Martin L. Sweeney
Martin Leonard Sweeney
(April 15, 1885 – May 1, 1960)
Bio Notes
At the age of 12 Martin found work to support his family while attending St. Bridget’s Parochial School, and later worked as a longshoreman, construction worker, laborer, hoisting engineer and a salesman while attending Cleveland Law School of Baldwin-Wallace College, graduating and being admitted to the Ohio bar in 1914. After one term (1913-14) in the Ohio legislature, Martin entered private practice until 1923, when he became a Municipal Court judge. On the bench he vocally opposed Prohibition. From 1924-32 Sweeney was judge of the municipal court of Cleveland.
In 1931, Martin was elected as a Democrat to the Seventy-second Congress. He was re-elected to the Seventy-third and the four succeeding Congresses, serving from November 1931 to 1943.
After losing Cleveland’s 1933 Democratic mayorial primary, Martin broke from the local Democratic Party and supported the Republican candidate. Then in mid-1936, he turned against President Roosevelt’s policies, supporting Father Charles Coughlin. Reelected in 1934 and 1936 without Democratic party support, Martin considered his victories as mandates for independent action.
During the late 1930s his politics became increasingly isolationist and Martin was an unsuccessful candidate for re-nomination in 1942 after being targeted for his stand against British Lend Lease and his isolationism.
He was an unsuccessful for Democratic nomination for mayor of Cleveland in 1933 and in 1941, and for the gubernatorial nomination in 1944. Martin went on to practice law with his son Robert E. Sweeney until his death on May 1, 1960. He is interred at Calvary Cemetery.
Martin married Marie Carlin in 1921 and had four children:
- Martin, Jr.
- Anne Marie
- Robert
- Eileen