkansas History Commission
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Donaghey was born in Union Parish, Louisiana, on July 1, 1856. At age fifteen he ran away from home to become a cowboy in Texas.
In 1879 Donaghey settled in Conway, Arkansas, a new and booming railroad town, and soon acquired a reputation as a skilled carpenter. After studying briefly at the University of Arkansas in 1882-1883, he returned to Conway to teach school. Donaghey married Louvenia Wallace of Lonoke County, Arkansas in 1883. The couple had no children. In 1886 he became a partner with John A. Pence in a cabinet shop. The same year a fire ravaged downtown Conway and the partners made their fortune as contractors in its subsequent rebuilding.
Donaghey became one of the most important construction contractors in Arkansas, numbering Hendrix College and the Faulkner County Courthouse among his accomplishments. In 1899 he was appointed to the commission charged with constructing the new state capitol. Jeff Davis's interference with the capitol project angered Donaghey and inspired his entrance into politics.
A pledge to complete the capitol became a cornerstone of Donaghey's campaign for governor in 1908. His status as a political outsider appealed to a public weary of infighting between Davis and the conservative wing of the Democratic Party.
Donaghey proved to be one of the most effective governors in Arkansas. He fulfilled his pledge to complete the state capitol building, and the legislature met in the new building in 1911. Having seen his own sister die of tuberculosis, Donaghey made Arkansas a national leader in the public-health movement. While he failed in efforts to render Arkansas's tax structure more progressive, Donaghey virtually single-handedly led the campaign to adopt Amendment 10 to the Arkansas Constitution. Amendment 10 allowed the process of "initiative and referendum", a form of so-called "direct democracy" where citizens could propose laws by means of petitions and then have them enacted by vote of the people. Donaghey convinced William Jennings Bryan to come to Arkansas to campaign for the measure. In 1910 Arkansas became the first Southern state to adopt the initiative and referendum. Donaghey ended the abuses of the convict-lease system through the wholesale pardoning of 360 prisoners whose sentences had been artificially extended so they might be used as slave labor. He also championed the cause of education, tax reform, and prohibition. Either directly or indirectly, Donaghey was responsible for six of Arkansas's ten public universities, presently known as Arkansas State University, University of Arkansas at Little Rock, South Arkansas University, University of Arkansas at Monticello, University of Central Arkansas, and Arkansas Tech.
Donaghey failed to win a third term as governor as a prohibition candidate.
See also these articles from The Arkansas News:
Next: Joseph Taylor Robinson
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