Stevenson Archer: defaulted defalcation

Image from comp.state.md.us

Along with a plea of guilty to embezzlement, Stevenson Archer submitted a written statement to the court in 1890 that sought to put the crime in context. Though the note may have given some reassurance as to the moral character of Maryland's treasurer, it might also have dashed any hopes that the state would recover the funds. "No part of the State's money or securities was ever used by me in gambling, stock speculation, or for political purposes;" Archer wrote, "nor have I at this time one dollar left."

Born near Churchville, Maryland in 1827, Archer was the third generation member of a well-known political family. Both his grandfather, John Archer, and his father, Stevenson Archer Sr., served in the state legislature and in the House of Representatives. John Archer fought in the Revolutionary War, and Stevenson Archer Sr. was also a judge in the state's supreme court and court of appeals.

Archer attended the Bel Air Academy and, following in his father's footsteps, attended Princeton University. He graduated in 1848, the same year his father died, and was admitted to the bar in 1850. Continuing in the well-worn path his family had set, Archer was elected as a Democrat to the state's house of delegates in 1854 and, in 1866, to the House of Representatives. He won another three elections to retain that seat, but failed to earn his party's nomination in 1874. A review of Princeton alumni reported that Archer was also a special judge in Cecil County in 1867.

After leaving the House, Archer returned to legal work in Bel Air, Maryland, but later became chairman of the state Democratic Party. He returned to public office in 1886, when he was elected treasurer of Maryland. He was re-elected in 1888, and by that time oversight of his position was becoming more lax. State law held that Archer was to have taken an oath and given a bond after each election. He did so after his first election, but not after the 1888 election. It wasn't until 1889 that he gave a $200,000 bond.

In March of 1890, Democratic Governor Elihu Jackson surprised the state legislature with an announcement: the state auditor, Jackson said, had determined that Archer had misapplied public securities. An investigative committee was formed and found that $127,000 of $572,000 in funds that were supposed to have been deposited by Archer in Baltimore banks were missing. The committee later finalized the stolen amount at $132,401.25.

The main transaction in question was Archer's purchase of railroad bonds for the state in 1889 amounting to a $473,000 sinking fund with a $20,000 premium. The committee found that out of the 140 bonds in this sale, Archer had kept 33 for personal use, with four more unaccounted for that may have also been kept by the treasurer. The exact use that Archer put the funds to is unclear, though it was determined that he had not used the money for political purposes, as had been suspected at first. The New York Times reported that it was thought that he may have been using the money to pay deficiencies on trust estates and hoping to make up for the theft with speculations, which failed. Elihu S. Riley says in A History of the General Assembly of Maryland that legislators felt Archer fell victim to temptations to use state money to pay off a private debt of about $100,000.

The incident brought criticism to Governor Jackson for his failure to oversee the oaths and bonds of the treasurer's office. The legislature was accused of being too lenient in their investigation and letting important witnesses off too easily. The New York Times said Archer was not likely to get a prison sentence in the matter, since "the law is so vaguely drawn that he can escape through loopholes." Though the comment held some truth, it later turned out to be a very poor estimate.

Archer, for his part, continued to enjoy strong support despite the incident. Prior to the revelation of the theft, state comptroller L. Victor Baughman was resolute in his belief that the scandal should be made public, but said he would offer to put $25,000 toward the defalcation; Democrat Thomas M. Lanahan said he would be willing to give $10,000. Though an auction was held to sell off Archer's personal property, neighbors bought up the items and refused to take them away. "His humiliation was a State sorrow," writes Riley. "His gentleness, his courtesy, his everpresent kindheartedness had made him invulnerable to enmity; foes he had none, friends were legion."

It wasn't an easy time for Archer, however. He tried unsuccessfully to commit suicide, and also offered his resignation to Jackson, who refused to accept it. In April of 1890, Archer was charged with embezzlement and his arrest ordered. When he did not show up in court, instead sending a letter saying his physical condition prevented his appearance, he was removed from office and replaced by Edwin H. Brown, a lawyer and brother of a state senator. Archer also vacated his chairmanship of the state Democratic Party.

It seems that the Times was accurate in saying that Archer would try to escape through loopholes, as his lawyers argued that the statute on embezzlement did not cover misappropriation by the treasurer. There was also the question of whether his first bond could pay off the money stolen in his second term, or if the later bond could be used if the theft occurred before it was given. In July, the state's supreme court ruled that the statute was broad enough to try Archer on the charge. Instead, he opted to plead guilty and was sentenced to five years in prison.

The embezzlement proved a heavy blow for the state, as it didn't get much of the money back. In December of 1890, the court ordered Archer's bondsmen liable to reimburse the state for the stolen money. After a legal battle, during which it was argued that paying the full amount would ruin the bondsmen, they were ordered to pay $60,000. However, also citing the possible ruination of the bondsmen, the legislature passed a bill in March of 1892 that had the state pick up $37,000 of that amount. The legislature also passed a bill not long after the theft became known that drastically increased protections of the state funds and securities. The treasurer was no longer allowed to visit the vaults alone, but had to be accompanied by the comptroller. Each was to have a key, and both would be needed to access the vaults; in addition, they were both to record in separate public records the amount of the securities in the vaults.

In 1892, an effort to secure a pardon for Archer due to his failing health was underway. After being given what the New York Times called "one of the strongest [petitions] ever presented to the Executive" 1894, Democratic Governor Frank Brown pardoned Archer. The action shaved a year off the former treasurer's sentence, but Archer's poor health continued for the next several years. In 1898, he died after a year of confinement in a Baltimore hospital.

Sources: The Political Graveyard, The Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, "State Treasurer Archer Removed" in the New York Times on April 16 1890, "Treasurer Archer's Crime" in the New York Times on Jun. 6 1890, "The Sureties Responsible" in the New York Times on Dec. 30 1890, "Stevenson Archer's Bondsmen" in the New York Times on Mar. 23 1892, "A Bold Lobby Defeated" in the New York Times on Apr. 4 1892, "Seeking Archer's Pardon" in the New York Times on Dec. 16 1892, "Treasurer Archer Pardoned" in the New York Times on May 10 1894, "Stevenson Archer Dead" in the New York Times on Aug. 3 1898, Appletons' Annual Cyclopaedia and Register of Important Events of the Year 1890, A History of the General Assembly of Maryland 1625-1904 by Elihu S. Riley, General Catalogue of Princeton University 1746-1906, Reports of Cases Argued and Determined in the Court of Appeals of Maryland by J. Shaaff Stockett

Thomas J. Dodd: dined and downed

Dodd and son, Chris, in 1946. Image from newsweek.com

In the midst of corruption allegations, Thomas Joseph Dodd declared, "My conscience is clear...I do not believe that anybody can look me in the eye and say I did wrong." With a solid background in legal work, including the prosecution of war criminals, the statement may have seemed accurate. But when an ethics committee determined that Dodd had indeed done wrong, he was buried by a nearly unanimous avalanche of votes in the Senate advocating punishment.

A native of Norwich, Connecticut, Dodd was born in 1907 and went on to graduate from St. Anselm's Preparatory School in 1926, Providence College in 1930, and Yale University's law school in 1933. His first brush with political affairs came at Yale, where he organized a group in support of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal programs. It would be almost two decades before Dodd truly re-entered that field, however. He served as a special agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation between 1933 and 1934 and state director for the National Youth Administration, an agency seeking to create educational and employment opportunities for young people during the Great Depression, from 1935 to 1938. From 1938 until 1945, he served as an assistant to five Attorneys General in the Justice Department. Here, he helped create a civil rights division and prosecute cases against the Ku Klux Klan and on behalf of labor unions. During World War II, Dodd also handled espionage, sabotage, and industrial fraud cases.

At the end of the war, Dodd became vice-chairman of the Board of Review, and later executive trial counsel for the Office of the United States Chief Counsel for the Prosecution of Axis Criminality: the U.S. team in the Nuremberg Trials of 1945 and 1946. Dodd was able to contribute directly to the prosecution of Nazi war criminals, focusing on proving the charge that German political, military, and industrial leaders had conspired to wage an aggressive war. He also determined that the will of Paul von Hindenburg, late President of the Weimar Republic, had been falsified by the Nazis to make it appear to support the rise of the National Socialist government. Among his other tactics, Dodd caused a bit of a stir by displaying the shrunken head of a concentration camp victim at the proceedings.

For his service at Nuremberg, Dodd received a Presidential Citation, U.S. Medal of Freedom, and Czechoslovakian Order of the White Lion. The greatest effect of the proceedings, however, was to inculcate a strong sense of anti-Communism in him. Dodd saw the Soviet government and its tactics as similar to those of the Nazis, namely in their domination of Eastern European countries following the war. When the Soviet-controlled Polish government also tried to present Dodd an award for his service, he refused to accept it. He was later given the Commander of the Order of the Merit award by the President of Italy for his counsel on preventing the spread of Communism there. Nevertheless, Dodd was not so virulently anti-Communist to go along with McCarthyism, and campaigned for Connecticut Senator Brien McMahon as Joe McCarthy tried to uproot him.

After Nuremberg, Dodd returned to Connecticut and practiced law between 1947 and 1953. He contemplated running for Governor in 1948, but never officially did so and later rejected an offer to be Lieutenant Governor. In 1952, Dodd turned his attention to the federal government and was elected as a Democrat to the House of Representatives. He was re-elected in 1954, but lost a 1956 attempt to unseat Republican Senator Prescott S. Bush (father of future President George H.W. Bush). During this time in Congress, Dodd served on the Government Operations and Foreign Affairs Committees and the Select Committee to Investigate Communist Aggression. In 1958, he again ran for a Senate seat and successfully defeated Republican incumbent William A. Purtell. He was re-elected in 1964.

