James Rood Doolittle

James Rood Doolittle

James Rood Doolittle (* 3. January 1815 in Hampton , Washington County , New York ; † 23. July 1897 in Providence , Rhode Iceland ) was an American politician of the Republican Party . From 1857 to 1869 he sat for the state of Wisconsin in the US Senate .

Early years

Doolittle was born in Hampton, New York. In Middlebury , Vermont, he attended the Middlebury Academy . He studied law at Hobart College . He successfully completed his studies in 1834. He was admitted to the bar in 1837. He set up his own law firm in Rochester . Between 1847 and 1850 he then served as District Attorney in Wyoming County . In 1851 Doolittle moved to Racine , Wisconsin, where he served as a judge between 1853 and 1856.

Senator career

Until the Missouri Compromise was lifted , Doolittle was a member of the Democratic Party . Then around 1856 he moved to the Republicans. In 1856 Doolittle was elected as a Republican for the state of Wisconsin to the federal senate, and was reelected once in 1862.

During his tenure as Senator, Doolittle chaired the Committee on Indian Affairs . Together with his colleague Jacob Collamer from Vermont, he represented the minority for the Mason Report , which investigated the attack by John Brown on the city of Harpers Ferry .

During the Civil War , Doolittle supported the policies of US President Abraham Lincoln . Just as resolutely as he supported Lincoln, he represented Wisconsin's interests in the Capitol. During the summer recess of 1865, he visited the Indians west of the Mississippi River as chairman of a joint special committee charged with investigating the condition of the Indian tribes and their treatment by the civil and military authorities of the United States. The committee then split into several sub-committees to carry out investigations in several regions at the same time. Doolittle was involved in the investigation of Native American affairs in the state of Kansas , Indian Territory, and what is now Colorado . The committee's report, entitled The Condition of the Tribes , was presented to the Senate on January 26, 1867. Doolittle played a prominent role in the debate over the various war and reconstruction measures and the preservation of the federal government, but he was always careful that the split-off Confederate States were always part of the Union despite everything. He was strictly against the introduction of the 15th Amendment .

Late years

After Doolittle was out of the Senate, he ran for governor of Wisconsin in 1871 , but could not prevail against Cadwallader C. Washburn . Thereupon he finally withdrew from politics.

He gained a foothold again in Chicago . First as a lawyer, later as president and professor at the newly established University of Chicago .

In 1897 Doolittle died in Providence, Rhode Island. He was buried in Mount Cemetery in Racine.

Web links

• James Rood Doolittle in the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress (English)

• James Rood Doolittle in the database of Find a Grave (English)