Deems Hardy Clifton (1910-1998)

From the 1947 North Carolina Manual.

   Sampson County, North Carolina native Deems Hardy Clifton represented his home county in the state legislature for one term and was later an unsuccessful aspirant for the state senate and state commissioner of insurance. The son of William Deems and Cora (Kornegay) Clifton, Deems Hardy Clifton's birth occurred on August 1, 1910, in Duplin County. Clifton was a student at the Faison High School in Duplin County and continued his education at the University of North Carolina from 1928-31. 

  Following graduation, Clifton began a long career as an insurance agent in Sampson County, being an owner of the Clinton Insurance Agency. A  real estate dealer in addition to his insurance business, Clifton was a longstanding member of the North Carolina Association of Insurance Agents, where he served on the committees on Rural Agents and Finance. He married in Fayetteville, North Carolina on May 17, 1934, to Gwendolyn Madge Britt (1909-2006). The couple's fifty-four-year union saw the births 0f two daughters, both of whom died in infancy. 

   At the age of just twenty-three Deems Clifton began his political ascent, being elected as a town commissioner for Clinton, North Carolina. Serving from 1933-35, Clifton went on to be named as Chairman of the Duplin County Republican Executive Committee for a two year period (1935-37), and for a decade held the chairmanship of the Third Congressional District Committee. From 1940-42 Clifton held a seat on the State Republican Executive Committee and in the year of his legislative election was a member of the Republican State Finance Committee. Elected to the North Carolina House of Representatives in November 1946, Clifton served during the 1947-49 session and was a member of the following committees: Education, Finance, Game, Mental Institutions, Insurance, Military Affairs, Unemployment Compensation, and Trustees of the State University. Clifton was also one of only 11 Republicans serving in this particular session, out of a total of 119 representatives!

   Midway through Clifton's single term in the house, he received the Republican nomination for State Commissioner of Insurance in March 1948. Despite a strong showing at the polls with 207, 092 votes, Clifton would lose that contest to Democratic incumbent William P. Hodges, who polled over 500,000 votes. Following this defeat, Clifton continued in the insurance business in Clinton and from 1953-54 held the office of chairman of the Independent Insurance Agents of North Carolina. In 1960 he again sought elected office when he entered into the race for State Insurance Commissioner in that year's primary but was dealt another loss, polling just 6, 748 votes to Democrat Charles Gold's winning total of 422, 981.

From the Duplin Times Progress Sentinel, October 24, 1968.

  In 1968 Deems Clifton was induced to reenter politics, in that year becoming a nominee for the North Carolina Senate from the 10th senatorial district. He would lose that contest in November to former state senator Stewart Bethune Warren (1916-1981), who continued to serve in the Senate until 1973. Five years following this defeat, Clifton achieved some measure of consolation when he was appointed to the Small Business Administration's District Advisory Council for the Charlotte district. Clifton's full dates of service on that council remain unknown at this time, and he continued residence in Sampson County until his death at age 87 on March 11, 1998. His wife Gwendolyn survived her husband by eight years, and after her death at age 96 in 2006 was interred alongside him at the Springvale Cemetery in Clinton.

Deems H. Clifton, from the April 4, 1966 "Piedmonter".