While in the Senate, Dodd served on the Foreign Relations, Judiciary, and Aeronautical and Space Sciences Committees. He also co-chaired a subcommittee on internal security and chaired another one on juvenile delinquency. He displayed a mix of beliefs, including support for civil and voting rights, limiting violence of television, stopping the flow of illegal drugs, and the United Nations (though his support for the organization later waned, as he believed it was becoming dominated by poorer nations).

Dodd continued to be a fervent anti-Communist while in Congress. In 1959, he opposed a visit by Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev to the United States, saying such a visit would be seen as an acceptance of Soviet domination of Warsaw Pact countries. "What would the Senate and the country have thought if in 1939 President Roosevelt had invited Adolf Hitler to a barnstorming tour of the U.S., fresh from conquest of Czechoslovakia, Austria and Poland and in the midst of his extermination of millions of Jews?" asked Dodd. The Senator also criticized the John F. Kennedy Administration for not doing enough to remove Fidel Castro from Cuba. Most notably, Dodd was a stalwart supporter of the Vietnam War; when he learned that the U.N. Secretary-General was opposed to the war, Dodd called for his resignation. While this made him a good friend of President Lyndon B. Johnson (who even considered Dodd as a Vice Presidential candidate for the 1964 election), it created some tension within the Democratic Party. Dodd's support for the war was enough to merit his inclusion in "The Draft Dodger Rag," a protest song by Phil Ochs which included the lyrics, "I'm just a typical American boy from a typical American town / I believe in God and Senator Dodd and keeping old Castro down."

Dodd was also well-known for his attempts to secure gun control legislation. In 1963, he co-sponsored legislation that would increase requirements for gun dealers and ban mail-order pistols. When President Kennedy was assassinated by a sniper with a mail-order weapon in November of that year, Dodd expanded his proposal to include a ban on mail-order rifles and shotguns as well. The bill died in committee in 1964, but was reintroduced by Dodd in 1965. The bill finally passed as the Gun Control Act in 1968. Though more watered-down than its original intent, the legislation still effectively banned mail-order firearms sales; added an age limits for gun sales and prohibited certain people, such as criminals, from purchasing them; raised the dealer fee to restrict gun traffic to legitimate sellers; and restricted the marketing of heavy-hitting weapons such as bazookas and mortars.

When the first accusations began flying at Dodd, they were fired from the newspaper pages. In January of 1966, investigative columnists Jack Anderson and Drew Pearson began blasting Dodd and did not let up for another 17 months. Thanks to four whistleblowers who had been on Dodd's staff, the columnists had managed to copy thousands of documents from the Senator's office. They accused Dodd of getting paid by Julius Klein, a lobbyist for West German interests, to fly to Germany to reassure his clients. He was also charged with receiving untaxed contributions and gifts from several companies, including firearms companies opposed to his gun control legislation.

Enraged, Dodd filed a libel lawsuit against Anderson and Pearson and invited an investigation by the Senate Select Committee on Standards and Conduct, the first time the committee would conduct an investigation since it was founded in 1964. Dodd said the visit to Germany was a legitimate trip related to business on the internal security subcommittee, and he was cleared of wrongdoing in that matter in June of 1966. In March of 1967, the committee began reviewing accusations of financial misconduct on Dodd's part. On those counts, he was not so fortunate.

In April of 1967, the committee recommended that Dodd should be censured. They found that Dodd had accepted free use of a vehicle from a constituent for 21 months, accepted $8,000 from International Latex Corporation, and billed the Senate for $1,763 in trips that had already been paid for by private organizations. Receiving the most attention was the charge by the committee that Dodd had diverted about $116,000 out of $450,000 in campaign funds to personal use. The money had not been reported or taxed, and it had mostly been raised by testimonial dinners between 1961 and 1965.

In his defense, Dodd said that the people who attended the dinners knew that he was not a wealthy person and that the money could be used on personal matters. He said the double-billing of trips was simply a matter of bad bookkeeping. Going on the offensive, Dodd also said the pressure was a result of "dishonorable and vindictive ex-employees" and a press hostile to his attitude on the Vietnam War.

Perhaps even more in favor of Dodd's exoneration than the man himself was Democratic Senator Russell B. Long of Louisiana, who persistently defended Dodd during the proceedings. Long said half the members of the ethics committee would not come away unscathed if they were given the same treatment as Dodd, and that Dodd had spent his own money on the campaign and deserved to recoup some of the funds through what he raised. A son of Louisiana Governor Huey Long, there was some speculation that Russell Long's support was due to his father's impeachment proceedings in 1929 or Dodd's support of Long during a debate over Long's presidential campaign fund in 1966.

Whatever the reason, Long attempted to introduce a resolution that would admonish Dodd rather than censure him. The proposal was overwhelmingly defeated in a 92-2 vote. A suggestion by Republican Senator John G. Tower of Texas to reduce the punishment to a reprimand was met with more support, but still failed 87-9. When the vote was finally called, the Senate decided 92-5 to censure Dodd, the sixth such punishment it had ever given. The Senate also decided 51-45 against any action on the double-billing accusation.

No penalties were imposed, and Dodd was allowed to keep his seniority. Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., under fire in Congress at the same time, said he would "accept with reluctance" the same punishment meted out to Dodd. The Senator had some degree of vindication after the incident. The Senate committee also rebuked the staffers, saying the unauthorized removal of documents was "reprehensible," "a threat to the orderly conduct of business of a public office," and "constitutes a breach in the relationship of trust between a senator and his staff." His libel charge against the two columnists fell through, but a judge found that he was entitled to collect damages for theft. In the year after the scandal, the Senate adopted a formal code of conduct that allowed members to accept funds from political events for personal use.

Dodd was also investigated for potential tax evasion in the years between 1961 and 1965, but not charged. However, this investigation and the censure likely contributed to Dodd's loss of the Democratic nomination for the 1970 Senate race. In that year, the party offered the nomination to Joseph D. Duffey for a race against Republican Lowell P. Weicker, Jr. Dodd nevertheless entered as an independent candidate, and though his hawkish views probably siphoned votes from Weicker as well as Duffey, the split race allowed Weicker to win the election. In 1971, about five months after leaving Congress and a week after telling a former press aide, "I'm not going to live very long," Dodd died of a heart attack.

A stadium in Dodd's hometown is named for him. His son, Christopher, followed in his footsteps and is currently a Senator from Connecticut and another son, Thomas Jr., served as the U.S. ambassador to Uruguay and Costa Rica. In 1995, both sons and President Bill Clinton were present at the dedication of the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center at the University of Connecticut. According to the center's website, a prize named for Dodd is biannually awarded to a group or individual who has made significant strides in furthering international justice and human rights, ideals they say the late Senator championed.

Sources: The Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, The Thomas J. Dodd Research Center, The U.S. Embassy, "Minority View" in Time on Aug. 24 1959, "Private Lives" in Time on Jul. 1 1966, "The Undoing of Dodd" in Time on May 5 1967, "Senate Refuses, 92-2 To Admonish Dodd" in the St. Petersburg Times on Jun. 22 1967, "Senate Again Rejects Easing Dodd Censure" in the St. Petersburg Times on Jun. 23 1967, "Dodd Censured by Senate" in the Spokesman-Review on Jun. 24 1967, "Powell Would 'Reluctantly' Accept Censure" in the Rome News-Tribune on Jun. 28 1967, "Not Libel, Theft" in Time on Jan. 26 1968, "U.S. Drops Tax Probe of Sen. Dodd" in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Dec. 24 1969, "Thomas Dodd Dead At 64" in the Evening Independent on May 24 1971, "Once a Disgraced Senator, Dodd Gets a Presidential Salute" in the New York Times on Oct. 16 1995, Legacy to Power: Senator Russell Long of Louisiana by Russell T. Mann, The Whistleblowers: Exposing Corruption in Government and Industry by Myron Peretz Glazer and Penina Migdal Glazer, On Capitol Hill: The Struggle to Reform Congress and its Consequences 1948-2000 by Julian E. Zelizer, Gun Violence in America: The Struggle for Control by Alexander DeConde

Jon C. Hinson: southern exposure

Image from The Ledger

With a little luck on his side, Jon Clifton Hinson was able to win a second term in Congress despite admitting that he'd visited a couple of homosexual hangouts. It was only a matter of months, however, before he was once again caught with his pants down.

Hinson was born in Tylertown, Mississippi in 1942. After graduating from the University of Mississippi in 1964, he served as an aide to Mississippi congressmen Charles Griffin from 1968 to 1973 and Thad Cochran from 1973 to 1977. From 1964 to 1970, he was also a member of the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve.

In 1978, Cochran moved on to the Senate and Hinson was chosen to run for his seat. His conservative platform included support of lowering taxes and increased military growth, as well as opposition to affirmative action, socialized medicine, deficit spending, and the ceding of the Panama Canal to Panama. Running as a Republican, he successfully took over for his former boss.

The first scandals befell Hinson in his run-up to the 1980 elections. In a press conference in August of 1980, he admitted that he'd been arrested in September of 1976 on a charge of committing an obscene act near the Marine Corps War Memorial in Washington, D.C. He later pleaded to a reduced charge of creating a public nuisance and was fined $100. Hinson also revealed that he had been in Cinema Follies, a pornographic theater, in October of 1977 when a devastating fire broke out. Nine people died in the blaze, and Hinson, one of four survivors, was rescued from beneath a pile of bodies. Both the memorial and the theater were known sites of homosexual activity.

