Rubel Lex Phillips (March 29, 1925 – June 18, 2011) was an American politician and lawyer. Growing up poor in Alcorn County, Mississippi, he served in the United States Navy during World War II and, upon returning, earned a law degree. Hailing from a politically active family and initially a member of the Democratic Party, he served as a circuit court clerk from 1952 to 1956 and chaired the Mississippi Public Service Commission from 1956 to 1958. In 1962 Phillips joined the Republican. He ran as a Republican in the 1963 Mississippi gubernatorial election, the first person to do so since 1947. Supporting a platform of racial segregation and opposition to the presidential administration of John F. Kennedy, he lost, garnering only 38 percent of the vote.