Montgomery Blair

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Montgomery Blair

Montgomery Blair (born May 10, 1813 in Franklin County , Kentucky , †  July 27, 1883 in Silver Spring , Maryland ) was an American politician from the US state of Maryland. He was a member of Abraham Lincoln's cabinet during the Civil War .

Career

Montgomery Blair, son of Francis Preston Blair , eldest brother of Francis Preston Blair, Jr. and cousin of B. Gratz Brown , was born in Kentucky on May 10, 1813. His father was an editor for the Washington Globe and a prominent figure in the Democratic Party during the Jacksonian era. Montgomery graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1835 , but after a year of fighting in the Seminole War, he left the Army, studied law, and then began practicing in St. Louis , Missouri . He served as a federal attorney between 1839 and 1843 . He was also a judge on the Court of Common Pleas between 1834 and 1849 . Blair moved to Maryland in 1852, where he practiced as a lawyer primarily at the United States Supreme Court . He was also a United States Solicitor in the Court of Claims between 1855 and 1858, and joined George T. Curtis as counsel for the claimant in the Dred Scott v. Sandford Fall from 1857.

The Blairs, like many other nationalist Democrats but unusual for border state politicians, left the Democratic Party immediately after the Kansas-Nebraska Act and became the founding fathers of the new Republican Party . In 1860, Montgomery Blair took an active part in Abraham Lincoln's presidential campaign. After his successful election, he worked from 1861 to September 1864 in his cabinet as Postmaster General . He resigned as a result of hostility from the Radical Republican faction , who agreed with him that Blair's resignation should follow the withdrawal of John C. Frémont's name as a candidate for presidential nomination that year. Under his administration, such reforms and improvements as the establishment of free city delivery, the adoption of a money order system, and the use of rail mail cars, the last of which was recommended by George B. Armstrong († 1871) of Chicago , who served from 1869 to his Death was the General Superintendent of the United States Railway Mail Service .

Because of differences of opinion with the Republican Party over reconstruction policy , Blair gave in to his adherence to the Democratic Party after the American Civil War, along with his brother, who then ran for the post of Democratic Vice President in 1868 .

His country house in what is now Silver Spring, Maryland was called Falkland . It was then burned by Confederate forces during the war . Blair died in Silver Spring. He was married to a Mary Woodbury, daughter of Levi Woodbury . You are the great grandparents of actor Montgomery Clift .

Lincoln pictured with his cabinet at the first reading of the Emancipation Draft on July 22, 1862

Work

  • Speech on the Causes of the Rebellion (1864)

Honors

  • Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland

Publications

  • Croly , Seymour and Blair: Their Lives and Services. Richardson, New York 1868.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Blair, Montgomery
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American attorney, judge, and postmaster general
DATE OF BIRTH May 10, 1813
PLACE OF BIRTH Franklin County , Kentucky
DATE OF DEATH July 27, 1883
Place of death Silver Spring , Maryland