Hinson said he'd given the information as a preemptive measure against any attempt by political opponents to use the incidents against him. He had recently given a deposition to lawyers handling civil suits related to the theater fire, and his involvement could easily have been discovered. He argued that he had not committed an obscene act at the memorial, and that his innocence on that charge was demonstrated by his ability to plead to a reduced charge. A friend said the incidents were a result of emotional problems Hinson had been having, and that he had resolved those issues by 1978.

Media reports after Hinson's revelations unearthed more details than Hinson had been willing to admit. The arrest at the memorial had occurred after Hinson had exposed himself to an undercover agent and allegedly tried to get the agent to perform oral sex on him. He failed to show up at court on the charge on multiple occasions until the threat of a second arrest. Reporters also found out that the theater had 22,000 members and multiple uses, including empty rooms where members could have sex. Hinson had also managed to delay giving his deposition until after the Republican primaries.

Nevertheless, Hinson maintained that he was straight. "I am not, never have been, and never will be a homosexual," he said at a news conference with his wife of one year. Whether or not his constituents believed him, Hinson was re-elected in the 1980 election. Some analysts said that the Mississippi voters simply preferred a conservative in Congress, no matter what his sexuality was. However, Hinson was also helped by a three-way contest, in which independent candidate and Jackson State University professor Les McLemore outperformed Democratic candidate Britt Singletary. Hinson came away with 39 percent of the vote for the victory.

Hinson had barely returned to office when he blew any chance of a quiet second term. In February of 1981, Capitol Police had a busy night at the Longworth Building, a House of Representatives office building on Capitol Hill. Tipped off that a bathroom in the building was being used for homosexual activities, police staked out the location. They arrested a consultant and a member of the Democratic Study Group on charges of sodomy. Two hours later, they arrested another two men engaged in oral sex: Hinson and Harold Moore, a black Library of Congress clerk 10 years his junior.

Hinson was originally charged with felony sodomy, which was punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a $10,000 fine. The charge was reduced to a misdemeanor, with the prosecuting attorney saying consensual homosexual acts could be prosecuted as such. Hinson pleaded innocent to the charge and, following the lead of Walter Jenkins, checked himself into the hospital "in order to have the benefit of professional care, counseling, and treatment," according to a statement from his office. The statement blustered on that the care was "necessitated by the onset of an episode which he termed a dissociative reaction attributed to a two-year period of intense emotional and physical exertion." He remained hospitalized for two months.

Hinson immediately faced calls to resign from Mississippi and Republican Party leaders. "I think we gave him the benefit of the doubt on the other charges," said Clarke Reed, national Republican committeeman from Mississippi. "I feel strongly he should resign if found guilty on the charges." Mike Retzer, the Mississippi GOP chairman, said he thought the party had been fooled into supporting Hinson in the 1980 election and added, "It's unfortunate Jon has serious, substantial problems that are ongoing." Hinson agreed to resign, and later pleaded no contest to attempted oral sodomy. He was given a suspended 30-day jail sentence and one year of probation. In April of 1981, he resigned, saying it was "the most painful and difficult decision" he had ever made.

Democrat Wayne Dowdy, the mayor of McComb, was chosen to face off against Republican businessman and strong supporter of President Ronald Reagan, Liles Williams. Though Williams had the majority of the vote in these selections, it was not enough to forgo a special election. In an upset, Dowdy, who had spent one-third as much on his campaign as Williams, narrowly won Hinson's seat. He credited a strong turnout in black voters, though some saw it as a repudiation of Reagan.

Hinson later admitted that he was gay. In an article he wrote shortly before his death, he said that he was "still closeted and into heavy denial" when he was first elected. He and his wife separated in 1987, and divorced in 1989. In a tragic parallel to Hinson's miraculous escape from death in 1977, his parents were killed in 1984 when their house was destroyed by fire.

Remaining in the Washington, D.C. area, Hinson became active in gay rights issues. He opposed a ban on gay servicemen in the military and was a founder of the Fairfax Lesbian and Gay Citizens Association in Fairfax County, Virginia. In 1994, he attended a fund-raising event for a gay community center in Biloxi in his home state. The next year, Hinson died of respiratory failure from AIDS.

Sources: The Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, "Rep. Hinson Facing New Sex Charge" in The Bulletin on Feb. 5 1981, "Hinson Pleads Innocent; Congressman Faces Charge of Sodomy" in the Eugene Register Guard on Feb. 5 1981, "Lawmaker is Facing Sex Charge" in the Rome News-Tribune on Feb. 5 1981, "Hinson Enters Plea; Admitted to Hospital" in The Ledger on Feb. 6 1981, "Lawmaker Pleads Innocent to Sex Charge" in the Sunday Star-News on Feb. 6 1981, "Aide Says Hinson Planning to Quit" in The Bulletin on Feb. 9 1981, "Businessman, Mayor Win Mississippi Runoff Spots" in the St. Petersburg Times on Jun. 24 1981, "Mississippi Democrat Says Blacks Helped" in the Ellensburg Daily Record on Jul. 8 1981, "Democrat Wins Mississippi Race" in the St. Petersburg Times on Jul. 8 1981, "Jon Hinson, 53, Congressman And Then Gay-Rights Advocate" in the New York Times on Jul. 26 1995, Mississippi Politics: The Struggle for Power, 1976-2006 by Jere Nash and Andy Taggart, Men Like That: A Southern Queer History by John Howard

William M. Jenkins: big stick vic

Image from digital.library.okstate.edu

History has judged William Miller Jenkins as a capable politician. However, he may nevertheless have been too dependent on a political ally; a flaw that left him vulnerable after the sudden departure of that person.

Jenkins was born in Alliance, Ohio in 1856. He attended Mount Union College, taught from 1876 to 1878, and then began studying law. He was admitted to the bar in 1883 and started practicing first in Harlan, Iowa and then Arkansas City, Kansas.

In 1888, Jenkins attended the Republican National Convention for that year's presidential contest. There, he earned the distinction of being the first person at such a convention to cast a vote in favor of nominating William McKinley. At that time, McKinley was a congressman from Ohio. Though the Republican nomination for that year went to Benjamin Harrison, Jenkins had earned McKinley's favor with his support.

Jenkins was appointed an agent for the allotment of Pawnee lands in Oklahoma, and began the position in 1891. Two years later, he was able to claim a piece of property during the Cherokee Outlet land run. When McKinley was elected President in 1896, he must have still looked on Jenkins with favor. Midway through his first year in office, he appointed Jenkins to serve as territorial secretary under Governor Cassius M. Barnes. When Barnes' term expired in April of 1901 and he chose to retire, Jenkins was named his successor and the fifth Governor of Oklahoma Territory.

The biggest event under Jenkin's term was the opening of the Kiowa-Comanche-Apache and Wichita-Caddo lands to settlement in August of 1901, part of the overall disintegration of what had once been a territory-wide Indian reservation. The move made 3,460,000 acres of new land available. In order to prevent a mad dash for property, a la the "sooners" who broke deadlines and settled ahead of time, the land was put up for grabs by lottery. Over 160,000 people applied for claims, and an estimated 50,000 new people came into the territory as a result of the opening of the reservations. About 1,725,647 acres remained the territory of four Indian reservations, and Jenkins advocated that this land be allocated to the tribes with the "residue" opened for settlement.

At this period in history, the Oklahoma Territory was expanding rapidly in population and businesses. A 1900 census put the population at 398,331, over 500 percent greater than the previous year's census. In addition to his official duties, Jenkins served on the Territorial School-Land Board and as a regent for three universities in the state. The Department of the Interior, summarizing a report made by Jenkins in 1901, described the educational system as "excellent," with easy access to public schools. Though statehood would not arrive until 1907, Jenkins was already pushing for it during his term. "In the little more than a decade which has elapsed since the creation of the Territory the people have accomplished here more than any other community had ever accomplished in a quarter of a century," he said in November of 1901.

Jenkins' 1901 report to the Department of the Interior is dry reading, a summary of different areas of the territory's infrastructure. He concludes by recommending a uniform measure to apply to all school, college, and public lands; the cession of 4 million acres of land in the west to the territory to make up for losses in the eastern part of the territory; and the expansion of the territory's supreme court from five to seven justices.

The report also includes a section on the care of the insane, which Jenkins said was done by the Oklahoma Sanitarium Company under contract in a facility near Norman. "The site is beautiful and healthy," he wrote. "The buildings are commodious and in excellent sanitary condition." Among other statistics, he noted that the sanitarium's population stood at 315 on July 1 of 1901, and that it cost the territory $56,369.90 for the care and transportation of the insane during the year. It was rumors of misconduct in the awarding of this contract that would eventually end Jenkins' governorship.

In September of 1901, McKinley was shot by an assassin and died eight days later; Vice-President Theodore Roosevelt took his place. With the loss of Jenkins' longtime friend, his political opponents began pressing for an investigation into the Governor's contract with the Oklahoma Sanitarium Company. Jenkins was summoned to Washington, D.C. for a hearing. At the end of November of 1901, Roosevelt removed him from office due to his "improper connection" with the contract. "The decision is based purely upon his own written statements, and his oral explanations of them at the final hearing," he added.

According to Roosevelt, the Oklahoma Sanitarium Company had reserved $10,000 in stock for Jenkins at his order in exchange for the awarding of the contract. The President said Jenkins then rewarded some friends, to whom he had political obligations, with the stock. Roosevelt said the only known sale of stock since the reward benefited the seller at twice what was paid for it. "The Governor's confessed relations to the matter disclose such an entire lack of appreciation of the high fiduciary nature of the duties of his office as to unfit him for their further discharge," said Roosevelt.

