About David Bennett Hill
David Bennett Hill (August 29, 1843 – October 20, 1910) was an American politician from New York who was the 29th Governor of New York from 1885 to 1891.
He was Mayor of Elmira, New York in 1882. He was Lieutenant Governor of New York from 1883 to 1885, elected in 1882 on the Democratic ticket with Governor Grover Cleveland. He was Governor from 1885 to 1891, succeeding to the office upon Cleveland's resignation and re-elected in 1885 and 1888. During his tenure as Governor, William Kemmler was executed in the electric chair, the first inmate in the country ever to be put to death in this manner. On April 23, 1889 Hill vetoed a bill from the state legislature that would block the street construction at the Polo Grounds.
He was a U.S. Senator from New York from 1892 to 1897. He was elected in February 1891, but took his seat only after the end of his term as governor in January 1892. He was also a candidate for the Democratic nomination for President in 1892, but lost to Grover Cleveland, who later won the presidential election. He was defeated by Republican Levi P. Morton when, as a sitting U.S senator, he ran again for Governor in November 1894. While Senator in 1893 and 1894 he blocked President Cleveland's two appointments to the U.S. Supreme Court: William B. Hornblower and Wheeler H. Peckham who had opposed Hill's political machine.