Dill was born in Knox County, Ohio. As a young man he was a teacher, and moved to Spokane, Washington in 1908. He became a lawyer in 1910, and soon entered politics. He was a member of the United States House of Representatives for two terms, from 1915 to 1919, and was defeated for reelection. He was a member of the United States Senate from Washington for two terms, from 1923 to 1935 and did not run for reelection. He ran for governor of Washington in 1940 but was defeated by Republican Arthur B. Langlie. His last attempt at elective office was in 1942 when he ran for a seat in the United States House of Representatives. Dill then served as a member of the Columbia Basin Commission from 1945 to 1948, and as a special assistant to the United States attorney general from 1946 to 1953. In between all of these jobs, he usually practiced law. He died in Spokane.
ClarenceC. Dill: Life of a Western Politician is a balanced though incomplete account of how a progressive young journalist, lawyer, and former Democratic congressman upset incumbent Republican Miles Poindexter in the 1922 Senate race and went on to serve two terms in the U.S. Senate.
Dill embraced the cause of "the pumpers," those who, in 1918, proposed construction of a dam at Grand Coulee to store water for irrigation and pump it onto the dry plateau above.
Irish writes that "there was no evidence Dill was party to Funkhouser's activities." Still, he argues that "historians are not limited to what can be proven in a court of law" and suggests that the senator "probably engaged in unethical conduct" (p.
Dill's account to Woods is probably fairly accurate: there was a brief disagreement; Dill probably worried that he had gone too far; then, to his relief, the president proposed a low dam that might cost only $40 million.
Dill expected to meet with the president after all of the preliminary conferences were completed to seek final approval.
Dill probably telephoned S. Harper, acting chief engineer of the project, because O'Sullivan soon received a letter from Harper explaining that the low dam was entirely adequate to serve as a base for the high dam.
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