William C. Grimes, the territorial secretary, served in Jenkins' stead for 10 days. Roosevelt then chose Thomas B. Ferguson, a newspaper publisher, postmaster at Watonga, and chairman of the Republican Territorial Committee to become the new Governor. Ferguson is said to have declared that Jenkins had "suffered a great injustice."

Historians have also been sympathetic to Jenkins. "Those were the days when Teddy was carving his big stick," John Bartlett Meserve wrote in 1942. "William M. Jenkins was a man of high character and no taint of official corruption actually attended him before or during his term as governor of Oklahoma Territory." In their biographical profile, the Oklahoma Historical Society writes that an inquiry by the Department of the Interior had found no wrongdoing prior Roosevelt's decision to sack Jenkins. The profile adds that the Territorial Legislature exonerated Jenkins after an investigation between 1903 and 1905.

Jenkins remained in Oklahoma to do farming work, moved to Utah for awhile, and then came back to Oklahoma to reside in Sapulpa. He was elected court clerk of Creek County in 1920, and was able to hold a variety of other public offices. He died in 1941.

Sources: The Oklahoma Historical Society, "Plea For Oklahoma Statehood" in the New York Times on Nov. 19 1901, "President's Rebuke to Gov. W.M. Jenkins" in the New York Times on Dec. 1 1901, West of Hell's Fringe: Crime, Criminals, and the Federal Peace Officer in Oklahoma Territory 1889-1907 by Glenn Shirley, The International Year Book: A Compendium of the World's Progress During the Year 1901 edited by Frank Moore Colby, Chronicles of Oklahoma, Volume 20 No. 3 by John Bartlett Meserve, A History of Oklahoma by Joseph Bradfield Thoburn and Isaac Mason Holcomb, Report of the Governor of Oklahoma to the Secretary of the Interior: 1901, Report of the Secretary of the Interior for the Fiscal Year Ended June 30 1901

William Stanbery: taking a licking

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On the morning of April 13, 1832, William Stanbery was walking down Pennsylvania Avenue when he was approached by Sam Houston. The former Tennessee congressman and Governor, and future president of the Texas Republic, asked Stanbery to confirm who he was. When the Ohio congressman did, Houston called him a "damned rascal" and proceeded to beat him with his hickory cane.

Stanbery struggled unsuccessfully to resist the assault, a task made more difficult by a right arm that had become basically useless after the Battle of Tohopeka. However, he was not completely unprepared. Stanbery pulled out a pistol, put it to Houston's chest, and fired.

One of the largest cities in the Lone Star State may well have had a different name if the gun had not misfired. Houston continued his assault, at one point lifting Stanbery up by his legs and striking him "elsewhere." He was finally dragged away from the hapless man by two companions he had been walking with, Senator Alexander Buckner of Missouri and Representative John Blair of Tennessee.

Stanbery was born in Essex County, New Jersey in 1788. After studying law in New York City, he moved to Ohio in 1809 and began practicing in Newark, in Licking County. He served as a member of the state senate from 1825 to 1825. After the death of Representative William Wilson in Newark in 1827, Stanbery was chosen as his replacement for the House of Representatives. A Jacksonian Democrat, he began serving in October of 1827 and was re-elected in 1828. He was also elected in 1830, but this time as an Anti-Jacksonian Democrat.

The incident on Pennsylvania Avenue had its roots in a statement Stanbery made in Congress in March of 1832. During the course of his criticism of President Andrew Jackson's Indian policy, he asked, "Was not the late Secretary of War [John Eaton] removed because of his attempt fraudulently to give Governor Houston the contract for Indian rations?" By some accounts, Houston attempted to enter the House after hearing of the remark, and was restrained by his friend James K. Polk, a Tennessee congressman and future President of the United States.

By all accounts, Houston sent Stanbery a letter demanding to know if his question, which had been printed in the National Intelligencer, had been accurately transcribed. Though a rather formal request, it was essentially the prelude to a challenge for a duel. Stanbery refused to acknowledge the letter, which only further enraged Houston by failing to acknowledge him as an equal. Stanbery must have been aware of this, as he started carrying two pistols for protection. The assault occurred about two weeks after he made his remarks in the House.

Shortly after the incident, Stevenson sent a letter to Andrew Stevenson, the Speaker of the House, letting him know the circumstances that had caused him to be absent from the chambers. The House voted 145 to 25 to arrest Houston on the grounds that he had violated congressional immunity by assaulting Stanbery for remarks made on the House floor.

The trial was seized upon by the press as a Jacksonian vs. anti-Jacksonian showdown. Members questioned whether Stanbery's remarks had been slanderous or if he was expressing freedom of speech, and whether Congress even had the authority to try Houston. Until President Jackson sent him a finer set of duds, Houston attended the hearing in his buckskin coat. He was represented by Francis Scott Key, the author of the national anthem, and argued that Stanbery's charges had been disproved at trial, that he had not been "lying in wait" for the congressman as some had suggested, and that he was upset over the newspaper report rather than the remarks themselves (a defense undermined by the fact that the proceedings were reported verbatim). Stanbery said that he did not mean to accuse Houston himself of fraud, though he later wavered on that point. He characterized Buckner's testimony of the assault as "destitute of truth and infamous;" he withdrew the statement and apologized soon after.

In a stirring final statement, Houston invoked his patriotism and received a good deal of support from the galleries; one woman even declared, "I would rather be Sam Houston in a dungeon than Stanbery on a throne." In their vote, the House convicted Houston of contempt of Congress in a 106-89 vote and gave him a reprimand.

Not satisfied, Stanbery managed to set up a committee to investigate Eaton and Houston for fraud in relation to the Indian rations, but the panel found both men innocent. He was more successful in getting a criminal assault indictment against Houston, for which Houston was given a $500 fine. Unfortunately for Stanbery, Jackson remitted the fine. In an editorial in the Globe, Houston declared of Stanbery, "Nothing but the blackest malignity can justify the perverseness and vindictiveness of this man!...His vices are too odious to merit pity, and his spirit too mean to deserve contempt."

Things went from bad to worse for Stanbery in 1832. In July, he aimed a barb at Speaker Stevenson by proclaiming, "And let me say that I have heard the remark frequently made, that the eyes of the Speaker are too frequently turned from the chair you occupy toward the White House." James Bates, a Jacksonian congressman from Maine, motioned for a vote to censure Stanbery for unparliamentary language.

Charles Mercer, an Anti-Jacksonian congressman from Virginia, disputed the censure. He said the remark had not been recorded, and that a day had gone past before the proceedings on the censure got underway. While the appeal was pending, Stanbery's mouth got him in trouble again: he declared, apparently to Stevenson, "I will make a motion that is in order; I make a motion that you leave that chair." Polk moved to censure Stanbery on those remarks, but withdrew the motion.

Bates' resolution was accepted in an 82-48 vote. Stanbery remained unrepentant, saying, "I neither deny, retract, nor explain the words I used the day before yesterday, but do now re-affirm the words I then used." In a curious incident, John Quincy Adams, former President of the United States and since a Republican representative from Massachusetts, asked to be excused from the vote on the censure. Adams said the vote was unconstitutional because it was based on inference rather than a recorded statement. He maintained his silence after the House refused to excuse him, and a committee was set up to determine if punitive action should be taken.

The vote to censure Stanbery was 93-44 in favor. He was the first member of Congress censured, and lost the nomination for Congress later in 1832.

Stanbery returned to law work, and apparently retained some of his old standoffishness. "Old Bill" sometimes didn't pay his debts on times, and at one point a sheriff approached him on the steps of the courthouse in order to arrest him. Glaring at the sheriff, Stanbery told him he would step inside the courthouse and handle the case. There, he drew up a document reading, "That William Stanbery, an attorney-at-law and officer of the court of the great State of Ohio, while engaged in the practice of his profession, had been wantonly and maliciously arrested on the steps of the court house, in violation of the Constitution and in contempt of the majesty of the great State of Ohio." The embarrassed sheriff said he would let Stanbery go if he didn't fall behind again.

In 1873, Stanbery died in Newark, Ohio.

Note: I'll be visiting friends in Minnesota over the weekend, so I won't be starting on another entry until I return. Apologies for the delay.

Sources: The Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, The Political Graveyard, "In Lieu of Manners" in the New York Times on Feb. 4 2001, Sam Houston by James L. Haley, State Centennial History of Ohio by Rowland H. Rerick, Memoirs of Lucas County and the City of Toledo edited by Harvey Scribner, Sam Houston: The Life and Times of the Liberator of Texas by John Hoyt Williams, The Raven: A Biography of Sam Houston by Marquis James, Register of Debates in Congress, A Congressional Manual by Joel B. Sutherland

Evan Mecham: the faux pas factory

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Governor Evan Mecham's legacy, such as it is, seems mostly to be his ability to offend any state resident who wasn't a white, straight, conservative male. While these embarrassments started his decline, it was a financial scandal that removed him from office.

Mecham was born in Duchesne, Utah in 1924, and attended the Utah State Agricultural College. He left school before graduation to join the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II, and became a fighter pilot. He survived being shot down on one occasion and was held prisoner for 22 days; he was later awarded a Purple Heart and Air Medal for his service.

In 1947, Mecham returned to school, this time at Arizona State University. Once again, he left early, this time to open up a car dealership in Ajo. It was successful enough that he moved to Glendale later on to open another one, and the business made him a millionaire. Less successful were several short-lived newspapers Mecham launched.

