Thomas Martin Kennerly

Thomas Martin Kennerly (January 24, 1874, Lee County, Texas – July 29, 1962, Houston, Texas) was a United States federal judge. He was a Republican.

Kennerly read law to enter the bar in 1893. He was in private practice in Giddings, Texas, from 1893 to 1897 and in Houston, Texas, from 1897 to 1931. He was a Referee in Bankruptcy, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas from 1903 to 1906. He was a Special state district judge, Harris County, Texas in 1918.

On January 24, 1931, Kennerly was nominated by President Herbert Hoover to a seat on the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas vacated by Joseph C. Hutcheson, Jr.. Kennerly was confirmed by the United States Senate on February 4, 1931, and received his commission on February 7, 1931. He assumed senior status on August 29, 1954, serving in that capacity until his death, in 1962.

Kennerly's son, Thomas Everton "T. E." Kennerly, Sr. (1903-2000), a Houston lawyer, was the Republican gubernatorian nominee in 1966; he was handily defeated by incumbent Governor John B. Connally, Jr. In 1964, T. E. Kennerly ran unsuccessfully for the Texas Supreme Court.

Sources

• Thomas Martin Kennerly at the Biographical Directory of Federal Judges, a public domain publication of the Federal Judicial Center.