This post contains spoilers.
Before I see The Last Jedi in the cinema, I want to re-watch all of the other Star Wars movies in chronological order, so I started with The Phantom Menace earlier this week. Last year I realized something about Chancellor Valorum, but I wanted to re-watch the movie again before I wrote about it.
In The Phantom Menace, he's referred to only as "Chancellor Valorum." I don't remember where I first came across this (maybe it was in the novelization), but in the expanded universe, his first name is Finis. Finis valorum is the Latin phrase "the end of values." Finis is a third declension masculine singular noun in the nominative case, and valorum is a third declension masculine plural noun in the genitive case.
Based on the little that's seen of him in The Phantom Menace, Chancellor Valorum is a chancellor "of values," as his name suggests. (Senator Palpatine tells Queen Amidala that the "accusations of [Valorum's] corruption" are "baseless," but this might just be part of his manipulation.) His name has more significance in light of Palpatine's replacing him as chancellor. Valorum represents "the end of values" because once Palpatine becomes the chancellor, he uses deception to gain power and eventually turns the Republic into the Empire.