In 1952, Mecham took his first stab at politics with a run for the state house of representatives. In 1960, he was elected as a Republican to the state senate and served one term. In 1962, Mecham won the Republican primary for U.S. Senate on a platform critical of the United Nations and a recent Supreme Court decision limiting prayer in public schools. However, he failed to gain enough support from the party to succeed in the general election. Mecham also made four unsuccessful bids for governor in 1964, 1974, 1978, and 1982.

It took a third party to help Mecham win the gubernatorial race in 1986. In that year, independent candidate Bill Schulz split the Democratic vote and brought Mecham into office despite the lack of a clear majority. Mecham ran on a platform of tax relief and political reform, and urged such measures as lowering taxes, encouraging economic development, establishing a 50-year plan to address the state's water needs, investing in solar power, decreasing state spending, and phasing out state offices that were not needed. While in office, he established an Arizona trade and tourism office in Taiwan, supported legislation allowing the governor to choose pro-tem judges to handle drug cases, and advocated raising the highway speed limit from 55 to 65 miles per hour.

Mecham's most well-known and infamous decision was announced at his first State of the State address in January of 1987: he declared Martin Luther King, Jr. Day canceled as a state holiday. In 1983, President Ronald Reagan had signed a bill declaring the third Monday in January a national holiday to honor the late civil rights leader. However, the decision followed three years of debate in Congress, and the holiday did not officially go into effect until 1986. Mecham said he had been advised that the state could be sued for the $3.5 million in lost productivity from the new holiday if it remained in place. He further contended that his predecessor, Democratic Governor Bruce Babbitt, had illegally created the state holiday by executive order after the state legislature had rejected the measure by one vote.

The result was a boycott of Arizona by civil rights and other groups, with 45 conventions choosing to cancel arrangements they had made in the state. These groups included the National Newspaper Publishers Association, which represented 134 black-owned newspapers and canceled a convention in Arizona; the Democratic Party, which moved a finance council meeting from Tucson to California; and the National Black Nurses Association, which also moved its convention out of Arizona. Looking back on the debacle, Time reported that Mecham's attempt to save $3.5 million had resulted in $25 million in lost business due to the boycotts.

Mecham was also criticized for nominating people with problematic backgrounds for state positions. There was a liquor commissioner suspected of involvement in a murder in Mexico, a special assistant who left upon being charged with extortion, a tax commissioner who had not filed his own state taxes, and a state investigator twice court-martialed while a Marine. Receiving the most attention was an education commissioner who said teachers should not contradict the beliefs of a student, even if the student believed the world was flat.

As Mecham's term progressed and more troubles befell him, newspaper articles noted the increasing number of groups he offended with off-color remarks or other actions. The list included blacks, women, gays, liberals, Jews, Japanese-Americans, and Catholics. He suggested that Jews should face up to the fact that they were living in a Christian nation; that working women led to increased divorce rates; and that the eyes of visiting Japanese businessmen "went round" when they heard of the country's golf courses. He defended himself against charges of racism, stemming from his decision over Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and his support of a textbook that made a reference to black children as "pickaninnies." Time referred to him as a "veritable faux pas factory." A joke book began circulating with such quips as, "What do Mecham's political appointees have in common? Parole officers." Across Arizona, motorists sported bumper stickers reading, "Pickaninny: what we did for Governor."

With the questionable appointments and offensive statements as its basis, a recall effort began within the first year of Mecham's term. Political leaders, including former Republican Senator Barry Goldwater, Democratic Congressman Morris Udal, and ex-Governor Babbitt joined in the cry for his resignation. Mecham dismissed the recall effort, saying it was doomed to fail because the person who started it, Republican businessman Ed Buck, was gay. He also said he enjoyed the support of former Republican Governors Jack Williams and Paul Fannin, then a U.S. senator.

Nevertheless, the recall signatures swelled to 350,000 by November of 1987: 6,000 more than the number of votes Mecham received in the general election and 130,000 over the minimum limit needed to certify the petition and establish a recall election in May of 1988. Adding insult to injury was the "Evan Mecham Eco-Terrorist International Conspiracy," a group named for the governor that made its debut act in late 1987 by sabotaging ski lifts at a resort in Flagstaff. Despite his rising unpopularity, Mecham declared, "These people don't have a prayer of getting me out of this office because the people are with me."

The recall had been well underway, but it was spurred on in October of 1987 when it was revealed that Mecham had not reported a $350,000 loan to his campaign by developer and lawyer Barry Wolfson. State law required elected officials to report any debt of $1,000 or more, together with the identity of the lender. The money had been loaned in 14 promissory notes, and it was questioned whether Wolfson's support had influenced two appointments to the State Housing Finance Review Board. The board's duties included awarding bids of industrial development bonds for low-income housing, and at the time Wolfson was being sued for fraud and racketeering in the alleged misuse of $368 million in such bonds. In January of 1988, Mecham was criminally indicted on six counts of perjury, fraud, and filing a false campaign report.

Both the house of representatives and senate in the state legislature were dominated by Republicans, but the legislators had had enough. In February of 1988, the house of representatives voted 46-14 to impeach Mecham on the basis of the $350,000 loan. The house also charged him with inhibiting an investigation into a death threat against a former lobbyist who testified before the grand jury about the loan, as well as an illegal loan of $80,000 of state money to buoy up his car dealership. Mecham was removed from office, Democratic Secretary of State Rose Mofford was named acting governor of Arizona, and the recall election (now a moot point) was called off.

In April, the state senate voted 21 to 9 to convict Mecham on charges related to obstruction of justice and the illegal loan. It dismissed the charge related to the $350,000 so as not to inhibit the upcoming criminal trial on that issue. Mecham was officially removed from office, the first governor to be impeached in 59 years, on the anniversary of Dr. King's assassination. However, a senate vote to prevent him from running for political office again failed to achieve the two-thirds majority necessary to pass. The senate also approved payment of about $202,000 to compensate Mecham for the legal fees he incurred while governor.

Mecham had claimed that the failure to report the $350,000 loan had been an innocent mistake on the part of his brother and campaign manager, Willard Mecham. The prosecution argued that Mecham had been willingly trying to conceal the funds, but a jury acquitted him of all criminal charges. The loan itself had been repaid in full by the end of 1987.

Though Mecham's decision to cancel the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday is seen as one of his biggest blunders, the issue over the holiday was not quite over. Three months after impeaching Mecham, the senate rejected a bill to establish the day as a state holiday by two votes, with some legislators complaining that Democratic efforts to create the holiday were heavy-handed. The holiday was finally ratified in Arizona in September of 1989 when Mofford signed it into law; at that point, Arizona was the 47th state to recognize the holiday.

Mecham tried unsuccessfully to run for governor once more in 1990, and also failed to take the Republican nomination for the Senate from the incumbent, John McCain, in 1992. Three years later, he became the chairman of the Constitutionalist Networking Center, an organization advocating the election of people who were strict constructionists in regards to the U.S. Constitution. He spent much of his time saying that he had been the victim of conspiracy, working for a time as a radio talk show host and newspaper columnist. In 1999, he published a book entitled Impeachment: The Arizona Conspiracy, where he said his impeachment was "pure and simple raw political power exercised by those who wanted to remain in control."

Besides the joke books and bumper stickers, Mecham's brief term also sparked an amendment to the Arizona constitution that required a runoff election in the event that no majority winner emerges, as was the case in Mecham's gubernatorial contest. In 2008, Mecham died in Phoenix after suffering for several years from Alzheimer's disease.

Sources: The American Presidency Project, National Governor's Association, "ML King: Slain Civil Rights Activist Is Finally Honored With National Holiday" in the Daily Collegian on Jan. 17 1986, "The GOP's Silver Lining" in Time on Nov. 17 1986, "Headliners: A Holiday Dispute" in the New York Times on Dec. 28 1986, "Newspaper Group Calls Off Meeting in Arizona as Protest" in the New York Times on Jan. 22 1987, "Black Nurses Shun Arizona" in the New York Times on Mar. 7 1987, "Mecham Campaign Loan Subject of Inquiry" in the New York Times on Oct. 22 1987, "Recall Backers Have The Signatures, But Mecham Just Scoffs" in the Deseret News on Oct. 25 1987, "Mecham Not 'Knowingly Guilty'" in the Deseret News on Oct. 26 1987, "Evan Mecham, Please Go Home" in Time on Nov. 9 1987, "Mecham Repays Controversial Loan" in the Washington Post on Dec. 13 1987, "House Impeaches Arizona Governor" in the New York Times on Feb. 6 1988, "Arizona Senate Ousts Governor, Voting Him Guilty of Misconduct" in the New York Times on Apr. 5 1988, "Senators in Arizona Vote to Pay Fees For Ousted Governor" in the New York Times on Apr. 7 1988, "Mecham Cleared of Concealing Loan" in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Jun. 17 1988, "Arizona 47th State to Honor Dr. King With Holiday" in the Los Angeles Times on Sep. 23 1989, "Evan Mecham, Ousted Governor, Dies at 83" in the New York Times on Feb. 23 2008, "King Holiday Loses Again in Arizona" in the St. Petersburg Times on Jul. 2 1988, "Evan Mecham, Ousted Governor, Dies at 83" in the New York Times on Feb. 23 2008, "Evan Mecham, 83; Was Removed as Arizona Governor" in the Washington Post on Feb. 23 2008, Encyclopedia of Terrorism by Harvey W. Kushner, Biographical Dictionary of American Newspaper Columnists by Sam G. Riley

Gerry E. Studds: on the wrong page

Image from usatoday.com

Successfully overcoming a sex scandal in 1983, Gerry Eastman Studds had the misfortune to see his old misconduct recalled by a similar scandal that affected Congress 23 years later.

