Andrew Mellon
Pennsylvania politics, 1921–1933

Knox and Penrose both died in 1921, leaving a power vacuum in Pennsylvania Republican politics. Along with his nephew, William Larimer Mellon, Mellon became an influential player in Pennsylvania politics, and their support helped ensure the elections of Senator David A. Reed and Senator George W. Pepper in 1922. Mellon was unable to assert the same level of control that Boies Penrose had had over state politics, and his leadership of the state party was challenged by William Scott Vare of Philadelphia and progressive leader Gifford Pinchot, who won the 1922 Pennsylvania gubernatorial election. Nonetheless, Mellon would continue to exert an important influence on Pennsylvania politics throughout the 1920s, especially in senatorial elections and in Allegheny County. Mellon's influence over state politics waned in the early 1930s, as the progressive allies of Governor Pinchot took control of the state Republican Party.
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