Charles S. Thomas (December 6, 1849-June 24, 1934) was a United States Senator from Colorado. Born in Darien, McIntosh County, Georgia, he attended private schools in Georgia and Connecticut, and served briefly in the Confederate Army. Thomas graduated from the law department of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor in 1871, and was admitted to the bar in 1871. He moved to Colorado and commenced practice in Denver, and was Denver city attorney in 1875 and 1876. He was a member of the Democratic National Committee from 1884 to 1896, and was an unsuccessful candidate for election to the United States House of Representatives in 1884, to the Senate in 1888 and 1895, and to the governorship in 1894. Thomas was Governor of Colorado from 1899 to 1901, and was elected as a Democrat to the United States Senate in 1913 to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Charles J. Hughes, Jr. he was reelected in 1914, and served from January 15, 1913, to March 3, 1921. In 1920, he was an unsuccessful candidate for reelection on the Nationalist ticket.
In the Sixty-third and Sixty-fourth Congresses, Thomas was chairman of the Committee on Woman Suffrage, and a member of the Committee on Coast Defenses (Sixty-fifth Congress) and the Committee on Pacific Railroads (Sixty-sixth Congress). He resumed the practice of law and died in Denver; h is remains were cremated and the ashes interred in Fairmount Cemetery. This article incorporates facts obtained from the public domain Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
