James A. Hughes

James A. Hughes

James Anthony Hughes (born February 27, 1861 in Ontario , Canada , † March 2, 1930 in Marion , Ohio ) was an American politician . Between 1901 and 1903 and again from 1927 to 1930 he represented the fourth constituency of the state of West Virginia in the US House of Representatives . Between 1903 and 1915 he represented the fifth constituency there.

Career

James Hughes, son of James W. Hughes and his wife Ellen McNulty, attended public schools in his home country, Canada, and immigrated to the United States as a teenager. Until 1875 he studied at Duff's Business College in Pittsburgh ( Pennsylvania ). In the following years he worked as a bank clerk, traveling merchant and businessman. Hughes became a member of the Republican Party . Between 1888 and 1890 he was an MP in the Kentucky House of Representatives . After moving to West Virginia, he was a member of the State Senate between 1894 and 1898 . Between 1892 and 1924 he was a delegate at all Republican National Conventions . From 1896 to 1900 Hughes served as a postman in Huntington .

In the congressional elections of 1900 he was elected to the US House of Representatives in Washington, DC in the fourth district of West Virginia , where he succeeded Romeo H. Freer on March 4, 1901 . Hughes initially only represented the fourth electoral district for a legislative period up to March 3, 1903. From the elections in 1902, he ran for the then newly created fifth district, which he re-elected between March 4, 1903 and March 3, 1915 represented in Congress . Between 1903 and 1907 he was chairman of the committee that controlled expenditure on public properties ( Committee on Expenditures on Public Buildings ); from 1907 to 1911 he chaired the Committee on Accounts . In 1914, Hughes decided not to run again. During this time in Congress, the 16th and 17th amendments to the constitution were discussed and passed there. This involved nationwide income tax legislation and direct election of US senators .

For the 1926 congressional elections, James Hughes returned to the political scene and ran for the seat of parliament in the fourth electoral district, which he had already occupied between 1901 and 1903. After his election victory and re-election in 1928, he was able to represent this district in Congress from March 4, 1927 until his death on March 2, 1930.

On December 28, 1885, Hughes married Ida Belle Vinson (1868-1951) in Huntington, West Virginia , who came from a well-known family of politicians. They had two daughters: Tudelle Vinson Hughes (1895–1974; later Mrs. Harold Henderson Van Sant) and Mary Eloise Hughes (1893–1940; later Mrs. Lucien Philip Smith). Eloise Hughes Smith survived the sinking of the RMS Titanic in 1912 , on which she returned from her honeymoon. Her second husband was Robert Daniel , who like them had survived the sinking of the Titanic .

Web links

• James A. Hughes in the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress (English)

• James A. Hughes in the database of Find a Grave (English)