D. Leigh Colvin (David Leigh Colvin)

David Leigh Colvin, usually known as D. Leigh Colvin, was born in Ohio in 1880, the son of David Taylor Colvin and Maria Larkin Colvin. In 1906 he married Mamie White, who became politically active in the temperance movement. She was Prohibition Party candidate for Lieutenant Governor of New York in 1918, Prohibition Party candidate for Presidential Elector for New York, 1920, Prohibition candidate for U.S. Representative from New York's 21st District in 1922 and Dry candidate for delegate to New York convention to ratify the 21st amendment (Repeal of National Prohibition) in 1933, and served as president of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). from 1944 to 1953.

D. Leigh Colvin attended the American Temperance University and Ohio Wesleyan University before studying law at the University of California and the University of Chicago. He received his Ph.D. in political science from Columbia University in 1913.

Dr. Colvin was the Prohibition Party's candidate for U.S. Senator from New York in 1916, the party's candidate for mayor of New York City in 1917, its candidate for the vice-presidency of the United States in 1920, its candidate for U.S. Representative from New York in 1922, and its candidate for the presidency in 1936. He also served as chairman of the Prohibition National Committee from 1926 to 1932.

D. Leigh Colvin was intolerant of those who opposed Prohibition and called members of the Women's Organization for Prohibition Reform (WONPR) "Bacchantian maidens, parching for wine -- wet women who, like the drunkards whom their program will produce, would take pennies off the eyes of the dead for the sake of legalizing booze."

David Leigh Colvin died in 1959, four years after Mamie White Colvin died.

Colvin's efforts were not entirely in vain but helped change American culture. Many people and organizations today support neo-prohibition ideas and strongly defend the many vestiges of Prohibition that still continue to exist.