put someone into the chair —(also: put someone in the chair)
1. elect a person chairman:
- Most of the meetings were held in our Church House, and at all of them I was put into the chair.
2. nominate a person to a position of authority:
- A demagogue of greater talent may practically pull the wires of a President whom he has put into the chair.
send someone to the chair—sentence a criminal to death by electrocution:
- “Reckon what they’ll do to Floyd for that?” “Send him to the chair probably,” Jim Howard said.