Born in Mineola, New York in 1937, Studds earned two degrees from Yale University. He briefly taught at St. Paul's School in Concord, New Hampshire, and also worked as a foreign service officer with the Department of State. Studds began his transition to government work in the 1960s, serving as a member of President John F. Kennedy's staff from 1962 to 1963 and a legislative assistant to New Jersey Senator Harrison A. Williams, Jr. in 1964. Studds was also a New Hampshire state coordinator of Minnesota Senator Eugene McCarthy's bid for President in 1968.

In 1970, Studds ran as a Democrat for a seat in Congress to represent a Cape Cod, Massachusetts area district. Though he narrowly lost the race in that year, he was elected in 1972, the first Democratic congressman to be sent to Washington from the predominantly conservative district in 50 years. Studds solidified his popularity with constituents by sponsoring several laws to protect the seashore and create national parks along the Massachusetts coast. An advocate of the fishing industry, he successfully lobbied to prevent foreign fishing boats from operating within 200 feet of the U.S. shore. He also proved a staunch opponent to President Ronald Reagan, opposing support for Contra rebels in Nicaragua and the Strategic Defense Initiative, which he dubbed the "Edsel of the 1980s." He contested claims that El Salvador was improving human rights and led 93 congressmen in cosponsoring a bill to ban military aid to the country.

The turn in Studds' political fortunes came about almost accidentally in 1983. A House ethics committee conducted a one-year, $1 million investigation into sexual relationships between congressmen and pages in the Capitol after two former pages brought up accusations of wrongdoing. The committee found no evidence to substantiate those pages' claims. However, the probe did net three people in unrelated incidents. One was Daniel Crane, a Republican congressman from Illinois, charged with having a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old female page in 1980. Another was James Howarth, former majority chief page, who was charged with having a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old female page and purchasing cocaine in a Capitol cloakroom. The third was Studds.

Studds was also charged with having a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old, a male page he met in 1973. The page said that he had gone to Studds' apartment with other congressmen and ended up staying up until nearly 4 a.m., drinking and discussing different topics. When the page noted that Studds was too drunk to drive him home, Studds suggested that he stay overnight. The page said they then engaged in sexual activity, and that the two had other trysts and went on a two-week trip to Portugal together.

Studds and Crane both admitted to the charges when they were revealed in July of 1983. "It is not a simple task for any of us to meet adequately the obligations of either public or private life," said Studds. "But these challenges are made substantially more complex when one is, as am I, both an elected public official and gay." He was the first member of Congress to publicly admit that he was a homosexual, and declared the relationship with the page "a serious error in judgment." He also admitted to making advances on two other male pages in 1973.

The ethics committee determined that while the sexual relationships between the congressmen and the pages were a "serious breach of duty," they were legal and consensual. It recommended that Studds and Crane be reprimanded, the lowest form of punishment. However, conservative members of the House urged a stronger punishment in the form of a censure. Newt Gingrich, a Republican congressman from Georgia, threatened to pursue the expulsion of Studds and Crane if the ethics committee didn't reconsider its recommendation. In July of 1983, both Studds and Crane were censured, with a 420-3 vote in Studds' case. As a result, Studds lost his chairmanship of his subcommittee on the Coast Guard.

Studds refused to resign or apologize after the scandal, saying the investigation had been an invasion of his privacy. He was met with support in his district, but also some challenges. In August, opponents presented two petitions with over 800 signatures seeking his resignation. During the Democratic primary for the 1984 elections, challenger Peter Flynn - the sheriff of Plymouth County - described Studds' affair as "child molestation."

Nevertheless, Studds went on to win the primary, as well as the general election against moderate Republican challenger Lewis Crampton. He was the sole survivor of the page scandal. Crane was defeated in his re-election attempt, and Howarth resigned from his position in November of 1983.

Following his outing, Studds became noticeably more supportive of measures for homosexual rights. He pushed for AIDS research, and also supported letting homosexuals serve in the military. In 1989, he released a Pentagon report saying that a person's sexuality was "unrelated to job performance in the same way as is being left or right handed." He regained a chairmanship on the Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries between 1993 and 1995. In one hearing, he challenged the Coast Guard policy of excluding homosexuals, as the service was under the Department of Transportation but had implemented the policy to keep consistent with the military branches. Studds said it was strange that he could supervise the Coast Guard but not sail with them.

Studds opted not to run for re-election in 1996, the same year a marine sanctuary off Cape Cod was named for him. Following his retirement from Congress, he worked as a lobbyist for fishing and environmental causes. In 2004, he took advantage of Massachusetts' legalization of same-sex marriage and wedded his longtime partner, Dean T. Hara.

In 2006, a scandal similar to the 1983 one hit Congress when it was revealed that a Republican congressman, Mark Foley of Florida, had written sexually explicit e-mails and instant messages to male pages. The incident brought back memories of Studds' censure, as well as charges from conservatives that Democrats had glossed over Studds' misconduct and criticism that Studds had not resigned as Foley did in September of 2006. Studds did not have much time to respond to the renewed interest in his misconduct; just weeks after Foley's resignation, he died in Boston of a vascular illness.

Sources: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, "Republican Gains Offset by Gubernatorial Losses" in the Harvard Crimson on Nov. 5 1970, "Financing El Salvador's Reign of Terror" in the Harvard Crimson on Mar. 5 1981, "Overcoming the Doubts" in Time on Aug. 9 1982, "The U.S. Stays the Course" in Time on Feb. 28 1983, "2 Congressmen Admit to Affairs with Pages" in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Jul. 15 1983, "Stronger Punishment Sought in Sex Scandal" in the Deseret News on Jul. 19 1983, "Housecleaning" in Time on Jul. 25 1983, "Hard Choices on the Hill" in Time on Aug. 1 1983, "Studds' Resignation Sought" in the Evening Independent on Aug. 16 1983, "Studds 'Overwhelmed' by Support" in the St. Petersburg Times on Aug. 20 1983, "House Employee Quits in Sex Case" in the New York Times on Nov. 16 1983, "Foe of Studds Says Issue is 'Child Molestation'" in the New York Times on Jun. 27 1984, "The House: A Silver Lining For the Democrats--Sort Of" in Time on Nov. 19 1984, "Gerry Studds Dies at 69" in the New York Times on Oct. 15 2006, "First Openly Gay Person Elected to Congress Dies" in USA Today on Oct. 15 2006, Conduct Unbecoming: Gays and Lesbians in the U.S. Military by Randy Shilts

John H. Mitchell: scandal smorgasbord

Image from bioguide.congress.gov

In the years following the Civil War, the United States began to fully capitalize on its resources and entered into a period of wealthy industrialists and excess. Humorist Mark Twain referred to the time, marked in large part by corrupt government officials, as "The Gilded Age." John Hipple Mitchell, a United States Senator throughout this period, is a good example of this age; it seems there was hardly any point during his career that wasn't touched by political turmoil and scandal.

Mitchell was born John Mitchell Hipple in Washington County, Pennsylvania in 1835. After graduating from the Witherspoon Institute, he worked as a teacher before being admitted to the bar in 1857. Two years later, he departed for California, staying only briefly in that state before moving up the coast to Portland, Oregon. Once there, Mitchell started practicing law again, albeit under the name John Hipple Mitchell.

Mitchell's rapid change of fortunes continued. After only two years in Oregon, he was elected to the state senate as a Republican in 1862. He served until 1866, and was named the senate president in 1864. The state legislature was charged with making appointments to the U.S. Senate in those days, and Mitchell missed the 1866 nomination by one vote. When the nomination came around again in 1872, Mitchell was successful in getting it.

The first accusations of political corruption against Mitchell involved his association with Ben Holladay, a transportation magnate whose interests had evolved along with the industry to include stagecoaches, steamships, and railroads. Mitchell was a legal advisor to Holladay, and supposedly turned down a $15,000 offer from the man during the 1872 Senate race to allow Holladay to capture the spot. Despite this action, Mitchell's opponents charged that Holladay had paid off members of the legislature, and that Mitchell was so much in the pocket of Holladay that he had declared, "Whatever is Ben Holladay's politics is my politics, and whatever Ben Holladay wants I want."

Mitchell was further dogged by opponents when he went to the capital. One issue was the transposition of his middle and last names, which some trumped up to "living under a false name." The more serious charges involved his past. Mitchell was accused of abandoning his wife and two children in Pennsylvania when he went West with a mistress, abandoning her in California and taking another wife in Oregon before divorcing his first one. His trip across the country, opponents charged, had also been sweetened by $4,000 stolen from his former law office.

The Oregon Historical Project states that Mitchell repaid the $4,000. However, Mitchell firmly denied the theft allegations when they surfaced, even producing dispatches from his former law partners as proof. "No man in Pennsylvania ever lost a cent by you," former partner John M. Thompson said. On the charges of bigamy and desertion, Mitchell was vaguer. He admitted to "domestic troubles of painful character, resulting in separation and divorce," but denied any wrongdoing. He referred to his decision to change his name as a way of trying to leave his past behind, "an indiscreet, ill-advised, and injudicious act; a great blunder, a foolish mistake." He was satisfied enough with his new moniker to legally change his name in 1874, however.

A Senate committee decided not to investigate the charges against Mitchell. Ironically enough, Mitchell was at the forefront of a debate on whether or not to seat the other Senator from Oregon in 1876. In that matter, he advocated that Lafayette Grover not be seated based on charges that bribery and fraud had brought Grover to office, as well as the basis of Grover's actions in the controversial Presidential election between Republican candidate Rutherford B. Hayes and Democratic candidate Samuel Tilden. Grover, who had been Governor of Oregon before resigning to take the Senate appointment, had tried unsuccessfully to disqualify a Republican elector due to his employment as a postmaster and replace him with a Democratic substitute. Grover was able to overcome the opposition and serve one term in the Senate.

