Biography
Representative and a Senator from Oregon; born near Springfield, Sangamon County, Ill., December 28, 1826; attended the common schools; moved to California in 1849; settled in Corvallis, Oreg., in 1850; studied law; admitted to the bar in 1854; clerk of the district court of the Territory of Oregon for Benton County 1853-1856; member, Territorial assembly 1857-1858; member, State house of representatives 1859; published the Oregon Weekly Union at Corvallis 1859-1861; district attorney for the fifth judicial district of Oregon in 1868; presidential elector on the Democratic ticket in 1868; elected as a Democrat to the Forty-second Congress (March 4, 1871-March 3, 1873); elected as a Democrat to the United States Senate and served from March 4, 1879, to March 3, 1885; resumed the practice of law in La Grande, Oreg.; member of the State railroad commission 1889-1891; died in La Grande, Oreg., January 28, 1899; interment in Masonic Cemetery.
Courtesy of Biographical Directory of the United States Congress