THOMAS WINGETT CORBETT JR. was born on June 17th, 1949, to Mary Bernardine (Diskin) and Thomas W. Corbett in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He received a Bachelor’s degree from Lebanon Valley College and worked as a 9th-grade teacher for one year at the Pine Grove Area School District. Corbett earned his Juris Doctor from St. Mary’s University Law School in 1975. He also served in the Pennsylvania Army National Guard’s 28th Infantry Division from 1971 to 1984, retiring as a captain.

After receiving his J.D. he worked as an assistant district attorney in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania in 1976. From 1980 to 1983, Corbett served as an assistant U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania for the U.S. Department of Justice. He worked in the private sector until he was elected in 1988 as a Commissioner in the Pittsburgh suburb of Shaler. Then he served as United States Attorney for Western Pennsylvania from 1989 to 1993 under the George H. W. Bush administration.

In 1955, Corbett served the remainder of Ernie Preate’s term as Attorney General of Pennsylvania, until 1997 before re-entering the private sector and working as the general counsel for Waste Management, Inc. In 2004 Corbett was elected as Attorney General of Pennsylvania and would be re-elected in 2008. He ran for governor of Pennsylvania in 2009, defeating Dan Onorato in the 2010 general election. He lost his bid for a second term to Tom Wolf in the 2014 general election. Afterward, he returned to the private sector and registered as a political lobbyist in 2021.

By Santos Mencio, St. Mary’s University Law Fellows in Public History, 2023.

References

1. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – Google News Archive Search, https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=q9NRAAAAIBAJ&pg=3701,276799&dq=tom+corbett+attorney&hl=en (last visited Sep 18, 2023).

2. Official Campaign Website – Tom Corbett, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA, https://www.loc.gov/item/lcwaN0005082/ (last visited Sep 18, 2023).

3. Corbett begins uphill fight, announces campaign for second term, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, https://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-state/2013/11/06/Corbett-announces-re-election-bit-in-Pittsburgh/stories/201311060157 (last visited Sep 18, 2023).

4. Corbett announces he will run for governor in 2010, https://web.archive.org/web/20090924013553/http://www.post-gazette.com:80/pg/09258/998105-178.stm (last visited Sep 18, 2023).