Mitchell served until 1879, unsuccessfully ran for re-appointment in 1882, and was again sent to the Senate in 1885. Holladay still had two more years to live, and may yet have had some influence over the legislature's decision. Specifically, Mitchell was charged with giving payoffs financed by the Southern Pacific Railroad Company to 17 Democratic legislators to gain their votes. The New York Times printed a brief, bitter response to the affair from the Portland Oregonian in 1887: "'No United States Senator could keep his seat a single day if it was found that he had used money to secure one vote.' Thus says a Washington dispatch. It sounds well, but it won't go down in Oregon so long as John H. Mitchell is a Senator." Mitchell was re-appointed in 1891, but dissatisfaction with him and the legislature's politics prompted the formation of a populist People's Party the next year.

Despite the accusations of complicity with a transportation baron, Mitchell nevertheless served on numerous committees while in the Senate, including several related specifically to the nation's infrastructure. These included the Committees on Railroads, Transportation Routes to the Seaboard, Claims, Privileges and Elections, Coast Defenses, and Interoceanic Canals. He secured federal funding for the construction of lighthouses and the Cascade Locks in Oregon, as well as navigational improvements on the state's rivers. In what may have been a prelude to the final scandal that befell him, Mitchell also advocated the withdrawal of federal treaties for the Coastal Indian Reservation to open the land up for settlement.

Going against his own party, Mitchell was also a proponent of the free silver movement, which supported inflation and a withdrawal from the gold standard in favor of a less rigid monetary system. In a bizarre political move in his home state, a coalition of legislators opposed to the free silver movement refused to organize the state house in 1897. With no session to confirm him, Mitchell once again had to leave the capital.

The furor over the free silver movement had died down by 1901, when the legislature appointed Mitchell to a fourth term in the Senate. Three years later, investigators had discovered widespread land fraud in Oregon. Over the prior few years, such ignominious methods as false or forged affidavits and nonexistent persons had been used to lay claim to government-owned public lands, namely for timber uses. In December of 1904, a defendant by the name of S.A.D. Porter testified that he had paid Mitchell $2,000 to use his influence as a Senator to push the fraudulent claims through the United States General Land Office.

In January of 1905, Mitchell was indicted on charges of helping out Porter and others in the land fraud. Other government officials were also indicted, including a deputy sheriff of Multnomah County and Binger Hermann, who had been the Commissioner of the General Land Office when the fraud took place and had since become a Congressman. Other indictments came down against Mitchell, charging him with trying to fraudulently secure government lands, receiving $500 from Fred A. Kribs in 1902 and on six other dates to expedite timber claims on behalf of Kribs, complicity in an attempt to create a forest district in the Blue Mountains for the benefit of private individuals, and conspiracy in attempts to discredit the prosecutor, U.S. District Attorney Francis J. Heney. The New York Times reported that the state senate endorsed Mitchell for Senator in February 1905, despite the indictments (and despite the fact that Mitchell's term should have gone on until 1907).

Some of the most damning evidence against Mitchell came from his Oregon law partner, Judge Albert H. Tanner. A document provided to the grand jury showed that Mitchell had taken his return to government into account in 1901, and that the two men had altered their agreement to split the income to the firm and instead have it be paid solely to Tanner. However, investigators noticed that the document was a not-so-elaborate fake: it was printed on paper that had not been in production at the date of the purported document, had a different color of ink from that normally on the firm's correspondence in 1901, and had misspelled two words. With his son facing a possible perjury indictment for drawing up the document, Tanner crumbled and confessed that the document had been created when the accusations against Mitchell came out.

Mitchell was also not helped by a letter he wrote to Tanner in February, prior to one of his appearances before the grand jury. The letter strongly suggested to Tanner what the "facts" of the case were, including that Mitchell had no knowledge of the land fraud and did not benefit by any services. He conspicuously ended the letter with the instruction, "Burn this without fail."

Of the slew of accusations against Mitchell, it seems that only the ones related to Kribs' claims went forward. In July, Mitchell was found guilty of those charges; later in the month, he was sentenced to serve six months in prison and pay a $1,000 fine. Mitchell appealed the conviction. With a decision still pending in December, he died of complications following the extraction of four teeth. John M. Gearin, a Democrat, was appointed to replace him.

Sources: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, The Oregon History Project, The Bethel Historical Society, "Oregon; The United States Senatorship" in the New York Times on Oct. 14 1872, "Oregon; The Weather and the Crops; A New United States Senator" in the New York Times on Jan. 3 1873, "Senator Mitchell; The Charges Against Him" in the New York Times on Jun. 14 1873, "Forty-Fifth Congress; Summary of the Day's Proceedings" in the New York Times on March 8 1877, "Not Believed in Oregon" in the New York Times on Jul. 12 1887, "Senator Mitchell Indicted for Fraud" in the New York Times on Jan. 1 1905, "Oregon Stands By Mitchell" in the New York Times on Feb. 8 1905, "Burn This Letter, Said Mr. Mitchell" in the New York Times on Feb. 13 1905, "Mitchell Indicted Again" in the New York Times on Feb. 14 1905, "Mitchell Guilty" in the New York Times on Jul. 4 1905, "Senator Mitchell Dead, With Appeal Pending" in the New York Times on Dec. 9 1905, "New Senator From Oregon" in the New York Times on Dec. 14 1905, The Green Bag: A Monthly Illustrated Magazine Covering the Higher and Lighter Literature of the Law, Volume XVII edited by Sidney R. Wrightington, Land of Giants: The Drive to the Pacific Northwest, 1750-1950 by David Lavender, Looters of the Public Domain by Stephen A. Douglas Puter and Horace Stevens, The Centennial History of Oregon, 1811-1912 by Joseph Gaston and George H. Himes, The Oxford Companion to United States History edited by Paul S. Boyer

William W. Belknap: shell game

Image from politico.com

William Worth Belknap's argument was simple, if not a model defense: you can't impeach someone who is no longer in office.

Born in Newburgh, New York in 1829, Belknap graduated from Princeton University in 1848, studied law at Georgetown University, and was admitted to the bar in 1851. He moved to Iowa, briefly entering government work in 1857 when he was elected as a Democrat to one term in the state legislature.

When the Civil War broke out in 1861, Belknap joined the Union Army and became a major in the 15th Iowa Infantry. He fought at Shiloh, Corinth, and Vicksburg before taking part in the campaign from Chattanooga to Atlanta. In 1864, he was promoted to brigadier general and given command of the 4th division of the XVII Corps. Belknap joined General William Sherman's march through Georgia and the Carolinas. When he was mustered out in 1865, Belknap was a major general; he had also switched parties to join the Republicans.

After the war, Belknap returned to Iowa and served as a collector of internal revenue from 1865 to 1869. In that year, President Ulysses S. Grant appointed him to be Secretary of War after the death of John A. Rawlins. In a time of relative peace for the country, Belknap's activities in this position included starting preparation of historical reports by post commanders, advocating preservation for Yellowstone Park, launching a secretarial portrait gallery, and recommending that Congress fix May 1 as the start of the fiscal year. He was evidently not supportive of the Freedmen's Bureau.

Belknap's annual salary was $8,000, though he was known for living in a certain amount of luxury and throwing extravagant parties. The New York Times later reported that many acts of government corruption were considered unsubstantiated or invented, and investigations of wrongdoing were conducted "in an aimless, drifting manner." However, Belknap soon found himself fully exposed after the damning testimony in late February of 1876 by one Caleb P. Marsh of New York.

Marsh testified before the House Committee on Expenditures in the Department of War that Belknap's second wife, Carrie, encouraged him to apply for a post trader position at Fort Sill in Indian Territory. She asked for $6,000 a year to help convince her husband to appoint Marsh, though she also warned that Belknap had threatened to throw a man who offered $10,000 for a post trader appointment down the stairs. Such a position could be quite lucrative, with the New York Tribune reporting that a $15,000 investment could yield a $40,000 annual income. Not surprisingly, the current trader, John S. Evans, wasn't inclined to part with it.

Though Belknap was later charged with appointing Marsh to the position, Marsh never took the job. Instead, apparently with Belknap's consent, Evans and Marsh entered into a contract which would allow Evans to keep his job; he agreed to pay Marsh $12,000 each year, half of which he was to pay to Carrie. The amount was subject to a proportional decrease if the number of troops at the fort fell below 100. The first payment rolled out in the fall of 1870.

Carrie died of tuberculosis in 1870. Marsh kept sending the payments to Carrie's sister, Amanda, ostensibly to help support Carrie's infant child. Belknap, if he didn't know about the arrangement from the start, received some of the payments while Amanda was traveling. The child died in 1871; Belknap later married Amanda, and the payments kept coming. According to the articles of impeachment later handed down in Congress, Belknap received $24,450 between 1870 and 1876.

Following Marsh's testimony, things moved with surprising speed. On March 1, 1876, Belknap apeared before the committee. They offered to hear him the next afternoon, but he didn't show up. Instead, on the morning of March 2, Belknap handed in his resignation to Grant. The President accepted, appointing the Secretary of the Navy to replace him. Within a week, he had appointed attorney Alphonso Taft to the post.

