<Tr> <Th> Education </Th> <Td> Yale University (BA) University of Cincinnati (LLB) </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Th> Signature </Th> <Td> </Td> </Tr> <P> William Howard Taft (September 15, 1857--March 8, 1930) was the 27th President of the United States (1909--1913) and the tenth Chief Justice of the United States (1921--1930), the only person to have held both offices . Taft was elected president in 1908, the chosen successor of Theodore Roosevelt, but was defeated for re-election by Woodrow Wilson in 1912 after Roosevelt split the Republican vote by running as a third - party candidate . In 1921, President Warren G. Harding appointed Taft to be chief justice, a position in which he served until a month before his death . </P> <P> Taft was born in Cincinnati in 1857 . His father, Alphonso Taft, was a U.S. Attorney General and Secretary of War . Taft attended Yale and, like his father, was a member of Skull and Bones . After becoming a lawyer, he was appointed a judge while still in his twenties . He continued a rapid rise, being named Solicitor General and as a judge of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals . In 1901, President William McKinley appointed Taft civilian governor of the Philippines . In 1904, Roosevelt made him Secretary of War, and he became Roosevelt's hand - picked successor . Despite his personal ambition to become chief justice, Taft declined repeated offers of appointment to the Supreme Court of the United States, believing his political work to be more important . </P>

Who became chief justice of the supreme court after serving as president