Horton was elected to the
Tennessee Senate in 1926 for the district of Marshall and
Lincoln counties. During Horton's second term, he and Lea began using state
patronage to distribute jobs in Memphis in an attempt to weaken Crump's influence there. Crump, who was running for Congress and wanted to focus on his own campaign, agreed to support Horton in the 1930 governor's race if he and Lea would stop providing patronage to his foes. With Crump out of the way, Horton defeated his chief opponent,
Lambert Estes Gwinn in the Democratic primary. He defeated C. Arthur Bruce in the general election. Four days after Horton was reelected governor, the Bank of Tennessee, owned by Lea associate Rogers Caldwell, was declared
insolvent following the
stock market crash in 1929, and Caldwell's banks throughout the South soon followed. Horton had deposited more than
$6 million in state funds in Caldwell's banks, all of which was lost. A Tennessee General Assembly investigation produced charges that Horton had conspired with Lea and Caldwell to run branches of state government for their own financial gain in exchange for Lea's political support. Crump and his allies assailed Horton for depositing state funds in the banks of his political allies. They also attacked Horton for awarding
no-bid contracts to Caldwell's road-paving company, Kyrock. A motion calling for Horton's
impeachment was voted on by the state House in June 1931, but the motion failed, 58 to 41. Horton finished his term and did not seek reelection. During Horton's tenure as governor, he continued most of Peay's reform initiatives. He abolished a land tax that had been unpopular with farmers, established a
parole board, created a state division of aeronautics, and developed a secondary state highway system. He supported statues of
Andrew Jackson and
John Sevier being placed in
Statuary Hall in
Washington, D.C. ==Later life and legacy==