List of governors of Michigan
head of the executive branch of the state government of the state of Michigan
The governor of Michigan is the head of government of the U.S. state of Michigan as well as the commander-in-chief of the state's military forces. The governor has a duty to enforce state laws; the power to either approve or veto appropriation bills passed by the Michigan Legislature; the power to convene the legislature; and the power to grant pardons, except in cases of impeachment. The governor is also empowered to reorganize the executive branch of the state government.
In the 17th and 18th century, Michigan was part of French and then British holdings, and administered by their colonial governors. After becoming part of the United States, areas of what is today Michigan were part of the Northwest Territory, Indiana Territory and Illinois Territory, and administered by territorial governors. In 1805, the Michigan Territory was created, and five men served as territorial governors, until Michigan was granted statehood in 1837. Forty-seven individuals have held the position of state governor. The first female governor, Jennifer Granholm, served from 2003 to 2011.
After Michigan gained statehood, governors held the office for a two-year term, until the 1963 Michigan Constitution changed the term to four years. The number of times an individual could hold the office was unlimited until a 1992 constitutional amendment imposed a lifetime term limit of two, four-year governorships.
“List of governors of Michigan” enters the record as head of the executive branch of the state government of the state of Michigan. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what List, governors and Michigan can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q888386. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1805, 1837, 2003 and 2011.
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This entry incorporates text from “List of governors of Michigan” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.