The House of Representatives immediately took up the question of whether it had the authority to impeach Belknap, since impeachment cannot impose fines or imprisonment but only remove someone from office or disqualify them from holding office. Hiester Clymer, Democrat of Pennsylvania and chairman of the Committee on Expenditures in the War Department, described Belknap as "the proper outgrowth, the true exponent, of the corruption, the extravagance, the misgovernment that have cursed this land for years past." The House unanimously voted to have the Senate go ahead with the impeachment process.

As the impeachment process moved along, Marsh fled to Canada. Congressman Lucius Q.C. Lamar, a Democrat of Mississippi, said that Marsh's flight took with him any chance of a criminal indictment of Belknap. "Now, gentlemen, we have all the proceedings which have been been taken in this House and all the testimony which has been brought before it against William W. Belknap," said Lamar. "But with Marsh absent it is useless, and there is no way of criminally proceeding against William W. Belknap." A grand jury still managed to find enough to indict Belknap on bribery charges in May. The Times had reported prior to the indictment that he faced up to three years in prison and a fine three times the amount taken if convicted.

The Senate took up five articles of impeachment against Belknap, which included one colorful charge that he had been "basely prostituting his high office to his lust for private gain." When he was tried before the senators, he repeated the argument that the impeachment did not apply to him, since he was no longer a United States officer but simply a citizen of Iowa. The official Senate reply stated that his argument did not hold water, since the malfeasance occurred during his time as Secretary of War.

After over 40 witnesses came before the Senate, 35 senators voted that Belknap was guilty; 25 voted that he was not guilty, although 23 of them said that it was only because they felt that Congress did not have jurisdiction in the matter. The Times dubbed the whole impeachment affair "a rather stupid and uninteresting farce," and said that it set a precedent in allowing any civil officer to "escape the penalty fixed by the Constitution by hastening to resign as soon as his deeds are disclosed." The newspaper noted how the criminal indictment still stood, but guessed that it would not hold up in light of the "rather common robbers" involved in a $47,000 theft from the Treasury managing to avoid prosecution. The writers were prophetic in this matter, as the charges against Belknap were dismissed in February of 1877 for lack of evidence.

Belknap returned to practicing law, moving first to Philadelphia and then back to Washington. He died in 1890 of an apparent heart condition.

Sources: The Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, The Senate Historical Office, Secretaries of War and Secretaries of the Army by William Gardner Bell, "The New Secretary of War" in the New York Times on Oct. 14 1869, "Gen. Belknap's Career" in the New York Times on Mar. 3 1876, "The Case in the House" in the New York Times on Mar. 3 1876, "The Testimony" in the New York Times on Mar. 3 1876, "The Event at the Capital" in the New York Times on Mar. 3 1876, "The Belknap Impeachment" in the New York Times on Mar. 31 1876, "Belknap Indicted" in the New York Times on May 4 1876, "Acquittal of Belknap" in the New York Times on Aug. 2 1876, "The Suit Against Gen. Belknap" in the New York Times on Feb. 9 1877, "Belknap's Sudden Death" in the New York Times on Oct. 14 1890, Grant: A Biography by William S. McFeely, Lucius Q.C. Lamar: His Life, Times, and Speeches 1825-1893 by Edward Mayes, Appleton's Annual Cyclopaedia and Register of Important Events of the Year 1876

Charles J. Faulkner: the French connection

Image from bioguide.congress.gov

Suspected of assisting rebellion from abroad and later an aide to a well-known Confederate general, Charles James Faulkner was nevertheless able to make his way back to government work.

Born in Martinsburg, Virginia in 1806, Faulkner graduated from Georgetown University in 1822 before studying law and being admitted to the bar in 1829. Three years later, he was elected to the Virginia house of delegates, where he served until 1834. While there, he proposed the gradual elimination of slavery by a measure that would declare all children born to slave parents after July 1, 1840 to be free. The proposal was voted down, and Faulkner fell more into the pro-slavery camp due to his opposition to Abolitionists in the North. Faulkner was also a member of the state senate from 1841 until his resignation the next year, and returned to the house of delegates from 1848 to 1849. He was credited with introducing a bill that passed the house and formed the basis for the federal Fugitive Slave Law of 1850.

In 1850, Faulkner was elected to Congress as a Whig. He joined the Democrats and was elected to another three terms, chairing the Committee on Military Affairs in his last term.

One of Faulkner's biggest court cases, if perhaps one of his shortest-lived as well, was the representation of John Brown after the abolitionist's raid on Harper's Ferry in 1859. Faulkner and fellow attorney Lawson Botts were assigned to defend Brown, two of six lawyers who would take up the case before Brown's conviction. Faulkner immediately asked to be dismissed from the matter, saying he had been at the scene and heard the confessions of the raiders, that Brown did not approve of his appointment, and that he doubted the authority of the court to assign him. He still served in the role for one day before taking his leave.

Also in 1859, Faulkner was appointed Minister of France by President James Buchanan. Buchanan had offered Faulkner the post after his election in 1856, but Faulkner declined out of deference to his friend John Y. Mason, who was already serving in the position. He accepted Buchanan's second offer, as it came upon Mason's death. While he was Minister, Faulkner was able to secure the right of expatriation for American citizens visiting the country.

When the Civil War broke out in April of 1861, Faulkner found himself in a foreign country with his home state joining the Confederacy. Given his potential sympathy to the new government (a feeling shared by the French government), President Abraham Lincoln recalled Faulkner to replace him with William L. Dayton of New Jersey. Faulkner returned to the Washington, D.C. in August, intending to formally end his association with the government. There, he was arrested by order of the War Department.

Faulkner was suspected of successfully negotiating arms sales to the Confederacy while in Paris, a charge the New York Times reported was substantiated by "conclusive evidence" that had arrived on another transatlantic steamer. He was also accused of planning to return to Virginia to take command of a contingent of rebels who had elected him colonel. Faulkner appealed to the War Department, but was rebuffed and told he was being held as a hostage to be exchanged for Pennsylvania state treasurer James McGraw, who had been captured after the First Battle of Bull Run while searching for a friend's body.

Imprisoned at Fort Lafayette in New York Harbor, Faulkner was not released when McGraw was returned, but rather transferred to the custody of the Secretary of State. Now a political prisoner, he also changed prisons and was taken to Fort Warren in Boston Harbor. He refused to take an oath of allegiance to the Union, which would have led to his release. In a rather strange deal with Secretary of State William H. Seward, Faulkner agreed to a 30-day release in December to travel to the Confederate capital in Richmond, Virginia to negotiate his own exchange for Republican Congressman Alfred Ely of New York. Like McGraw, Ely had been captured while observing the First Battle of Bull Run. Faulkner was able to secure Ely's release and remained in Richmond, where he was cheered by a crowd of thousands. Ely later credited him with advocating the improvement of Confederate prison conditions based on Faulkner's own treatment in a Union lockup.

Following his release, Faulkner joined the Confederate army and served as assistant adjutant general on the staff of General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson. In a letter to a Jackson biographer in 1876, he says, "He was always equal to the position in which he was placed, whether it was in command of a regiment, a brigade, a division, or an army; and he could have with as much ease have handled 100,000 men upon the battlefield as he did 10,000." Accounts are mixed as to whether Faulkner stayed in the army after Jackson's death in 1863 or if he went to reside at his son-in-law's house at Appomattox. The matter is no doubt complicated by the fact that Faulkner's son, also a Charles J. Faulkner, served as an aide to two Confederate generals, including one who surrendered at Appomattox. Following the war, Faulkner made a visit to Washington, D.C. and said that he had been misrepresented by some newspapers, that he favored a union between the North and South and had joined Jackson's staff as a personal consideration for the Confederate officers instead of a political reason.

For a short period after the war, little information is available on Faulkner. The ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibited any person who had previously taken an oath of support for the Constitution as a member of the federal or state government from holding any government office if they had supported the Confederacy in the Civil War. Faulkner certainly qualified for this restriction.

However, he soon returned to public life. In 1870, he was elected president of the Martinsburg and Potomac Railroad. In 1871, he was elected president of the Berkeley County Agricultural Society and also successfully defended the claims of the newly formed state West Virginia to Berkeley and Jefferson counties before the U.S. Supreme Court. He was a member of the West Virginia constitutional convention in 1872, the same year Congress voted to remove his Fourteenth Amendment disabilities. Faulkner was named a regent to West Virginia University, and the next year successfully ran for Congress.

After one term, Faulkner opted not to run for re-election and returned to law work. He wasn't quite done with government; in 1876 he ran for the U.S. Senate and in 1880 he tried for the nomination for Governor of West Virginia, but was unsuccessful in both attempts. He died at his estate, "Boydville," in Martinsburg in 1884.

Sources: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, "The Great Rebellion: Important News From The National Capital" in the New York Times on Aug. 13 1861, "Miscellaneous War News" in the Philadelphia Press on Dec. 20 1861, "From Washington" in the New York Times on Jul. 26 1865, "The Rebel View of the War; It Is Again Presented By Hon. Charles J. Faulkner, of West Virginia" in the New York Times on Dec. 31 1876, "Obituary - Charles J. Faulkner" in the New York Times on Nov. 2 1884, The Trial in American Life by Robert A. Ferguson, The Public Life of Captain John Brown With An Autobiography of His Childhood and Youth by James Redpath, Journal of Alfred Ely, a Prisoner of War in Richmond by Alfred Ely, The Political Register and Congressional Directory: A Statistical Record of the Federal Officials, Legislative, Executive, and Judicial, of the United States of America, 1776-1878 compiled by Benjamin Perley Poore, The Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans edited by Rossiter Johnson, The Statutes At Large and the Proclamations of the United States of America from March 1871 to March 1873, The Life of William H. Seward by Frederic Bancroft, History of Berkeley County, West Virginia by Willis Fryatt Evans