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Raymond Hoyt "Ray" Thornton, Jr. (born July 16, 1928, in Conway, Arkansas) is a former U.S. Representative from the U.S. state of Arkansas. Thornton earned a degree in political science from Yale University and, later, a law degree from the University of Arkansas. He served in the United States Navy during the Korean War, earning the rank of lieutenant. Thornton returned to law school after returning from Korea; obtaining his law degree in 1956. After election as Arkansas Attorney General in 1970, he was elected to Congress as a Democrat in 1972. He defeated fellow Democrat Richard S. Arnold of Texarkana in the primary. Thornton went on to serve three terms in the House. He served as a member of the Judiciary Committee considering Articles of Impeachment against President Richard Nixon, and was included in the group of three southern Democrats and four moderate Republicans who drafted the articles adopted by the Committee. Thornton did not run for a fourth term in the House. Instead, he ran for the Senate, but narrowly lost in the Democratic primary to Governor David Pryor. Pryor then defeated a liberal Republican, William T. Kelly, in the general election. After his defeat in the Senate race, Thornton became involved in education, serving as President of Arkansas State University and then the University of Arkansas from 1984 to 1990. In 1991, Thornton ran for Congress in another district. His former popularity had not faded, and he easily beat his opponent. He left Congress after another three terms, retiring in 1997. Thornton served as a justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court from 1997 to 2005. After retiring from the court, he became the first public service fellow for the William Bowen School of Law at the University of Arkansas in Little Rock. In 2009, he became the first chairman of the Arkansas Lottery Commission, which operates the Arkansas Scholarship Lottery. |
