Alfred Alexander Taylor (August 6, 1848 – November 25, 1931), known as Alf Taylor, was an American politician and lecturer from eastern Tennessee. He served as the 34th governor of Tennessee from 1921 to 1923, one of three Republicans to hold the position from the end of Reconstruction to the latter half of the 20th century. He also served three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, from 1889 to 1895. In 1886, Taylor ran for governor against his younger brother, Democrat Robert Love Taylor (1850–1912), in a memorable campaign known as the "War of the Roses." Canvassing the state together, the brothers often engaged in light-hearted banter and played fiddles, in contrast to previous gubernatorial campaigns, which involved fierce debates. Taylor ran for governor again in 1910, but lost his party's nomination to Ben W. Hooper. He was victorious in 1920 due in large part to divisions within the Democratic Party over taxes and women's suffrage. Early life Taylor was born in the Happy Valley community of Carter County, Tennessee, the second son of Nathaniel Green Taylor, a congressman, Methodist minister, and poet, and Emaline Haynes Taylor, an accomplished pianist. Nathaniel Taylor was a Whig (many of whom later became Republicans), while his wife's family, among them her brother, Landon Carter Haynes, were Democrats. Alfred followed his father into the Republican Party, while his brother, Robert, followed their mother's family into the Democratic Party. Taylor attended Duffield Academy in Elizabethton, Tennessee and Buffalo Institute (modern Milligan College) in Carter County, Tennessee. Following the outbreak of the Civil War, Nathaniel Taylor supported the Union, and the Taylors were forced to move to the North. During this period, Alfred attended Pennington Seminary in Pennington, New Jersey. In 1867, Taylor accompanied his father, then Commissioner of Indian Affairs under President Andrew Johnson, to join the Indian Peace Commission in Kansas in an effort to end the Plains Wars. The commission negotiated the Medicine Lodge Treaty with the southern Plains Indians, bringing about their removal to reservations in Indian Territory. In 1924, Taylor wrote an account of this trip and published it in the Chronicles of Oklahoma. After his study of law, Taylor was admitted to the bar in 1870 and commenced practice in Jonesborough, Tennessee. Early political career Taylor was elected to the Tennessee House of Representatives in 1874, and served one term. Among his initiatives was the creation of Unicoi County